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TRACEY GARVIS-GRAVES

Author of the USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and New York Times bestseller On the Island.

I have horrible eye-hand coordination.
I change my hair color frequently.
I love going to psychics.
I know all the dialogue from Sex and The City.
I love karaoke.
I like red roses but not on Valentine’s Day.
I am mathematically challenged but I can spell almost anything.
I am horrible at geography.
I broke my arm on the playground in 3rd grade.
I love Google but I HATE Google Apps.
I don’t enjoy gambling.
I love to cook for other people.
I can’t stand beef.
I read extremely fast.
I love stormy weather. Snow, thunder, ice, whatever. I love them all.
I believe in karma.
I am 5’9″
I prefer music over television.
I have an IRA, a BBA, and a BOB.
I’ve somehow never been arrested.
I use really big words when I talk.
I always know what they mean.
I am a morning person.
There is nothing low maintenance about me.
I! LOVE! WINE!
I talk too loud.
I have a twin sister who is nothing like me.
She is EVEN louder.
I love the F word and use it frequently.
I pee my pants when I jump, cough, or sneeze.

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ONE OF MY ALL-TIME FAVORITE BOOKS

When thirty-year-old English teacher Anna Emerson is offered a job tutoring T.J. Callahan at his family’s summer rental in the Maldives, she accepts without hesitation; a working vacation on a tropical island trumps the library any day. T.J. Callahan has no desire to leave town, not that anyone asked him. He’s almost seventeen and if having cancer wasn’t bad enough, now he has to spend his first summer in remission with his family – and a stack of overdue assignments – instead of his friends.

Anna and T.J. are en route to join T.J.’s family in the Maldives when the pilot of their seaplane suffers a fatal heart attack and crash-lands in the Indian Ocean. Adrift in shark-infested waters, their life jackets keep them afloat until they make it to the shore of an uninhabited island.

Now Anna and T.J. just want to survive and they must work together to obtain water, food, fire, and shelter. Their basic needs might be met but as the days turn to weeks, and then months, the castaways encounter plenty of other obstacles, including violent tropical storms, the many dangers lurking in the sea, and the possibility that T.J.’s cancer could return. As T.J. celebrates yet another birthday on the island, Anna begins to wonder if the biggest challenge of all might be living with a boy who is gradually becoming a man.

My spoiler-free review of ON THE ISLAND
(5++ stars!!!)

This is an absolutely beautiful, unique and unforgettable story about survival and love.

Its well-written, riveting and heartfelt. The ending and epilogue brought the happiest tears to my eyes. I honestly don’t have one single complaint to make about this book.

I absolutely adored  it.

Here are some of our readers’ questions answered by Tracey.

Paula N  ~  Did you know how TJ and Anna would end up when you started writing OTI?

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Tracey  ~   Yes and no. Because I was writing a romance novel, I knew the hero and heroine had to end up together and have a happily ever after. But I didn’t realize until the end that they would marry. I remember thinking that I had written myself into a corner because surely no one would buy this relationship. But I think they did 🙂

Clista S  ~  How long did it take you to write OTI?

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Tracey   ~   About 18 months total, from first word written to uploading to Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords. The actual drafting, revising, and editing took 12-14 months, and the rest of the time was spent preparing to self-publish. I hired a developmental editor, copyeditor, and formatter. I also chose my cover and wrote my product description.

        Allie M ~ How did you plot out your story? Some people find it best to do an outline first, sort of draw it out, while others just free write and either go start to finish or write whatever comes to mind and pieces it together later…what worked for you while writing “On the Island”?

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Tracey    ~  I had a general idea of the beginning, middle, and end. I am more of an outliner than a pantser, but one of the things I love the most about writing a book is watching the story change. I also write scenes out of order.

        Audrie C ~  Love the book!! Do you ever feel hesitant about approaching a topic that might be controversial?? How do you approach that issue??

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Tracey  ~  Yes! I was extremely nervous. But I knew that there was nothing illegal about their relationship and I wanted readers to fall in love with T.J. and Anna and more importantly, root for them to fall in love with each other. I felt the storyline was worth the risk.

JoJo P  ~  Given the chance, would you agree to spend just 1 year on a deserted island if you knew for sure you would be rescued at the end of that year?

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Tracey   ~  It depends on what supplies I could have with me. If I had most of the basics, I might do it (as long as someone was there with me).

