Beauty of the Broken World

2010-11-29T04:21:00.000-08:00

Jennifer Johnson is Sick of Being Married.

2010-11-09T11:36:00.000-08:00

My #1 fan in the UK, Jade sent me this image - wouldn't it be perfect for the cover of Jennifer Johnsons' Sick of Being Married?? I love her slightly put-upon and condescending stare.

The Pug Ugg

2010-11-04T02:07:00.000-07:00

I just finished putting up directions for making your own Pug Ugg! A shoe for your dog. Tragic, I know and yet it is my life and we must embrace our oddities, for in the end...they are all we have.

pug ugg!

From Wally's blog:

2010-10-27T16:46:00.001-07:00

Winter's Coming...Let's Keep the wee Beloveds Warm!

Hey guys, We're headed to Key West again this winter...it's so good for Wally's foot and for Mama's psyche!

This is a picture of Walter in a Kentuckiana Pug Rescue scarf, they sent it to him along with a care package filled with amazing, lovely things when he was hit last year. (He is opening that very package in the picture. Nom Nom Nom!) I really don't know what we would have done without KPR's ongoing support, love and concern. It's an amazing group of folks with families and jobs, who help pugs in multiple states in the Midwest.

They've been hit themselves recently, with a big wave of incoming pugs who need HELP, like little Lazarus here, who was found half-dead by animal control and brought to KPR. This picture might make you sad, but it shouldn't! Lazarus us alive and recovering because of the warm hearts at Kentuckia Pug Rescue.

In fact, Kentuckiana Pug Rescue has had so many new arrivals, they just announced they'll have to close their doors temporarily until they get more funds for medical treatment and foster home care.

What??!!

Kentuckiana Pug Rescue were there for us - Now, Walter and I want to be there for them. I'm sending them all the nickles and dimes I can find, and a bunch of signed books they can use for fundraising. I want our 11th hour angels to have their doors wide open and stay in flight!

Many of us would take care of additional pugs if we could, but time and obligations prevent us. We rely on pug rescues to be 11th hour angels, and so they are, but even angels get tired. We owe it to the small beloveds, we owe it to the rescue groups, we owe it to ourselves to keep these doors open. We need rescue groups. We need our angels. If you can send them any nickles and dimes, please do. Every little bit helps.

Lets use the community's pug power to get 'em up and running again! Walter and I will never forget their good works and we say THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kentuckiana Pug Rescue • PO Box 22697 • Louisville, KY 40252-0697

• 877-784-7988

Kentucky - monicalovespugs@yahoo.com
Indiana - pugcrazy3@comcast.net

The Power of Reading

2010-10-25T20:27:00.000-07:00

The Power of Reading, from Steve McCurry’s blog

I love so many things about this picture. Truly the photographers have us over a barrel. It'd take me a thousand words or more.

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.

– Jorge Luis Borges

Here, somewhere in the electric snap and fizzle I feel in my brain when I look at McCurry's image...here is why I write. The insatiable urge to dive headlong into the grimy guts of something, to name it, to call it what it is, overtakes me. The odds of my touching on the truth of the matter? Slim. The degree to which I will most assuredly fail? Vast. The compulsion to try? Irrevocably unstoppable.

Writing is, in the end, a maternal instinct. To call something you love by name. I will make no excuses for my poor parenting, but it is not in me to give up.

So, despite being mid-long into the sticky tarpits a new draft of a new book and already behind and already tired...I look at this photograph and my heart hurts at the beauty, the hilarity, the absurdity of the world. No, I will not give up. Not yet. Neither should you, my darlings.

In the immortal words of a terrible tyrant of vast intelligence:

"Write, damn you. What else are you good for?"

Found Poetry

2010-09-22T14:51:00.000-07:00

Someone at the reading last night asked me about the "muse." When she comes, how to prepare for her arrival. All I could say was, "she comes when she damn well feels like it, which is rarely when you're ready."

I think there is a temptation for writers to assume the muse, or our inspiration comes at pre-ordained times and in cargo loads. In other words, we expect the muse to come when we're at our desks, and that she'll stay all night long. Well. I have found it is more often the case that inspiration arrives in tiny, fleeting, easily-overlooked moments.

Rather than recieving a torrential river of poetic pages while sitting with your hands poised at the keyboard, (which would be the sensible, polite way for inspiration to arrive,) it's more likely to stumble across a small gem, a single word, a sudden snapshot while you're out - running around in the world. Glancing at the slender wrists of a young waitress setting a plate down in front of you, catching sight of a blooming hydrangea, tracing your fingers along the warm metal banister outside an old stone building, catching the sound of a distant siren. In these moments small thoughts, like hummingbird moths, flut into view and then away again without much attention. Either we catch them, or we don't.

If we do notice a splendid detail, or conjure the sudden thought, then the thing to do is put it in your pocket (write it in your notebook) and take it home, where you can sit at your desk and put it with all the other captured hummingbird moths and press them lovingly, albeit firmly, onto paper. In this way, bit by bit, we stitch inspiration together, like half-blind quilters instead of waiting in vain for fiery archangels, which are remarkable to look at, but who always come late or not at all, and manage to singe the furniture.

2010-09-13T00:53:00.000-07:00

only two events left! (this month...)

2010-09-12T17:27:00.001-07:00

More events/readings to be posted shortly!

Chicago         Tuesday, September 21, 2010

           COLUMBIA COLLEGE BOOKSTORE
           624 South Michigan Avenue
            Chicago, ID 60605-1904
            Main Phone: 630-371-5103
           12:30 PM to 2:00 PM CST
            reading, Q&A, signing
            More Info

Minneapolis
Thursday, September 30, 2010

               4:00 PM CST
               reading, Q&A, signing
               UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA
               BOOKSTORE
               300 Washington Ave SE
               Coffman Memorial Union
               Minneapolis, MN 55455

Ahoy!

2010-08-29T15:16:00.000-07:00

Hi guys! Book tour time!! I hit the road and tap-dance like a Russian bear. (nervous, nervous, nervous!!) I wanted to invite all of you and anyone else to come see me in the various cities I'm visiting. Here are the first two readings - they're this week! (ikes.)

Milwaukee
Heather McElhatton reads from her new novel, "Million Little Mistakes"
Thursday, September 2, 2010 @ 7pm
NEXT CHAPTER BOOKSHOP
10976 N. Port Washington Road
Mequon, WI 53092
Main Phone: (262) 241-6220

Chicago
Heather McElhatton reads from her new novel, "Million Little Mistakes"
Friday, September 3, 2010 @ 7pm
BARBARA'S BOOKSTORE
1218 S Halsted St
Chicago, IL 60607
Main Phone: 312-666-3161

Come on down and see me! (There are lots more readings coming up, these are just coming up first.)

Medi-Dins, Pharmaceutical Frozen Dinners for Kids!

2010-08-25T09:27:00.000-07:00

There are so many people to thank for helping me with Million Little Mistakes - I'm just going to start one by one. First, I must thank Dave and Lena Wiebe.

Dave and I went to high school together, and he was one of those few souls with whom you could take intellectual refuge. And learn weird stuff. He always knew things like the average wingspan of the Icelandic Puffin, and what year the Replacements pressed their first vinyl record.

Now, Dave and his wife are both German experts and they helped me name a product in the book. Drogenbrot is the German name they gave me for section 138...or page 445, in which I need a name for my pharmaceutical-laced line of food for kids. (Strata-Kix! Strattera-laced cornflakes, Lexy Bears - Lexapro infused Gummi bears etc......)

In the USA, the brand name is "Medi-Dins" and in Germany, they're called "Drogenbrot," which the Wiebe's came up with for me - which literally means "Drugged Dinner."

Thanks Wiebes!

Facebook fan page!? (gushes)

2010-08-17T12:13:00.000-07:00

A fan made a fan page for me on Facebook. Wha??? I am totally embarrassed and completely bashfully honored. Here's the link, hope you become a fan too! Thank You Jade! I'm your fan!!!!

BOOK LAUNCH PARTY!

2010-08-09T16:16:00.000-07:00

Time for the BIG MLM BOOK LAUNCH!

Oh yes, reading, laughing, music and more!

Check it out - Full Event Schedule!

Newest fear: Being attacked by alligator while sea kayaking...(previous newest fear, sea kayaking.)

2010-07-13T17:13:00.000-07:00

Secret Revealed: How Crocodiles Cross Oceans

Charles Q. Choi
LiveScience Contributor

livescience.com – Mon Jun 7, 1:06 pm ET

How did the world's largest living reptile, the saltwater crocodile, reach so many South Pacific islands separated by huge stretches of water despite being a poor swimmer? Apparently, like a surfer catching a wave, these goliaths can ride currents on the ocean surface to cross large areas of open sea, researchers now reveal. The saltwater or estuarine crocodile (Crocodylus porosus) is a ferocious giant that can grow at least 23 feet long (7 meters) and weigh more than 2,200 pounds (1000 kilograms). These scaly monsters have been known to devour sharks, and even attack things they can't eat, often assaulting boats in the mistaken belief they are rivals or prey, biting down with nearly 2 tons of pressure - powerful enough to crush bone or punch through aluminum hulls.