Natalie W  ~ Where did the idea for OTI come from?

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Tracey   ~  I’m a HUGE desert island fan. I loved The Blue Lagoon and my husband and I are huge fans of the T.V. show Lost. I also loved the movie Castaway, but it bugged me that Tom Hanks was all alone on that island (I didn’t quite buy the relationship with the volleyball). I wanted to put two people together on an island (two people who really shouldn’t be together) and then see what would develop. They would obviously bond, but what would happen if they were rescued and had to return to society.

Enter the Rafflecopter link below to win a
*SIGNED* PAPERBACK OF “ON THE ISLAND”!!! 

Open internationally.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

TOMORROW’S *SIGNED* GIVEAWAY
11:00 AM EST
featuring
N I C O L E   W I L L I A M S
(author of Crash ) 
 

PRISCILLA GLENN

 Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads | Amazon

“Right back to him. Always to him.”

When Lauren Monroe first laid eyes on Michael Delaney back in high school, she had every reason to stay away from him; within minutes of their first encounter, his volatile actions confirmed his notorious reputation. But Lauren saw something in him that caused her to question his bad-boy persona, and against her better judgment, she took a chance. She had no way of knowing that the unlikely friendship they formed would become so important to her.

Or that it would end so painfully.

Eight years later, when Lauren begins her new job at Learn and Grow Day Care, Michael is the last person she expects to see. Refusing to revisit the hurt and confusion of their past, Lauren vows to keep her distance from him. But staying away from Michael proves to be more difficult than she thought, despite her lingering grief and her instincts for self-preservation.

As Lauren and Michael recall the friendship that changed them forever and the events that tore them apart, will they finally be able to heal? Or will the ghosts of Michael’s past prove to be too much to overcome?

My spoiler-free review of BACK TO YOU
(5 stars!!!)

Guys, you all HAVE to read this book!

Its a beautiful, believable second-chance friends-to-lovers story that was both heart breaking and heart warming, with an uplifting, satisfying ending that left me clutching my heart, with happy tears in my eyes and a smile on my face 🙂

I  absolutely loved it!!!!!

“I always knew I would fall in love with you,” he said softly, “But you were never supposed to love me back,”

PS. You may recognize this book from the old cover (shown below).
It is the same book, just a new cover 🙂

Here are some of our readers’ questions answered by Priscilla.

Nicole K – I can’t believe this is your first novel, it was absolutely amazing! When did you first start writing?

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Priscilla ~   Thanks Nicole! I’ve been writing since I was a kid. I remember being around ten years old and playing this game with my cousin. One of us would write a story in a composition notebook, and then when we saw each other at my grandmother’s house on the weekend, we would hand it off to the other person. Then that person would take it home, read the story, and pick up writing where the other left off. The following weekend, we would hand it off again. We did that for years. I wrote a lot in high school and college too, but it was mostly poetry and short stories. The first time I actually tried my hand at writing a novel was back in 2009. I wrote two novels before I started Back to You in 2011.

Raina – What inspired you to start writing? Which character came to you first?

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Priscilla  ~   Michael came to me first. One of my good friends growing up had this “public persona” that he put on for everyone else, but was very different when he was with me. I took that idea and just developed it a bit more. As soon as I figured out what shaped Michael – who he really was and what caused him to hide behind the facade he created for himself – writing Lauren was easy, because I already loved him.

        Amber D – This is one of my FAVORITE books because of how it grabbed me emotionally!! I need more! What is your next project?

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Priscilla  ~  Thanks so much Amber! My next project is called Emancipating Andie. It’s about a girl who thinks she has her life figured out until – due to circumstances out of her control – she ends up having to take a two-day road trip with her boyfriend’s best friend, who she happens to despise. The trip becomes a catalyst for all sorts of chaos in both their lives. It should be out some time this spring.

Heather K – Do you have a favorite quote that guides you when writing?

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Priscilla ~  I’m a big “quote” girl. I pull quotes from everything I read. In college, I used to have quotes plastered all over my dorm room walls, and now that I’m a teacher, I start each year by giving my students a list of quotes that I love so they can analyze them and apply them to their own lives. When I write though, I usually steer clear of quotes. It’s hard for me to “get in the zone” if I have other people’s words in my head, if that makes sense. 

Paula N – What do you think it is about friendship to love stories that resonate with so many people?

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Priscilla  ~   Well for one thing, they’re extremely relatable. I think at some point in almost everyone’s life (whether we admit it or not) we’ve all been in a situation where we felt something more than “friendship” for a friend. So, I think a lot of readers connect for that reason. But for me, it’s the realistic spin it puts on falling in love. With friendship-to-love stories, there is a solid foundation that exists between the characters before the line is crossed into anything more. Don’t get me wrong: there’s a time and place for insta-love, but the stories that have always gripped me and stayed with me are the ones where we actually get to watch the characters fall in love. We see it happening. We feel it. We believe it. And because of that, we are falling in love at the same time that they are. And any time you fall in love, it sticks with you 🙂

Gina S – Do prefer to write in quiet or while listening to music? And do you write every day? How long did it take you to write Back To You?

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Priscilla  ~  I try to write every day, but it’s not easy. I’m a teacher and a mom of three little ones (ages five and under) – so my writing schedule consists of “whenever I can squeeze a few words in.” It took me about a year to write Back to You, but within that year I gave birth to my youngest, so things were sort of hectic for a while. 

I absolutely love listening to music when I write. Sometimes I can’t write without it, depending on the scene. I think the only two scenes I wrote in complete silence were the scene where Aaron comes to pick Michael up from the old woman’s house, and when Michael is at Trashed.

I had a playlist on my ipod specifically for the novel, and some of the songs I listened to religiously when writing it were: Fix You by Coldplay (obviously), Hold You In My Arms by Ray LaMontagne, Sullivan Street by Counting Crows, Time After Time (cover) by Javier Colon, To Make You Feel My Love (cover) by Adele, and Never Think by Robert Pattinson. 

        Amanda L – Will there be a sequel?

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Priscilla  ~  I actually didn’t plan on a sequel. When I finished Back to You, I felt like Lauren and Michael were right where they were supposed to be. However, something I hadn’t prepared for was the Adam Fan Club that emerged after I published the novel 🙂 I’ve had quite a few people ask me if I would ever write his story. I could see myself doing that one day. 

Emancipating Andie teaser

To be released Spring 2013.

Andie shook her head in amazement as she turned to walk back upstairs, stopping when she spotted a third doorway at the opposite end of the hall. What the hell, she thought. She’d already given in to her shameless snooping. When would she ever get to be in a house like this again?
She realized what it was before she even crossed the threshold: a wine cellar. “My God,” she said under her breath as she reached the doorway. It was practically the size of her apartment; the walls were floor to ceiling shelves full of bottles, and in the center of the room were several more independent shelves, filled to capacity. There had to be hundreds of bottles.

She stepped into the cellar in complete awe, her eyes fixed on the soaring shelves bordering the entire room, nearly tripping over something underfoot. Andie looked down to see a small wrought iron step-ladder on the floor next to the door, and as she lifted her eyes back up to the impossibly tall shelving, she bent to grab it, dragging it over to the nearest wall of wine.

Just as she was about to climb up and take a closer look, a loud slamming sound caused her to jump, and she whipped her head around to see the cellar door closed behind her.

“Crap,” she mumbled, stepping down off the stool. She walked back toward the door and twisted the handle.

Nothing.

Andie froze, her eyes widening for a second before pulling a bit more forcefully. “No,” she whispered, twisting the handle the other way and trying again. “No, no, no,” she begged, leaning back on her heels and grabbing the handle with both hands, yanking back with the full weight of her body. The substantial oak door didn’t budge. It didn’t even squeak. “Oh God, please no,” she whimpered to herself.

The voice came from behind her. “Well that sucks.”

She screamed before he’d even finished his sentence, whirling around and flattening herself up against the door.

Instead of being startled by the ear-piercing shriek that ripped from her throat, he seemed amused by it. The corners of his mouth curved up in a smile as his eyebrows lifted ever so slightly.

Andie felt the panic begin to swell in her chest. Locked in a cellar with a strange man at a party where she didn’t know anyone, where practically no one would be looking for her. Weren’t there scary movies that began this way? For all she knew, the room was probably soundproof. She felt a surge of adrenalin heat her veins as she kept her eyes on him, her back against the door.

“Did you think that was down there for show?” he asked, nodding toward the iron step stool she had dragged over to the shelves.