These deadly predators hunt in tropical areas throughout eastern India, southeast Asia, northern Australia, and on an untold number of the islands in-between. Although these crocodiles spend most of their lives in saltwater, they cannot be considered marine reptiles the same way sea turtles are, because the crocs rely on land for food and water.
There were already many anecdotal accounts of large crocodiles sighted far out at sea, but nothing confirmed. Now, for the first time, using sonar transmitters and satellite tracking, scientists now find that saltwater crocodiles actually do ride surface ocean currents for long-distance travel, enabling them to voyage from one oceanic island to another.

"Because these crocodiles are poor swimmers, it is unlikely that they swim across vast tracts of ocean," said researcher Hamish Campbell, a behavioral ecologist from University of Queensland in Australia. "But they can survive for long periods in saltwater without eating or drinking, so by only traveling when surface currents are favorable, they would be able to move long distances by sea."

Crocodile river travel
Working at the remote Kennedy River in northeastern Australia, the team of scientists - which included the late Steve Irwin, "The Crocodile Hunter" - tagged 27 adult seawater crocodiles with sonar transmitters, employing 20 underwater receivers deployed along a 39-mile-long stretch of the river (63 km) to track the reptiles' every move for more than 12 months. They found both male and female adult crocodiles undertook long-distance journeys, regularly traveling more than 30 miles (48 km) from their home area to the river mouth and beyond into open sea.

The scientists also discovered the "salties" always began long-distance travel within an hour of the tide changing, allowing them to go with the flow. They halted their journeys by hauling out onto the river bank or diving to the river bottom when the currents turned against them.
The researchers originally were just aiming to investigate the territorial habits of the crocodiles and how they divvied up land among themselves.

"I never thought they would be making these long-distance journeys out to sea," Campbell told LiveScience.
Riding ocean currents

After they made their discovery on the river, Campbell and his colleagues re-analyzed archival data from the few crocodiles that have been satellite tracked while undertaking ocean travel. By overlaying the reptiles' movements with surface current estimates, they found the strategy of ocean-swimming crocodiles was similar to what they employed with rivers.

One male (3.8 meters) - left the Kennedy River and travelled 366 miles (590 km) over 25 days, timing its journey to coincide with a seasonal current system that develops in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Another croc traveled more than 255 miles (411 km) in only 20 days through the Torres Straits, which are notorious for strong water currents. When the reptile arrived at the straits, the currents were moving opposite to his direction of travel - he then waited in a sheltered bay for four days and only passed through the straits when the currents switched to favor his journey.

These findings could explain why this crocodile species did not split into many other species despite occupying islands across such a large range, where in principle populations could have been isolated and diverged from their relatives over time.

"Regular mixing between the island populations probably occurs," Campbell said. "Crocodilians have crossed major marine barriers during their evolutionary past."

Although scientists now know that salties seem to make long-distance journeys on purpose, "we presently do not know what these are for," Campbell noted. However, it was recently discovered that considerable numbers of the reptiles congregated to feast on an annual fish migration, so these long trips might be a way for the predators to satisfy their hefty appetites.

The scientists will detail their findings June 8 in the Journal of Animal Ecology.

Sussexful Speaking

2010-06-08T14:56:00.000-07:00

Went to a lovely pub in Sussex. The Shepherd and Dog in Fulking. Really beautiful. Splendid. Rolling green pastures dotted with fluffy white sheep. (NOTE: The citizens of Fulking pronounce their town's name VERY carefully.) After we fetched our drinks from the low-ceilinged bar (where my companion forbade me to sit AT the bar, as this is a big no-no at country pubs. At country pubs, bar stools are for regulars only. Not locals, regulars) we went outside to the lovely garden and I staggered down a little path with my high heels and glass of chardonnay. The path led to a neighboring field where more bucolic sheep were grazing, (why so bucolic? Drugged? Drunk? Complacent due to pension plans?) and I resisted my urge (was told not) to traipse across the field - as I had a distinct premonition of hidden dangers and sudden terrain issues, as well as tomorrows headlines: AMERICAN WRITER FOUND IN WELL.

"Splendid" is a word you hear a lot more in England, as is "Lovely" and "Fab." I have thought long and hard about the American/British accent conundrum, as when you've been here for awhile and you start talking like a British person and that makes you look like a wanker. Americans tend to spend a lot of time wondering how not to appear "wankery." Not easy, since all Americans start as "wankers" to the British and slowly (so slowly) work their way up from there...if they ever move at all.

After speaking with fab expat agent Elizabeth in London, I've decided to adopt her rules, which are "Americans should NOT attempt to adopt a British accent permanently. (e.g. Madonna. *shivers*) They MAY use a British accent briefly on certain occasions. (e.g. when telling a joke.) They MAY adopt British words that expedite the situation (e.g. "Where's the lift?" for "Where is the elevator?") but should use British-isms SPARINGLY. (e.g. "Bloody hell! I'm pissed!" is too British for Americans to pull off.)

Basically, I just try not to speak.

Tiny bacon

2010-05-25T01:39:00.000-07:00

I just found out the Paris Miniatures show is coming up. (**clutches at heart**) Have you seen what people can do with FIMO and an exacto blade? Like, make tiny miracles?

I admit, I've been making miniatures for years. It's a dirty secret that began like so many disgusting things do, when I was a child. We had a family dollhouse, a big turntable kind with working lights and hand printed wallpaper. My favorite room in the whole house was the kitchen. The tiny carrots, (bundled with tiny twine) miniature thanksgiving turkeys, (browned and glazed) and all the little baked goods. pies in bottle caps, cookies on little handpainted plates...anyhow, I began to make dollhouse food myself.

I've been focusing on both ends of the spectrum. High end appetizers and French pastries all the way down to my new favorite, hobo food. Scrambled eggs with hot sauce, baked beans on toast and mulligan stew. (Thise beans are really hard to make.) My pal in L.A asked me why I liked hobo food so much and my only answer was, I like food that makes me sad.

If I get a little braver, I'll post pics.

I also have to hand out due awards to this genius lady and her husband who made an actual tiny cheeseburger and then ate it. Gorgeous.

Africa Unite - Bob Marley's 60th Birthday

2010-05-19T22:35:00.000-07:00

Some of you know I bring books to schools and libraries in Jamaica. The last shipment went to the Negril All Ages School in Negril. With postage, shipping and the uncertainty of packages actually making it to their intended destination, it's actually easier to load up suitcases of books and carry them down there by hand. I went on vacation to Jamaica about 15 years ago for the first time, and while I had no interest in the resorts or beach parties, I did find myself wandering up in the hills and meeting many many many small children who were like bright shining little stars, eager to learn and know more about the world, but many of them without access to books.

Once I was in a tiny grocery store in a small village standing in a long line waiting for the cashier. (In Jamaica there aren't "lines" so much as people bunch up around the counter and muscle their way in.) While waiting, I felt a tickle on my arm and I looked down to see a little girl, maybe six years old, who was wearing a pink dress and riding on her mother's hip. She was earnestly studying the freckles on my arm, lightly touching my skin. She'd never seen a white person before and she was trying to figure out what I was. She studied my freckles, and looked up at my red hair...and then back to my freckles until her face lit up. "Giraffe!" she said.

The whole place cracked up. Her best, most logical guess, was that I was a giraffe. As I told her mother, I thought that was just about the most intelligent idea possible. After all, a giraffe had a heck of a lot more business there. I'm a lousy tourist and also the whitest woman on earth, with little reason to be in a such a hot, sunny place..but what can I say? One Love. The little girl asked if I would send her a Nancy Drew book and I said, "Honey, I'll bring you every Nancy Drew book there is."

So I went back to Jamaica with books. Again and Again. I feel like I'm helping a great nation in my own small way. A truly great people. There's this great documentary called "Africa Unite," in which Bob Marley's family travels to Ethiopia for the first time to celebrate Bob's 60th birthday. ( or as they say eee-tee-OH-pee-ah.) They're there to celebrate, perform and promote the Africa Unite movement, which aims to break down barriers and clashes between tribes. It's a great documentary, covering everything from The Queen of Sheba's link to Rastafarian's to Hallie Selassie's great speech at the League of Nations to candid family interviews with Bob Marley... Both men are saying the same thing. Get up, Stand up, don't give up the fight...

This, plus C. and I saw Sean Marley perform in Key West this past February...he performed on this giant dock that stretches out over the ocean (boaters pulled up alongside and danced till their boats rocked...although some of the rocking didn't look like dancing...) anyway, it all makes me want to slap some 300SPF sunscreen on my peach butt and get to Ethiopia. Here comes the Giraffe!

Won the Lottery? get ready for alcoholism, divorce and food stamps!

2010-05-19T12:05:00.000-07:00

MSN reports on 8 lottery winners who lost their millions. I read many many stories like these while researching my next novel, Million Little Mistakes. In my choose-your-own-ending book, you win 22 million in the lottery and get to spend it any way you like. I polled hundreds of folks about what they'd do with that much money, and if they thought it would make them happy.