Andie brought her hand to her still thudding heart. “I…I didn’t know…I’m sorry,” she said, reaching behind her with her free hand and twisting the handle again. The uneasiness in her chest was beginning to mix with embarrassment. “How do we get out?”

He shrugged indifferently. “We wait. Someone will probably be down here any second now after that scream. Nice pipes, by the way,” he added with a smirk.

A frown tugged at the corners of her mouth. His lack of urgency bothered her. As did his flippant response. Not to mention the look he was giving her. It was a combination of amusement and condescension, that little smirk playing at his lips. He was dressed much more casually than anyone she’d seen so far upstairs: jeans and an open button down over a T-shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. The cellar was too dim for her to pinpoint the color of his eyes, but she could tell they were light, and his hair, a sandy brown color, looked like it was in need of a cut; it flipped away from his forehead and the tops of his ears in little curls. As if he could read her mind, he ran his hand through it, tousling it in a way that made it look stylishly disheveled.

Whatever this guy was willing to do, waiting was not an option for her; there was no way she was going to sit in the wine cellar with this stranger until Colin came to rescue her and she had to fumble through some feeble explanation as to why she was in the wine cellar in the first place. She turned and twisted the handle again. This time, she pulled back on the door so hard that a guttural grunt escaped her lips, and she heard him laugh behind her.

Andie looked over her shoulder.  “A little help would be nice,” she said, trying to keep the annoyance out of her voice.

“When that door sticks, you can’t open it from the inside. Hence the doorstop that someone chose to ignore.”

“Well excuse me for assuming a house like this would have functioning doors,” she snapped, irritated that he was mocking her. He didn’t even know her, for Christ’s sake.

He grinned at her.

Andie turned, balling up her fist and banging sharply on the door. The muted thudding rang through the space just as a dull ache shot up her arm, and she dropped her hand to her side, flexing her fingers.

“No one’s gonna hear that, and you’re gonna hurt your hand,” he said, the amusement prevailing over the concern in his voice. “And for the record, I have no medical training. Although there’s plenty of wine, so I guess we could just get you drunk enough so that you wouldn’t feel it.”

Ignoring his taunts, she turned around and used the flat of her other hand, banging again. Andie knew he was right; it was fruitless. No one would hear her and she probably would end up hurting her hand, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of conceding.

“If you’re in such a rush to get back to the party, why don’t you just use your phone and call someone upstairs?”

Yeah, she could just see how that conversation would go. “Hey Colin, it’s Andie. I locked myself in the wine cellar while I was snooping around your friend’s house. Can you come let me out?” She turned around, folding her arms. “If I had my phone with me, do you think I’d be standing here abusing my hands on this door?”

“Well I told you to stop, didn’t I?”

She shot him a look and he laughed again. “Relax. Trust me, someone will want more wine eventually,” he said, walking toward the first shelf in the middle of the room. He sat on the floor with his back against it, his feet wide apart and flat on the floor in front of him. He rested his elbows on his knees as he looked up at her.

“I’m Chase.”

Realizing that she very well might be trapped with him for a while, she figured it was probably in her best interest to at least attempt civility, even though he seemed determined to get under her skin.

“Andie,” she said before turning back toward the door and inspecting the doorknob, praying for some magic button that would set them free.

“Andie, huh? Interesting,” he said, and then after a beat, “Well, Andie, are you a friend of Justin’s? Or Stella’s?”

She turned to look at him, the confusion evident in her face.

He smiled slowly. “Justin and Stella? You know, the people who are hosting this party?”

“Oh. No…I don’t…I’m here with Colin Tate,” she added by way of explanation, turning back toward the door and examining the hinge, trying to remember anything she could about the show MacGyver.

“Colin’s here?”

Andie spun quickly to face him, her eyebrows raised. “You know him?”

“Of course I know him.”

Yes, definitely in her best interest to attempt civility.

“Oh.”

A silence filled the space between them, and he smiled, running his hand through his hair again. “So…you and Colin? You guys are a thing?”

With a resigned sigh she gave up, walking away from the door and over to one of the shelves against the wall, sitting cross legged in front of it. “Not a thing. We’re dating.”

“What’s the difference?”

Andie looked down with a shrug, feeling cautious since she had no idea how close he and Colin actually were. “It’s…new.”

“Ah. Haven’t decided if you’re gonna bang him and bail yet?”

She whipped her head up, an offended expression on her face, and he laughed, shifting his weight as he reached in his back pocket. He pulled out a pack of cigarettes, tapping them against his palm and then glancing up at her from under his lashes as he held the pack out to her.

“No.”

He chuckled, shaking his head as he held the pack to his mouth and removed a cigarette. “That’s rude, you know,” he said, the unlit cigarette wagging between his lips as he spoke.

“What is?” she scoffed. “Declining a cigarette?”

“No, that face you just made,” he said, pulling a lighter out of his pocket. “It’s like grimacing at someone’s food while they’re eating it.”

“Well if the food in question killed the person eating it, or anyone within breathing distance of it for that matter, then I’d say it’s perfectly acceptable to grimace.”

He chuckled again as he held the lighter to the end of his cigarette, taking a long pull until the flame caught and the tip glowed orange. He put the lighter back in his pocket as he lithely pulled the cigarette from his lips with his thumb and forefinger, locking eyes with her as he blew the smoke out the side of his mouth, sending it away from her. “Just don’t breathe over there and I’m pretty sure you’ll survive.”

WANT MORE? 

Click this link for a longer teaser!!

Enter the Rafflecopter link below to win a
*SIGNED* PAPERBACK OF “BACK TO YOU”!!! 

(Winner gets to choose whether they want the book with the “original” cover or the “new” cover)

Open internationally.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

TOMORROW’S *SIGNED* PAPERBACK GIVEAWAY
(Open Internationally)
11:00 AM EST
featuring
T I N A   R E B E R
(author of Love Unscripted ) 

 

ALICE CLAYTON

Alice Clayton is a new novelist with an unholy love for her Kitchenaid mixer. Making her home in St Louis, she enjoys gardening but not weeding, baking but not cleaning up afterwards, and is trying desperately to get her long time boyfriend to make her an honest woman. Hi sweetie!!

After working for years in the cosmetics industry as a makeup artist, esthetician, and national educator for a major cosmetics company, Alice picked up a pen (read laptop) for the first time at 33 to begin a new career, writer. Having never written a thing before, she found writing was the creative outlet she had been missing since walking away from the theater 10 years ago. Combining her love of storytelling with a sense of silly, she was shocked and awed to be nominated for a Goodreads Author award in 2010 for her debut novels, The Redhead Series.

Alice has penned two novels, The Unidentified Redhead and The Redhead Revealed, and thinks you should purchase them immediately. She’s not kidding, not even a little bit. Everyone needs some comedic erotica in their lives. She is hard at work on the third book in The Redhead Series which will be out Spring of 2013 which will continue the saucy and sexual escapades of everyone’s favorite couple, Jack and Grace. She has another new release coming up soon in November of 2012, all new characters, all new story, but same brand of smutty hilarity.

Additionally, Alice loves spending time with her besties on notyourmotherspodcast.com, make sure you check them out on iTunes. 3 women rushing towards their forties still acting like teenagers. A saucy little mix of sex, love, relationships, pop cultural, celebrity gossip and All Things Jake Ryan.

Alice enjoys pickles, Bloody Mary’s, 8 hours of sleep, and a good pounding.

Finally Alice would also like all her readers and listeners to help her convince her long time boyfriend that the only other thing that would make her truly happy is finally bringing home a Bernese Mountain Dog. She is totally serious. And done talking about herself in the third person…

Caroline Reynolds has a fantastic new apartment in San Francisco, a KitchenAid mixer, and no O (and we’re not talking Oprah here, folks). She has a flourishing design career, an office overlooking the bay, a killer zucchini bread recipe, and no O. She has Clive (the best cat ever), great friends, a great rack, and no O.

Adding insult to O-less, since her move, she has an oversexed neighbor with the loudest late-night wallbanging she’s ever heard. Each moan, spank, and–was that a meow?–punctuates the fact that not only is she losing sleep, she still has, yep, you guessed it, no O.

Enter Simon Parker. (No, really, Simon, please enter.) When the wallbanging threatens to literally bounce her out of bed, Caroline, clad in sexual frustration and a pink baby-doll nightie, confronts her heard-but-never-seen neighbor. Their late-night hallway encounter has, well, mixed results. Ahem. With walls this thin, the tension’s gonna be thick…

My spoiler-free review of WALLBANGER
(5 HUGE stars!)

LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS BOOK!! 