The bizarre thing I learned was, the MAJORITY of real life lottery winners, like over 51%, end up in tragic situations and wish they'd never gotten the money. Read these stories and be GLAD you haven't been burdened with being a millionaire... yet! And if you think you can do better than these sad sacks, try the book and find out. Personally, I think money can buy you happiness, if you're smart!

All Meals Like This, Please...

2010-05-19T11:58:00.000-07:00

I love you! I eat you! I love you! I eat you!
"Kids, stop crying and swallow the damn happy egg."
"Sweetie, I don't know why you're having nightmares about eating little kittens. Just eat your rice friend."

The Broken Beauty of Adverbs

2010-05-19T11:33:00.000-07:00

I really love Arthur's bloody jacket.

But I don't know what I think about the word really. I was talking about adverbs with a writer pal and it's true, they're troubling at times. The general consensus seems to be adverbs should be avoided. Stephen King, who actually gives a lot of practical advice in his book "On Writing," feels they're a sign of weakness. If a writer chooses a verb well enough, they're not needed.

(For anyone wondering, an adverb is like a wingman for an adjective or a verb. It brags about the word it's with. The monkey king shrieked loudly. Those fake tits are crazy big. There's a cult classic on adverbs. "Lolly, Lolly, Lolly get your Adverbs Here.")

In Willa Cather's great essay, The Novel Demeuble, she says, "How wonderful if we could throw all the furniture out of the window; and along with it, all the meaningless reiterations concerning physical sensations, all the tiresome old patterns, and leave the room as bare as the stage of a Greek theater, or as that house into which the glory of Pentecost descended, leave the scene bare for the play of emotions, great and little - for the nursery tale, no less than the tragedy, is killed by tasteless amplitude."

Okay, but isn't a Greek stage built specifically for a Greek stage? Should we really be importing absolute aesthetics? Plus, you've got Capote and Faulkner and Liberace to factor in, who all used ample adjectives, adverbs and gold gilding to create their own brand of beauty. Is one style more beautiful than another or are they just different? Some people abhor flowery writing and others seek it out. Cather's idea of cutting back adverbs is poetic, but is it more poetic than her use of the adverb "grimly" here?

"A burnt dog dreads the fire," said the lawyer grimly, and closed his eyes.

- Willa Cather, "The Sculptors Funeral."

I'm thinking that adverbs aren't clear-cut villains, but more like chili peppers. Handle them carefully. Use them sparingly. A few go a long way and too many make you sick. Some people prefer to avoid them altogether. Still, banning them altogether seems like you'd be throwing out a specific spice that works very well - when it works.

The problem lies perhaps in an adverbs sincerity. Maybe saying something is "really disgusting," seems like a sales pitch. As though the adverb is nodding it's head and pointing next door and saying, "you're gonna wanna listen to this." Most genuine reading experiences seem to occur when the reader is personally invested. they've made up their own mind about whats disgusting.

My greatest challenge in avoiding adverbs seems to come when I want to describe how someone "said" something. As in Cather's line "...said the lawyer grimly..." It's one of the greatest challenges of writing, conveying the delicate tone, the air, the facial expression that filters the whole experience. The difference between:

"A burnt dog dreads the fire," said the lawyer nervously, and closed his eyes.

"A burnt dog dreads the fire," said the lawyer angrily, and closed his eyes.

"A burnt dog dreads the fire," said the lawyer jokingly, and closed his eyes.

This has led me to research "speech qualifiers," or "speech tags." or "words to use instead of said." I keep a big Word document with lists of options like these. Do you guys use adverbs in your writing?

Best bad baby gift.

2010-05-13T11:43:00.000-07:00

Your babies face on a sack of rice.
So, after you get it, you're supposed to slit it open and boil it?

Yoiks. Maybe I read the ad wrong. Maybe there is an actual baby inside this thing...
...and on back new recipes for:

Beef stew with baby carrots
Baby corn chowder
Baby spinach salad
Infant Foo Young
Baby back ribs??

oh yes, it's me.

2010-05-12T11:34:00.000-07:00

Writing on an island

2010-04-08T23:38:00.000-07:00

Blackouts, spring storms, spring breakers and NO INTERNET!

HELLLLLLLLLLLLO! So so sorry we've been incommunicado for so long. Living on a tiny island 100 miles out to sea has it's perks, but it has its drawbacks too. Intermittent electricity for one. Also, hella ferocious storms, where torrential rain flies sideways and stings like needles and I think maybe we should lash ourselves to a palm tree, even tho everyone else takes it in stride.

The spring break kids also flood the island and careen around in rented electric golf carts, frequently banging into parked cars, and VERY frequently banging into my car, which is so uniformly dented at this point it almost looks like post modernist design. I'm told every year these youthful party people bring diseases from up north, and sure enough two weeks after spring break started, everyone here started coming down with killer colds and a particularly nasty stomach bug.

The hardest part for us however has been the complete lack of internet access. Whatever dime store router we had went out, and upon calling the office for repair, we learned a little more about "island time." Many businesses here have a captive audience and little or no competition, so getting service can take weeks. I've never gone this long without connection and that combined with all the storm sponsored candlelight and old timey mustard plasters, I almost thought we'd turned Amish.

Then they fixed the internet! Back to civilization! We instantly forgot any of our piddly gripes and refocused our gaze on all things paradisey. The aquamarine ocean, the fact we've made friends with people who have boats and have gotten to spend lots of time on said aquamarine water, the fact that editing MLM proofs is almost done!

“When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”
-Harriet Beecher Stowe

"The older I get, the greater power I seem to have to help the world; I am like a snowball -- the further I am rolled the more I gain."
- Susan B. Anthony

KARE 11 interview

2009-06-15T11:34:00.000-07:00

Watch me live. I don't screw up too much. a little.

in Target today!

2009-06-15T04:50:00.000-07:00

Jennifer Johnson will be gracing the luxe halls of Target today! I am psyched. I went to the endcap where it will reside, and there's like BESTSELLERS there! Memory Keeper's Daughter, Time Travelers Wife etc...I'm like...what? Me? I am so excited I briefly considered sneaking in and camping out in a tent nearby so I can watch shoppers buy my book! (seriously, so cool.) That or I may be hosting a dinner party at the Target Cafeteria. Maybe both.

Taiwan

2009-06-07T17:11:00.000-07:00

Pretty Little Mistakes Hit #10 in Taiwan! My wonderful editor at Sun Color Publishing in Taiwan just sent me this JPEG of me (and Walter, of course) in the biggest newspaper in Taiwan! We made number 10 right up there with Twilight and Angels and Demons!

Thank you Taiwan!! We love you too!!!

Swanky Birthday Present

2009-06-02T23:36:00.000-07:00

It's my birthday today and I just found out "Jennifer Johnson is Sick of Being Single" made it into People "Style Watch" Magazine! It's out for a whole two months and has everything you need for summer! Woooot!
My Horoscope for the year:
Television journalist Anderson Cooper (1967) shares your birthday today. You're a wordsmith. You know how to enlighten others; you also know how to reach them. People find you entertaining and witty, and invariably seek out your company. You have a warm heart at high standards for yourself and others. However, you need the respect of your peers. (You never work in a vacuum.) In the year ahead, partnerships and close relationships are important.

and from another astrologer:
TODAY’S BIRTHDAY (JUNE 3) You approach life practically this year, using your common sense to guide you. And yet, you are still open to magical occurrences and will not argue with miraculous developments. Because you display such intelligence, you will be promoted in July and again in October. June and September are the most romantic months. Capricorn and Aquarius adore you. Your lucky numbers are: 14, 3, 30, 15 and 9.

Nicest Review of All Time

2009-05-22T15:28:00.000-07:00

Someone sent me this review and it is currently my favorite, because while being complimentary, it's also gritty and hard. like me. (and yes, YES, Katie S! If you're reading this, I would love to write the sequel, if only to thank you for this review!)

Good Reads
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/54813367.
JENNIFER JOHNSON IS SICK OF BEING SINGLE
Reviewer: Katie S.
This book was like becoming able to scratch that one spot on your back that was always out of reach - very satisfying despite the relatively inappropriate method used.

The review had set it up for me incorrectly though. It wasn’t that her tone changed towards the end, in fact it stayed perfectly consistent: brutally T.M.I.-ly honest. The sort of honest where it makes the tell-ing one feel better, and the listener feel possible worse. Because you really didn’t want to know those sorts of things, which range from superfluously excessive food-messiness to body smells and sounds to hysterically crude sexual references (for some, completely over-the-top I’d imagine), to biting class and other social human misbehaviors and eccentricities and religion and all that; all delivered with a clever deadpan wit that somehow brings us to the other side of the deeply plunging colorfully strobe-light-blinking abyss. With Heather as our guide, we do want to know all she tells us, and it feels great at the end -because- we know and because psychological slapstick can be as funny as physical and (likely most of all) because it wasn’t our life.

Heather’s writing style is impactful, constantly lobbing excrutiating moments at you (the reader) that take your breath away with how awful they are. And the way each episode is structured is like a multi-part firecracker. It starts with one single ingrediant. If you’ve caught on by this point, you’ll create images and arcs around what could happen based on that element. Then, she throws in two or three more. Then, she takes your story arc, bends it into some Escher creation, and the outcome is so -amazingly- much worse than you first thought of. It’s really mind-blowing, since it’s all relatively firmly anchored in the kind of mundane day-to-day real life aspects we all experience. Then it ends and the coast is clear until the next outbreak moments later of some other unadulterated catastrophe. Best of all, unlike shock-for-its-own-sake, Heather’s writing has a purpose and leads towards a great (albeit tragic) conclusion.

Excuse me a moment. Heather? Are you there? Listen, if you take reader requests, could you PLEASE write a sequel? Or a hundred sequels? I’m relatively fixated on the various potentials involved in what might happen … Next. Oh, god, I shudder to think, to an extent. But would really love to know. Of course, I’ll read anything you write at this point, starting with your previous book. But thought I’d put in my vote - a sequel would be awesome! Some things I was thinking about - insidious rebellion, maintaining meaningful ties despite certain bonds, and all the other parts of how she does do it (all the rest that lies ahead).. Since they only care about appearances after all, seems it would leave Jennifer with worlds of opportunity.

Ok, I’m back. So, here’s the story (in addition to what’s in the official review): Jennifer Johnson is the least prissy women either side of the Mississippi, and you’d better follow her example if you follow this invitation into her world. She has seen and experienced a lot, and processes it all with the jaundiced eye and crudely accurate and complete conversations with herself and her friends. Her closest friend, Christopher, is the ultimate gay bee, always true to her and their friendship. His partner Jeremy is sweet and well-meaning, but needs to read expiration dates more closely. Her work mate, Ted, has let himself blend in to the environment too much, and doesn’t rise above until really too late. Jennifer’s family is a cacophony of friction and distress but nonetheless, she is true to them when push comes to shove. Brad Keller? Oh, that’s Prince Charming. You know, like in the fairy tale. The fairy tale where the one-dimensional (and, to review, that one dimension is beauty of a thinness variety, certainly) girl finds her Prince Charming and lives happily ever after. This book is about that, only different. Much, much different: it’s a rework you could say, a customization to fit the modern day; or to fit as much as possible anyway.

One lesson I came away from this book with: there are two kinds of people in your life. Those who care and will become uncomfortable for you if it helps solve a problem or ease a pain, and those who are oblivious. And important distinction.

So this book, in reworking Prince Charming, is split into sections: find him, hunt him, nail him down. Your reaction to that? If you don’t think this book is for you, you’re probably right. Oh and by the way, this book has both women and men in it, and I’m sure there are men out there for whom reading this book would not cause any permanent damage. And I’d love to read the reactions of such men afterwards. I really think some would like it as much as I do, since they’re alive as well and everything.

Moments I loved (not in order):
The dog eating what it shouldn’t have thing
her dating profile-to-English translation phrasebook
how much it is true that saying “atleast life can’t get any worse” is always a bad idea
the clarity around the wrongness of the word ‘nuptial’
the employee team-building exercise
the muffin scene
the list of first date do’s and don’ts
the wedding Jennifer shouldn’t have tried to go to
the heavy-partying pity elf
the scene with Jennifer breaking up with Brad, especially the third person also there
Jennifer’s doll house catharsis activities
the Heart Bears thing
the green fluid explosion
the skeweringly accurate capture of the flavor of discourse about women ‘losing a little weight’
the firemen scene, which was part of an action that I feel really did move Jennifer forward, no matter how messy it got. It just simply was useful for her, despite all that.

and so many more

Personal gain: the insight into the choices I have in the workplace to try and work up from least useful to most useful emotions, the healing aspects of curiosity, and the power of ‘chunking-it-down.’ Wow!

So, all that is my attempt to help you self-select whether you’re right for this book or not. If you are, read at your next opportunity, you will be glad you did. If not, please don’t!
(less)

Come to the reading!

2009-05-13T11:25:00.001-07:00

I no longer have the Plague, and I am ready to rumble. My reading is BACK ON! I hope you can come. I will be sharing insider-only information on the making of the book - like what snacks I like to eat in bed, and exclusive, totally true stories, like the time my mom stabbed the Pillsbury Doughboy at my brothers seventh birthday party.

WHEN: MAY 26th at 7:30 pm
WHERE: Magers and Quinn Bookstore, Minneapolis
WHAT: Reading for JENNIFER JOHNSON IS SICK OF BEING SINGLE
WHY: First/only reading of the book. FREE and drinks afterwards!

TWEET!

2009-05-10T18:29:00.000-07:00

Follow Follow on Twitter!

Man Down

2009-05-05T00:03:00.000-07:00

Buy my weird short story for .49 cents! This short story has it all! A hot sultry night in Savannah, a nearly-ruined pigeon, and one of my most poignant memories.My very first story on the Amazon Short Storyprogram! I am very excited. Imagine, for just .49 (cents) you can further unlock the secrets of my sick mind. To download the story (It's addictive!)you can click here or you can cut and paste this:

link:">http://www.amazon.com/Man-Down/dp/B000KX0IWM/ref=pd_rhf_p_1/103-4320261-9405462">

Heather McElhatton Speaks About Man Down:I was having dinner at a friend's house in Savannah, when we noticed a pigeon stuck in the tar on the asphalt beneath us. It was obviously hurt and upset, and yet no one at the party wanted to get up to help it. We went around the table and came up with excuses as to why it didn't matter, how we couldn't really help anyway. Everyone had a different idea of what to do. One person thought killing it was the most merciful. Another thought we should call the police. Then one someone said, "Oh to hell with it," and jumped up with his fork to go pry the pigeon free himself. This was a war he was going to fight. That fascinates me - which battles we choose to fight and which we walk past. There's a hundred little wars a day, and we each choose what to tackle. We can't take on everything - after all, it's the little things that kill you.

2009-05-04T00:39:00.000-07:00

There's nothing like the moment you first see your book on a table in a bookstore. In this case, the good people at Barnes and Noble Calhoun Village in Minneapolis were the first in the nation to crack open a box of Jennifer Johnson is Sick of Being Single.

For an author the sensation of "First Sighting" is strange, you look at your novel on the counter and it's as though you left your underwear out in the open...an unmentionable you never meant for others to look at and you have to fight the momentary urge to scoop up all your bastard copies and flee. But then you swallow hard, exhale and say "Okay. Here goes nothing." Then you (profusely) thank the booksellers and go have a goldfish-bowl sized glass of wine. I don't drink much anymore, so for me it's an herbal tea, but still. Any tonic for the nerves.

Taiwan News

2009-04-13T07:08:00.000-07:00

This is a newspaper in Taiwan, and they asked celebrities to read Pretty Little Mistakes and see what ending they got. I can't translate too much of it, but I hope no one got the monkey sex.

2009-04-13T07:05:00.000-07:00

Thank you Happy Reading Club! The Happy Reading Club in Taipei is meeting and studying Pretty Little Mistakes for the entire month of April. I am honored beyond belief!

2009-04-06T09:15:00.000-07:00

HELLO SANXING BRANCH OF THE TAIPEI PUBLIC LIBRARY!

Tonight the Sanxing branch of the Taipei Public Library will be studying Pretty Little Mistakes. I wish I was there! I actually tried to find a plane ticket last minute to join them, but getting to China isn't is easy as it should be. Plus I'd want to take my Pug, Walter, and that would be a whole other obstacle, although if I could get him there he would probably become an international celebrity.

The library is located at: 4-5F No.6, Lane 156, Wuxing Street in downtown Taipei.

2009-02-23T13:37:00.000-08:00

Glitter Writing

2009-01-15T05:30:00.000-08:00

I wonder if she did this glitter thing to her vagina too. What if we were all jewel encrusted? blue diamonds on eyelids, crystal teeth, quartz hips, ruby lips, long braids of swinging rhinestones for hair. Shiny but scratchy. Bleedy. Rippy. Perhaps jewels are best left on magazine pages and in the earth.

Anyway, have you guys ever written for screen? It's a strange thing, to change your storytelling format. Many think you can't go from one to another, from fiction to screenwriting or poetry to documentary etc...and I can see why. It's like using totally different DNA to build the story.

I have all the books, Robert McKee etc..and while one part of me solemnly understands screenplays are a science, an exact mathematical structure that breaks when tinkered with....another part of me thinks all these rules can go bite it right along with all these blustery old men who shovel them out. I don't like being told what to do. Does anybody?

I do like this book:
"Aristotle's Poetics forScreenwriters," by Michael Tierno.

Cow Pug

2008-12-22T02:21:00.000-08:00

Polish PLM

2008-12-16T17:27:00.000-08:00

The Polish Publisher MUSA released Pretty Little Mistakes, and I just got a copy in the mail. The title: Drobne błędy.