This book was brilliant!!
Pure gold!
I’m in love with Simon. 
Completely, utterly in love.
My cheeks ache from laughing.
My heart is happy.
Did I mention I love this book?

This book was pure, decadent, lighthearted, un-put-downable, FUN!! A well-written, perfect blend of all things happy, romantic, sweet, funny (hilarious, really), melty, swoony, witty, steamy, with just enough tender, deeper moments to make my heart squeeze. I fell in love with everything – the characters, the writing, the story… and Clive. The most awesome cat ever to grace the pages of a novel.

It was just one winning line after another. I swear more than half my book is highlighted. No joke!!

READ IT!!!!!

If you loved Wallbanger and are looking for more from this author, try her debut series!

Enter the Rafflecopter link below to win eCopies of
either Wallbanger or The Unidentified Redhead!!! 

Open internationally.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

TOMORROW’S *SIGNED* PAPERBACK GIVEAWAY
11:00 AM EST
featuring
P R I S C I L L A   G L E N N
(author of Back To You ) 
 

KATJA MILLAY

I grew up in Florida where I spent my time hiding from the sun. Then I moved to NYC where I attended film school at NYU and spent my time hiding from the rats. I was a high school film production/screenwriting teacher in a former life and now I sit at my kitchen table writing stories and ignoring the frightening mountain of laundry threatening to overtake my home. The Sea of Tranquility is my first novel.

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“My name is Nastya Kashnikov.
I was a piano-playing prodigy…
I was murdered two and a half years ago.
Discuss.” 

Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.

Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.

Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to.

The Sea of Tranquility is a rich, intense, and brilliantly imagined story about a lonely boy, an emotionally fragile girl, and the miracle of second chances.

My spoiler-free review of THE SEA OF TRANQUILITY
(5 PLUS stars!)

The Sea of Tranquility is a beautifully written, deep, heart-wrenching drama about two damaged teens surviving unchangeable tragedies, and devastating grief, hurt, and pain, learning to cope with them, accept them, and somehow finding healing, safety and finally happiness and love in each other along the way.

Its quiet and slow building but it just felt SO real and believable. Without my even realizing it, this book had me worked up to the point where my heart was pounding and felt like it was being being ripped out. The emotional punch took a while to build, but when it hit, it was huge and powerful and took my breath away with its intensity.

Here are some of our readers’ questions answered by Katja.

Aestas  ~  Thank you so much for agreeing to do this Q&A. Your story was so beautiful and seamless! The kind that stays with you long after finishing it. What is your writing process? Do you write every day? Do you start with an outline? Do you start at the beginning and work your way through to the end or write in segments?

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Katja  ~   My process is to not have a process! I’m not sure how to even describe it. It’s pure madness. I don’t recommend it to anyone. lol The majority of the book was written out of order, by hand, in notebooks and on random scraps of paper whenever and wherever I could find them. In the beginning it was pictures in my head, random pieces of dialogue, half-scenes. Then I’d start developing the pieces and fleshing them out. At one point I did try to sit down and outline it but it was a joke and I finally just accepted that it was going to come out however it wanted to come out and it wouldn’t let me force it.

After a few months and a mountain of paper, I had to sit down at the computer and start putting it in sequence and smoothing over the transitions and making it flow. That was the most painful part, because nothing was in order. That was the point when I almost quit. The paper and the notes were daunting and to have to sort through it all was unfathomable but at that point I was invested in the characters and I really wanted to see it through. I couldn’t say that I wrote for any specific period of time each day. Some days I’d struggle to write for thirty minutes and I’d finally realize it just wasn’t going to happen. Other days I’d write literally 14 hours straight. There really wasn’t any method to any aspect of it at all.

The sad part is that after I survived TSoT, I swore I would never do it like this again – that if I ever wrote anything else, I would sit down at the computer and type it, in order, like a sane person. Unfortunately, I’m already finding myself drowning in a mass of paper, with nothing in any semblance of order and not one word in a computer. Apparently my brain won’t work without a pen in my hand. Or I just hate myself which is also a distinct possibility.

Trinity  ~  What was the first scene you wrote?

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Katja ~   The first scene I wrote was the flashback of Nastya’s attack.  Once I had the picture in my head of this girl and her hand and what had happened to her, I couldn’t let it go.  Even though that scene didn’t come in until much later in the story, I had to know what had happened to her and what was in her head from the beginning; the event that was the catalyst for everything else.  The scene itself evolved somewhat after I had initially written it but the essence of it was the same and the weight of what occurred there underscored so much of what happened throughout the book.