I LOVE the cover. Love it! So clever. Reminds me of the Matrix, when Keanu Reeves is asked if her wants the blue pill or the red pill. I looked up the book on the publishers site...and of course I don't undertsand a word, so I translated it using babelfish. This is apparently what it says:

The force Small mistakes are treated like adventure game, which further obstacles and events are determined in our elections. Regardless of whether or spontaneous, whether the industry will lead to a completely unexpected solutions. What would be useful if the author on the view Baccalaureate instead of the picturesque Italian went to England? Whether it is the only one that knows no reason for the journey. How many alternatives are likely to have the fate of one person? Full of fun stories novel Heather McElhatton is a relation of the extraordinary adventure that is life.

Bablefish translates the title as: PETTY CASH PALES, which frankly, is a better title.

Chinese PLM

2008-11-18T12:45:00.000-08:00

I got my copies of the Chinese edition of Pretty Little Mistakes in the mail today. I cannot read a word! Now I have to sit down and finish Million Little Mistakes, which I have promised you all ASAP.

Goin to Hollywood...

2008-11-06T10:03:00.001-08:00

Very exiting news from the Hollywood Reporter:

NBC sets sights on 'Mistakes'
Network developing series based on McElhatton's novel
By Kimberly Nordyke

Oct 30, 2008, 12:00 AM ET
NBC is developing an hourlong drama based on the "do-over" novel "Pretty Little Mistakes," with "Friday Night Lights" showrunner Jason Katims supervising the project from the writing team of Bruce Marshall Romans and Kiersten Van Horne.

"Mistakes," from Universal Media Studios, is based on the novel by Heather McElhatton that lets readers decide which path the female protagonist will take at the end of each chapter. It starts out with a high school graduation, after which the reader makes one of two possible choices -- college or travel -- ultimately leading to 150 possible endings.

The project, which has received a script commitment from NBC, will reflect the readers'-choice sensilbity of the book, but producers are still in the formative stages of working out the logistics.

Katims is attached as an executive producer and will supervise development of the script. Fuse Entertainment's Mikkel Bondensen and Kristen Campo (USA's "Burn Notice") are attached as executive producer and producer, respectively.

Fox previously tried its hand at a scripted viewers'-choice project in 2001 with "Nathan's Choice," a comedy from Chuck Lorre that would have featured viewers voting online or by phone from one of two choices the protagonist would face in each episode. "Choice" got only as far as the pilot stage.

Roman and Van Horne, who previously created and penned the pilot scripts "The Track" for FX and "Pushed" for Fox, are repped by APA and New Wave Entertainment. Katims is repped by CAA. McElhatton is with APA. Fuse, which also has a first-look deal at Fox TV Studios, is repped by Endeavor.

FINALLY!

2008-10-27T11:03:00.000-07:00

It's Finally done! My second book! It was like giving birth to the Chrysler building, or pushing a watermelon through a shopping cart. The most painful and yet oddly hypnotic experience you can imagine. It's available May 5th in stores, but you can preorder now! Here's the more official blurb. Enjoy!

Jennifer Johnson is Sick of Being Single
by Heather McElhatton
Published by: HarperCollins
Available: May 5th, 2009 or PREORDER

Quirky, retro-junk loving Jennifer Johnson wanted to marry a wealthy man and write the great American novel, but instead she's approaching her thirties, still single and working in the marketing department of a mid-range Christian department store writing ads for mens black dress socks.

When she finds out her little sister AND her ex-boyfriend are both getting married on Valentines Day (not to each other, but still) she decides she must find true love...at any cost. So ensues a series of the most painful online dates imaginable, including a pudgy lawyer telling her to lose weight and a dashing Xerox salesman listening to her make up incredible lies.Then she meets Brad Keller...the store president's handsome son.

In an attempt to win him over, she makes herself over completely, experiences an embarrassing moment with a ceramic elf, shows violent behavior towards her beloved doll house and the small inhabitants inside.

Worst of all, she develops an addiction to Cinnabons so severe, that the Cinnabon counter girl knows her by name.

Told in McElhatton's dark comedic voice, this is a cautionary tale of sex, survival and how getting everything you want might be the worst thing that ever happened to you. In stores May 5th, 2009.

I can die happy now. For reals. Kisses to Hans.

2008-09-23T00:10:00.000-07:00

As a writer you get used to criticism, as Heather McElhatton, you get used to a LOT of criticism. I don't know if it's because the book is an alternate format, or if the chic-lit packaging offends blue bloods, or if the monkey sex scene and attacks on the catholic cult...I mean catholic church...offend the religious-right-whites or quite possibly the writing really just does suck, an idea that has fair weight, but I've been told my book is awful, terrible, no good and belongs in the sewer, or something lower and uckier than the sewer, if I can find it.

so it's nice when people alert me to nice reviews. Sigh. Like sweet cinnamonny-goodness. Almost makes the Christian moms book group who voted my book "most offensive to moms" bearable.

Taken from Hans's Blog:
_________________________________________________________
Good writers write to put books on the shelf that they haven't seen before. And sometimes the more motivated amongst us actually thrill the rest of the pack with that little gimmicky book we always dreamed about but seemed like too much effort. THANK YOU, HEATHER, for taking the labor off me and delighting me.
One of my first defining entries into reading in English was the "Young Indiana Jones Chronicles/ Choose Your Own Adventure" books. That was the kind of shameless but thrilling capitalistic cash-in that I'd been deprived of all my life and Gosh did I take to it like KRAZY! You could CHOOSE where the book went! CHOICES! There weren't a heck of a lot of choices in Cuba, I'm sure you can glean that.
So what do we have here?
A "Do Over" Novel with 150 endings. You start out as a girl just off high school and you can choose to either go to college or travel around a little. Say you go to college- do you major in arts or sciences? Okay, suppose you go with science. Do you devote yourself to working for your brilliant-but-heartless boss in his search for a killer laser signal that will stop hearts from beating from a mile away? Or do you steal the secret and sell it to the highest bidder? And then, well, guess what, on the way to the secret meet up that will make you a millionaire some drunken asshole on an RV rams into you and sends you and your killer laser secret to an early grave.

Or you could end up a happy matron in Italy.
A suicidal rock star.
A transexual granny in Maryland.

It's real easy to misunderstand this book, and not get it. If you just dip in and read one life or two, you might smirk- I went to Amazon and look at this, from Kirkus Reviews:

"[A]n occasionally clever book that will appeal only to a very limited audience of grown-up readers who are unfazed by its methodology....Interesting to read for about ten minutes, but some things really are just for kids."

Obviously the reviewer did only devote ten minutes or so to the book, and failed to notice the wealth of subtle wisdom and intelligent writing and cumulative power that this singular book has... because you CAN tooootally end up in a chick-lit life in Tuscany where you have to choose between Paolo the gardener with the big dick but no money, or 60 year old Arnaldo with his hands in all sort of pies.
This book COULD be a Cosmo diversion.
But that may be because you didn't read about the life that you spent in Iceland studying the old sagas and being accused of withcraft... or the life where you settle down with a big fat Aristotle-quoting trucker that cusses like his mama never taught him any better but is the REAL LOVE OF YOUR LIFE.
Or hell, you could be a homeless lady in Atlanta.
Or... Travel again, take detours, let yourself end up where you didn't think you might have.
It looks like chick lit, it's wrapped like chick lit, and it seems like it's a pain to explore, but Heather McElhatton has actually written a wise, funny, sad, novel about LIFE- and I have a TOTAL mind-crush on this woman.
Very, very entertaining, and only as superficial as you want it to be.
Bravo.
(A typical "doesn't-get-it" bad review on Amazon?) "I tried and a lot of those lives ended with a creepy death!"
Yeeeeeeeeeees ma'am.
Your life is going to end up in a creepy death too.
THAT'S LIFE!!!

Walter plays nice...for now...

2008-08-11T16:48:00.000-07:00

Larkin gave me the most adorable littl eredheaded oll, and here is Walter being all sweet and cheerful near her. I hesitate to leave them alone however...image of the great Big Pig massacre still echo...

Passion Meets Purpose

2008-08-07T14:45:00.000-07:00

Someone sent me this lovely Passion Meets Purpose article on PLM

Make More Pretty Little Mistakes - I Dare You
Passionate Theme of the Day: Pretty Little Mistakes

“A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.” ~James Joyce

“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” ~Albert Einstein

“I never make stupid mistakes. Only very, very clever ones.”~ John Peel

Mistakes. That’s the PMP topic of choice today. What the hell is a mistake anyway? A quick Google search finds this little ditty of a definition: “A wrong action attributable to bad judgment or ignorance or inattention”.

Have you ever used bad judgment or been ignorant or not been paying close enough attention? I know I have. So why all the hang up about making mistakes? Our western culture gets so hung up about not making mistakes. Being “perfect” (whatever that is) has become another addiction. Another source of anxiety and stress. The latest form of self-abuse.

What if we stopped worrying so much about making mistakes and just started living more dangerously? Not like stupid dangerous. I’m not taking about stepping out in front of moving vehicles dangerous. Not recommending running with scissors in a daycare or anything. I simply mean lightening up and taking some risks.