        Kami B  ~  What was the hardest part of writing your book?

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Katja  ~   The hardest part was deciding how much information to give readers and when to give it to them.  Since the details of what had happened in the past are trickled out slowly, I had to balance how much to reveal as the story unfolded and that was the trickiest thing.  It was also difficult knowing that I had to make Nastya’s character abrasive and borderline unlikable and unrelatable throughout the entire beginning of the book even when I knew what was under that façade.  It was necessary though because she didn’t like herself and she didn’t want to be liked so I had to be true to her character and let her slowly evolve and reveal herself over the course of the book.

       Julie N  ~  Will Drew ever get his own story?

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Katja  ~  I’ve been asked this one a lot, which makes me really happy because I love that readers want more Drew.  I haven’t ruled out the possibility of Drew getting a book.  However, it’s very important to me that his character and the story itself be strong enough to carry an entire book, so I won’t make that decision until I know all of the pieces are there.  That said, I have an affinity for Drew and I do love the idea of revisiting him at some point.

Tracy D  ~  What are you working on right now? 

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Katja  ~  I haven’t made any announcements as to the story I’m working on yet.  I need to make sure that I am handling the material appropriately and that I can give it the respect and treatment it deserves before I reveal it.  That said, knowing me, I probably won’t say anything until it’s done because I won’t believe I have it until the whole thing is down on paper.

Angie L  ~  Did you know how the story was going to end from the beginning?

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Katja  ~     The ending that’s there was in my head throughout writing the book, which was absolutely necessary because it was very important to me that the foreshadowing be there along the way and that it didn’t just come out of nowhere.  However I didn’t know the entire time that I was going to specifically end it at that particular moment.  I made that decision when I was about halfway there.

Abby M  ~  This novel is so flawless, how long did it take you to write it?

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Katja  ~  Thank you so much Abby.  That is a HUGE compliment.  It took me about seven months from conception to publishing.

Jessica – I heard this is your first novel! What inspired you to start writing? 

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Katja  ~  As a teenager I wanted to write for film and television and that’s what I went to school to do.  I detoured for a while as a television producer and film studies & screenwriting teacher but writing was always in the back of my mind waiting for me to come back to it while I made a lot of excuses not to.  Finally, I was going through a particularly difficult time in my personal life and needed to get out of my own head for a while so I jumped into someone else’s.  My father was dying and he had been telling me for years that I should write and I had been telling him for years that I couldn’t.  But when your father is dying and tells you to write, you write.  He passed away in the spring before I even told him I was doing it, but I like to think he knows. 

Danielle  ~  Do you have any particular actors in mind who you could see playing Josh and Nastya in a movie of TSoT?

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Katja  ~    I am absolutely terrible at casting.  TERRIBLE, I say!  I don’t think I’ll ever find a perfect Josh.   I lived with such a specific picture of him in my head for several months that no one seems to fit just right for me.  There’s a Pinterest board that one of the readers (Trinity!) started for the book so if you have anyone in mind, please post the pictures.  We may find him yet!  As for Nastya, several readers have suggested Lucy Hale and I think she’s an amazing choice.  It has to be someone who can pull off the don’t eff with me attitude and retain a very distinct vulnerability at the same time.

Clista S ~ By far, one of the best stories out there!

Paula ~ I clearly love you, Katja! Of all of the authors that I have connected with through the social media, you have been the most warm, fan friendly of them all. Your story has changed me. I am a different person for reading your book. I’ve asked you numerous questions about TSoT and you have answered them all. Thank you so much!

Francine R ~ No question. Just a thank you. This story was simply beautiful.

Stephanie L ~ Absolutely breathtaking book!! Definitely my favorite book of the year! Can’t wait to read anything you write in the future 🙂

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Katja  ~  Thank you for all of your questions and comments and for reading TSoT.  I can’t tell you how much it means to me to hear from you all!

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** Note from Aestas: Readers, you have Katja to thank in large part for this 22-22-22 event. She was the first author I originally talked to about this when I was still considering whether or not I should run it and she was so encouraging about it that it gave me the motivation to put together the rest of the event. Thank you, Katja <3

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