Today’s post was inspired by this video interview on Borders.com. Author Heather McElhatton wrote a “do over book for adults” called Pretty Little Mistakes. (I haven’t actually read the book yet, but now it’s on my list.) Remember those books when we were kids that had multiple endings? It’s like that.

Apparently McElhatton took six years off to write her great American novel and it was a total flop. She didn’t date, quit her full-time job, moved back in with her mom and spent all her free time writing. Six years later, somewhere near the age of 30, she shopped it around and didn’t get a single nibble. No takers. Zip. Zero. Nada. Big fat goose egg.

What was the prize inside that six year “mistake”? Acording to her, she hauled ass up to the attic (after she hauled her ass out of the puddle of tears on the bathroom floor) and found a linoleum remnant. She grabbed a couple of sharpie markers and used her makeshift whiteboard to mind-map/time-line her life all the way back to high school. That was the last time she remembered feeling like she knew where she was at (you folks from STL know how we love to end sentences with prepositions...it’s in my blood people). Where she remembered thinking, “OK...I’m finished with school. Now I can either…go to college or marry so and so, or blah blah blah…”.

Then she played out the different endings as if she had taken different paths. (Reminds me of the movie Sliding Doors with Gwyneth Paltrow). So she fictionalized her multiple different endings and wrote THAT book. Sure she stumbled, but she didn’t let it keep her down.

If McElhatton hadn’t made that “mistake” she never would have white boarded out the idea for the book that DID get published. The one that DID resonate with publishers. The one that landed her the interview I saw on Borders.com and the one that got her two more book deals in the works.

Mistake? Nuh-uh. It was all part of the birthing process. Maybe she needed to get that first book out of her system to create the space for the “real one” to cultivate. Sometimes we’re in such a hurry to get “there”. We often overlook the stepping stones (that often are disguised as boulders, mountains, asteroids or cosmic blockage) that are simply part of the creative process.

I had a similar conversation with my friend Katie tonight about her hopes and dreams for her future and her business (and mine too). I remember telling her that everything she desires is already there. She just needs to step into it one day at a time. (Member THAT show? That’s another post).

It’s already on the map. She’s simply not clocked enough mileage to be at that destination point yet. The cool thing is (like McElhatton’s book) is that at any point Katie (or any of us) can turn, slow down, speed up, join up with fellow travelers, stop to camp and roast some marshmallows, star gaze, bird watch, meditate, go for a hike or skinny dip in a swimming hole along the way.

These places are our choice points. Forks in the road. Bends in the path. Occasionally we hit a pothole. Or a road closed sign. Or construction. But that’s all part of the adventure. I’m excited to read McElhatton’s book and see how many different ending’s I can try on for size.

What part of your story is unfolding? And if you’re less than satisfied, what choices can you make to change it? Which fellow traveler might you be able to hitch a ride with? Do you need to slow down? Speed up? Stop and smell the roses? Are you even on the road?

If you don’t have a map and are in need of some clarification send me an e-mail, I’m happy to lend you my flashlight…it’s kind of my thing. Maybe that’s a new branding statement for me… “Have flashlight. Will travel.”

Be well happy travelers. Make mistakes. Many. Lots. Zillions. If you’re not busy living in the here and now...falling down, getting back up and dusting your butt off again and again...what are you doing? Playing it safe? Is there such a thing? Live safely dangerous. It’s the only way to fly.

Peace, passion and one for the road,
Kam

PLM in Miami Herald

2008-07-08T14:00:00.000-07:00

I saw this charming piece on PLM in the Miami Herald today. A literary vending machine has such a nice ring to it...and the different details connected from vastly different parts of the book are wonderful to see. I love Maggie-Me two-minute noodles. They are double fun!

THE PROMISCUOUS PALATE | BY DINKINISH O'CONNOR
Spend your rebate check on simple pleasures
Posted on Tue, Jul. 08, 2008reprint print email
Facebook Digg del.icio.us AIM
BY DINKINISH O'CONNOR
promiscuouspalate@yahoo.com

NONE / DINKINISH O'CONNOR | FOR THE MIAMI HERALD
The book Pretty Little Mistakes is like a literary vending machine where you -- the main character -- choose from 150 succulent endings. You'll eat Maylay apples and shrimp curries in Port Antonio, Jamaica, or you'll move to Malaysia as a volunteer for Green Peace, eating Maggie Me two-minute noodles and discovering ``Happiness like a raw strawberry bursting in your mouth.''

Even though it might seem that our car's $4-plus per gallon gas diet has taken more priority than our own, we cannot neglect the simple indulgences that make these inconveniences more palatable.

Unlike Heather McElhatton's do-over novel, you only get one chance to spend your rebate check. This week The Palate offers rebate-spending ideas that might add a little twist to your summer menu.

Read the rest of the article

Welcome Sun Color Publishing!

2008-07-04T02:06:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Sun Color Publisher! Thank you for publishing my book and letting it stream into the streets of Taiwan, Hong Kong and Marcow! My editor, Mina Ho has asked me to right a preface for the Taiwanese edition, which I will gladly do. She told me Ya-Wen did a superb job keeping the tone of the book authentic, a very hard thing to do when you're switching languages. So well done Sun Color!

Ya-Wen!

2008-07-03T11:11:00.000-07:00

Meet Ya-Wen, my wonderful Chinese Translator! She is translating Pretty Little Mistakes into complex-chinese. She lives in Taiwan with her dog, May Johnson. ("May" means "beauty", and "May Johnson" is a brand of milk powder.) I can't tell you how amazing it is to meet these wonderful people from all over the world who take your work and translate it, making it possible for other readers, who might not have been able to access it before. PLM will be launched in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Marcow this August, by Sun Color Publishers and edited by Miss Mina Ho. I'll have a link up when it's ready!

Cabin Writing

2008-06-21T19:14:00.001-07:00

I have been working on a new novel, called Average American Female. Since I've been working in a little log cabin in the woods, I decided to make my process more "cabiny." I block the whole book out into scenes, put those scenes on colored index cards (different card for each location) and then when I've written the scene, I cover the card with a river rock. Very satisfying. Oh and here's my desk with Walter in the always-nearby chair. He likes to be nearby so when he breaks wind he has an audience.

Urban Outfitters has PLM!

2008-05-19T12:52:00.000-07:00

Hey, you can now officially buy PLM at any Urban Outfitters. Great for when you want a new funky afghan, a day-glo shower curtain and some cheeky books! (My book is the one on, erm, on the bottom there. The one with the colorful spine being crushed by all the other more esteemed periodicals.)

Youcan also go here and order it online with other chic things.

Dedications

2008-04-04T08:55:00.000-07:00

Someone emailed me and asked who "Correne" was, which is who I dedicated the book to. The truth is I had never met Correne before the book was published and this photo here is the first time we got to meet - which was the night of my book launch (A million and ten thanks MPLS Public Library! You rock!)

Anyway, when dedicating the book, I wanted to "give it" to someone important, and Correne is important, not just to me but to hundreds of her friends, family and music students. She had an advanced form of cancer, and was in chronic bad ass pain. The one thing that could take her mind off this pain, was reading.

She was (is) a voracious reader. Her nephew had found a few of my short stories on line and gave them to her to read. (At this point I had never been published "officially" but had some shorts up on the fabulous site www.failbetter.com)

He emailed me and asked for more and more, saying that my writing, for whatever reason, helped ease her pain in particular, and while who knew why - they just needed more.

This is where I want to pause and say that in every writers life, there will be those people who inexplicably believe in you. Who for no reason of blood ties or friendship or kindness find your work something they need to have...and for whatever reason, it eases their pain. These people will be who you truly, really ultimately write for, and so when you find your first "fan," (Hardly the word for it, but for lack of anything better...) you kinda sorta fall in mad hurt-deep love with them.

I was so inspired to write for this stranger, and I wanted to thank her, so I dedicated my first book to her. Now the problem is - who does the next one go to? My family is already making demands....

Lie To Me...

2008-03-22T12:37:00.000-07:00

My name isn't Heather Elaine McElhatton. I was born Heather Elaine Pedersen and then adopted by my semi-evil stepfather who legally changed my name, so my birth record now says he's my biological father, but he isn't. Legally I mean.

My biological father is Arthur Pedersen, but I couldn't prove that to you with any state documents. He's been dead for twenty years and his name has been stricken from all legal records. He doesn't exist except in my memory, and if someone wanted to fact-check this, they couldn't.

So what is the truth? Who is my father? There's my personal version, and Cook County's legal version, and the two ain't friendly.

As a citizen of flexible truth, I want to go on tedious record as being generally jubilant over watching the slow demise of the "accurate memoir."

James Frey was whip-switched on national TV for exaggerating his addiction, Margaret B. Jones drawn and quartered over weaving a story so visceral it fooled everyone from her publisher to the LA Times, and now Sebastian Horsley was denied entry into America because the facts in his sin-festooned memoir could not be proven or disproven when customs Googled him.

Liars liars everywhere! Forget Frey's book helped thousands of addicts until Oprah castrated him! Forget Jones was praised for her lyrical writing until we found out she wasn't actually a criminal and didn't really own a blood-soaked bandana! Now it's bad writing! Trash!

Only - aren't we killing the leopard because of his spots? The essential nature of the nasty beasty? We're writers. Born liars. People who get their moral turpitudes in a bunch over "untrue" memoirs are living in some alternate fairy tale land where there is only one truth and one truth only. As we all know, there are many truths, multiplying every second and giving birth to new demon baby truths. Your truth isn't my truth and Sebastian Horsley's truth is bloody fun to read, whether it's true or not.

And this is where I'm going to stand firm. Don't take a good story away from me. I don't care if it's true or untrue, fiction, non-fiction or a stained Cuisinart manual. I don't care if you file it the "Super True" or "Kinda True" or "Whopper Lies" section of the bookstore. If it's a good story, I want to read it. To swallow it whole, pretty little lies and all. I don't care what plate my meal is plunked down on or if the waiter tells me it's hot. Just gimmee.

All this hoopla over Margaret B. Jones' book, and now I can't even buy it? I'm enraged. That is my spectacle to behold. My disaster to gawk at. Her publisher had no right to take a tasty treat away from me. If I want to spend $14.95 on a pack-o-lies, then I should be able to. I can still buy a carton of Marlboro Reds and a pint of Smirnoff for the road, so why not a paper wad of sweet sweet cinnamon lies?

“It’s better to be quotable than honest,” Horsley told Time Out London in February. “I don’t speak, I quote. I am a fraud. I have cobbled together my personality from hundreds of little bits. I am simultaneously the most genuine and the most artificial person you will ever meet.”

Full disclosure: Sebastian Horsley and I have the same publisher at HarperCollins. When Carrie Kania discovered the manuscript last year, she sent me an early review copy and it never even occurred to me to ask if it was "true." I guess because I didn't care, and don't care and won't. It's a great story either way, and the label someone slaps on it means nothing.

If a book makes me feel something, then that emotion is true to me. That writing transported me somewhere I hadn't been before, and I don't need to know if it "actually happened." It actually happened on paper, and that’s good enough. Better than good enough. It's brilliant, because if a liar can lie so well s/he fools everyone, shouldn't we be issuing some kind of an award, rather than apologizing?

“God bless America," Horsley said, "land of the free, but sadly not the land of the depraved.” He noted the resignation of Eliot Spitzer, former governor of New York, in the wake of his prostitute procurement plan. “I’m not a politician, I’m an artist,” Mr. Horsley said. “Depravity is part of the job description.”

Kania had planned a big party for Horsley in New York, and when she got the phone call from Newark saying, "They won't let him in," she threw the party anyway. After all, HarperCollins still had a lot to celebrate. Not just the publication of a great book, but the accidental marketing strategy of the year. The good old reliable INS in its attempt to keep depravity out of the country - just made it a best seller.

PLM HITS UK!

2008-03-18T21:26:00.000-07:00

It's official, my book is now available in stores in England. I went to college for a time at the University of London, where I studied creative writing, and so to have it all come full circle is absolutely fabulous!

And you have to check out this amazing website Headline put together:www.prettylittlemistakes.co.uk
Forget Tarot and I-Ching, You can roll the Magic 8-Ball and get a fast fortune!!! I'm told it's eerily accurate!!

SPECIAL THANK YOU TO COOL BRITIANIAN PEE-PO's:

Everyone at Headline Publishing Group, the coolest publisher you can imagine! In particular Harriet Evans, Helena Towers and Angie Solomon. They make publishing look easy.

The BBC covered PLM on their great show "Open Book." You can listen to it here:http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/openbook

Trashionista did a swell interview here:
http://www.trashionista.com/2008/03/author-intervie.html

Waterstones and WHSmith bought a massive ton of books! Waterstones is making PLM their feature paperback! Say What? Damn, I'm moving to England.

If You Only Believe One Thing, Believe This:

2008-03-18T21:09:00.000-07:00

From Minerva Cuevas
(NOTE: The "swastika" sign, once used by Nazi's, was originally a Native American symbol for good luck. I believe this is the definition the artist intended.)

MN Book Awards

2008-03-05T12:05:00.000-08:00

Hello Wonderful People!

The Minnesota Book Awards are here and we the people get to vote for our favorite book. Now I just HAPPEN to be one of the nominee's. It's a coincidence really, There are some amazing books on the line up. I just wanted to point out that there is a voting page here:
http://www.twincities.com/bookawards
So if you have time ma peeps, please click on the link and vote! Feel free to pass this along to anyone feeling clicky! I needs ya!
http://www.twincities.com/bookawards

相当小的差错

2008-01-09T04:07:00.000-08:00

Pretty Little Mistakes sold in Taiwan!!!! It will be translated into Mandarin and my contract says I get THREE copies! I better quick learn the language so I can make sure the translation is accurate.

相当小的差错 + PRETTY LITTLE MISTAKES

Now where are you Japan?

Home Again

2008-01-05T15:24:00.000-08:00

Back from Christmas in Jamaica! highlights were: playing dominos by candlelight during an electrical storm, seeing an actual baptism by the river, walking up a clear turqouise blue river and standing under a thundering waterfall, drinking coconut Rum and pineapple juice, a drink we named "Countryman" after our driver, who took us to the bar which made us this tasty treat. Countryman also met Bob Marley (who he calls "Prophet") once and got him some "smokes."

The best part of the trip though was going to the Negril library and giving them not only a copy of my book, but far better, all the children's books we brought. The librarians didn't know what to make of the piles of books we kept marching through the door. Shipping is the biggest expense in any overseas donation, and so hand delivering books is actually the cheapest way to get them there. It was great. I encourage anyone going on vacation to Jamaica (or any other community in need) to bring books. Especially children's books, which are always in demand.

Letter

2007-12-16T18:38:00.000-08:00

Someone sent me this link to Fly Me To The Moon.

pretty little mistakes

yesterday my friend let me borrow a book called pretty little mistakes. it's like a grown up version of the choose your own adventure books and was very interesting. i read several versions. in my favorite one i ended up traveling the world on a ship and falling in love with a man named joel who also worked on the ship and we were together for our whole lives. then when i died (you die in every ending), i was reincarnated, but in every life joel and i found each other. it was quite poetic and touching. some of the other endings were not so poetic. in one of them i became, quite literally a nude circus freak who wore a chicken head while i skated around to perform. in another one i had some sort of drunken lesbian experience, and most of them involved at least some things i would never do.

but it was quite interesting to be faced with different choices, some that i have already faced in the past, but would do differently now, some that i wouldn't, some choices that i never knew existed, and to see what my attitudes were and what the consequences could possibly be. obviously the book only showed some of the possibly consequences of choices, but still, once you make a decision or choice, life is never the same.

anyway, then i was pondering today about my upcoming 30th birthday (yikes!) and i was also thinking about how practically everyone i know is pregnant, and then i got to thinking, had i stayed with a certain boyfriend a good 3 years ago (wow), and gotten married like we had talked about, there is a good chance that i could be pregnant or have a baby right now. i have never really thought about it that way. weird. of course i would likely be the same a different person that i am now, and i don't really like that girl very much, so i am pretty happy about how things are going right now. but as i shop for baby clothes for everyone, it is a unique thought, i suppose that it really could have been me.

How Does A Book Get On The Bestseller List?

2007-12-12T01:14:00.000-08:00

I had to snag this from bestselling author's Tess Gerritsen's blog, because it's the best explanation of a question I get asked alot: "How Does A Book Get On The Bestseller List?"

Does the bestseller list reflect books actually SOLD?

Friday, Jul 20th, 2007 @ 09:04 am

Among the comments I received for my last blogpost was this question from JMH (thanks for the great question!): “I’ve always been confused as to whether the numbers reflect books sold to the bookstores or sold from bookstores to customers. Every once in a while I see a comment that a book will come out as #8 on the list, and a single one hasn’t yet been sold to a customer.”
The answer is: the lists reflect books sold to consumers, not merely ordered by bookstores.

It’s an old and stubbornly believed myth that the bestseller list is really about how many copies are ordered by stores. In truth, the list is all about the velocity of retail sales for that particular week. A store could order 100,000 copies but if not a single one sells to a customer, that book will not be on the list. And the publisher will be in big trouble. (Which happens more often than the industry likes to admit.)

That said, a large order will help boost sales. Remember my earlier post on the importance of the printrun? A big printrun, and a display with tall stacks of a particular title, means consumers are more likely to see the book and pick it up. But they actually have to BUY the book for it to register on the bestseller lists.

Another myth that’s been floating around is that a book can hit the NYT list before it even goes on sale. Not true. The confusion, I think, is because of the timing of that list. Let’s say your book goes on sale on Day One. Sales are tallied up through Day Seven. The NYT gets back its reports from stores on Day Eight. On Day Ten, a Wednesday, the NYT finalizes its list and faxes it out to the industry, publishers and agents alike, usually in the late afternoon. Everyone involved is notified and champagne corks pop. Even though everyone already knows the book will be a bestseller, the actual printed list doesn’t appear in the Sunday Book Review until DAY TWENTY ONE! That’s twenty one days after the book went on sale.

This leads to the peculiar situation of the author knowing he’s going to be on the list a week and a half before the general public. If the book gets on the list after the first week on sale, you’ll sometimes see an ad that hails the title as an ”Instant NYT bestseller!” way before the actual bestseller list appears in print. As a result, it seems as if the author and publisher have “inside information” or the “fix was in” or “it must have been all those copies ordered.”
No, it really is book sales. True, not all sales (such as libraries and grocery stores) are counted. But it IS sales. To consumers.

Do the questions still come?

2007-11-18T21:19:00.001-08:00

Bonnie in Maryland asks:

I absolutely LOVE the concept of the book. First of all, I was completely hooked on the Choose Your Own Adventure books. Secondly, I have found myself asking myself that what if question just a little too often. HOW did I end up divorced at 26? WHY am I now so happy in a relationship with a guy I knew when I was 16? Could I have skipped the 10 years of marriage drama? Would I have still gone on to college? Would I be a teacher? Would I have been something else? How did I move away from my hometown at 19, and end up back here 7 years later? On and on. Sorry if that was too much info. I'm venting a bit, I think.I've read a few articles about the book (that's actually how I first learned about it) and I wonder - do those questions still come to you, or was writing the book one of those cathartic things where you just kind of pushed it all out?

Dear Bonnie,

Writing the book taught me something huge and definite. you're EXACTLY where you should be, and if you'd made different decisions, you'd probably have ended with your face blown off (God forbid) But seriously, it's so easy to think you could have just "skipped ahead" to the easy part...but who knows what horrors you also skipped over, because you didn't skip ahead? Would you have known this new man (old love) was THE man without all the other trials and travails?would you appreciate a or b or c if ex hubby hadn't been d or e or f? I think slyly, we weave our worlds with the precision of clockmakers, and even though it seems we stumble, there's an inner compass that does not, can not, will not fail. sail forth...

xoxoxoH

When you read our books, you save our lives.

2007-11-07T11:43:00.001-08:00

Oh I was having the worst day today. Spiraling down into the "stupid stupid world!" meanies, when I got the lovliest email...which turned everything around. I guess I wanted to publish this letter not to toot my own horn, but to show you that readers have direct and deep effects on writers. We do not live in a bubble, we are you, you are us, and when you "get" what we write, well, that's why we're doing what we do. Thats why we put up with the eye-blinding depressions and the suffocating panic attacks and the endless public critcism and our parents being worried about us 100% of the time. For this letter. So thanks J - I guess I'll sit down and write today after all.

Hi Heather- I just wanted to write to say how amazing I thought your book Pretty Little Mistakes is. In late August my fiancé and I were preparing for our wedding and honeymoon. We decided to go to Borders to choose books, magazines, etc. for our two week honeymoon in Greece. As a self-proclaimed unenthusiastic reader, I usually peruse Borders while the fiancé buys everything in sight (he's a super avid reader). I noticed your book on a table because of the pretty cover (hey, I'm being honest here) and started to read the back cover. When I realized it was similar to a choose your own adventure I was immediately smitten (as a kid I think I read every one). I bought the book and actually looked forward to reading it. Once we got on the plane and settled in I started to read, and re-read, and re-read. Finally my new husband turned to me and said he'd never seen me read so much and so intently - he inquired what the book was about. As I explained it to him, he said let me try, with that, it became a back and forth for the rest of the trip - on the plane, on the beach, by the pool, in the room...we just kept reading story after story and comparing them. Today at work I was on a bit of an attention break when I decided to look your book up on Amazon to see what others are saying, and if there's another book coming out. To my excitement there is (can't wait for a Million Little Mistakes) and I came upon this website. I can't even get over how many endings we never came to - I will have to tell him when I get home tonight and pick it back up for more reads. I would definitely love to be added to your mailing list and if you are going to be in New York please let me know. I don't know if you ever grab coffee or a drink with a reader but if you do, we'd love to take you out! I love the linoleum chart - you should totally tour with it if possible. My favorite part of the book is how if you choose the decision that it "correct" by social standards you don't always end up happy or in a good situation and if you choose the "wrong" decision you often end up happy and live a long life (I loved smuggling the coins in the bread)!Anyway thanks for writing!

- J (New York)

50,000 sold

2007-11-05T02:30:00.000-08:00

http://www.smokeyandthefoukemonster.com/about1.html

You have so many questions when you publish your book, and almost nobody knows what to tell you. Like "How many books have we sold?"

I have been told 50,000 copies of Pretty Little Mistakes have sold, and since I am a backwaters right-brained dyslexic idiot, you can tell me "50,000" anything, like "I have a 50,000 nest egg," and I'm probably picturing a single Faberge egg or an egg salad sandwich, who knows. I need to SEE it, so I image-googled "50,000 books" and found this:

"50,000 books would make a stack about a mile high. I say "about" because I don't know exactly how much the weight of books would compress the bottom most books in the stack, thereby reducing the stack height from what would be indicated by simple measurement and multiplication.It would take a bit of figuring to get a precise answer but "a mile" will do for a rough approximation." This excerpt taken from John Elder Robison's blog at:

http://jerobison.blogspot.com/2007/10/whats-it-like-to-sell-50000-books.html

A MILE OF PRETTY LITTLE MISTAKES! I like that idea. I also like what writer Smokey Crabtree did. He's selling books, but only two books - and he wrote them both.

IS "BIGFOOT" DEAD? CHECK OUT SMOKEY'S OPINION BY CLICKING HERE.

2007-10-31T21:19:00.000-07:00

Storyteller Kevin Kling has just published his long-awaited for debut, The Dog Says How.

I first heard Kevin Kling on National Public Radio a decade ago. He was reading one of his haunting and hysterical commentaries, and it was a "pull the car over to listen" moment. I was hooked from that point on. Since then I've tracked down every one of his live performances, on-air interviews and unforgettable commentaries that I could find. I kept thinking, "but when will he write a book? when will he write a book?" Finally he has written a book, this marvelous book, and I have ordered not only a copy for myself, but ten other copies for Christmas Presents. I cannot freaking wait.

Please vote for Walter Biggie Smalls

2007-10-24T21:05:00.001-07:00

Walter is in a photo contest, and if he wins $1,000 dollars goes to pug rescue!!! So if you have time, please stop by http://tinyurl.com/2eu26j and click on walter's photo (as above.) His name is Walter Biggie Smalls, and you can vote every day! click on Wally, save a life!

(You have to sign up to vote, but you don't have to give a valid email. They don't email you andyou still get to save a pugs life!)

#99 in the world...for...just...this...minute

2007-10-20T12:53:00.000-07:00

Of all the charming neurotic habits you pick up after getting your book published, one of them is to obsessively compulsively check your amazon ranking. Now, it isn't even an accurate indicator of how well your book is selling, as they can only check their own sales records and nobody elses, but I gotta tell you, I discovered http://www.titlez.com/ which is a site that tracks overall sales rankings, and you can see your best score (for me #1,734) to your worst score (371,00! ikes.)

But NOW, all of a sudden they are freaking tracking all their global sales (used to be just the USA) and due to the freaking great AP story, I am - this moment (and prolly not next) #60 in America (Just breneath John Stewart's Book) and #99 in the WORLD! (Above the Koran!) HAHA! I must savor this fleeting moment and pour champagne all over my naked body while zipping to and fro in the back yard!!!

Don't worry, crushing depression sure to return tomorrow. ;)

Pretty Little Mistakes

Product Details
Paperback: 512 pages
Publisher: Harper Paperbacks (May 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0061133221
ISBN-13: 978-0061133220
Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: based on 27 reviews. (Write a review.)
Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,875 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

#60 in Books > Literature & Fiction > United States
#85 in Books > Literature & Fiction > General > Literary
#99 in Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature

AP Reporters rock my world

2007-10-18T08:31:00.000-07:00

When you publish a book and you start to talk to reporters, at first you think everybody is your pal. They're all nice during the interview. What it's almost impossible to tell, is whether or not they actually like you/your book or if they're just being snake-charmer sweet to your face and going to eviscerate you in print. I've had it go both ways, and honestly, it's still somewhat shocking when you spend an hour with someone, bantering back and forth, and you sort of bond with them - but then they run and tell everyone sumpin' nasty. It's the minority of situations, but still, it makes you wary with all reporters.

That's why I would like to bow down in eternal praise to Jeff Baenen from the AP wire, who acted nice, and was nice, and said nice things about the book:

http://www.ocregister.com/entertainment/mcelhatton-says-little-1893700-pretty-mistakes

This was a big one, because newspapers all over the country (world) pick up AP wire stories. Als, thanks to Dawn Villella, the AP photographer, who managed to make me look not like the exhausted strung out lady I am! I highly recommend her for your wedding, your portrait or your AP wire piece. http://www.dawnvillella.com/

PHEW!

University Club Reading

2007-10-17T08:48:00.000-07:00

The initmate gathering last night at the Unversity Club was worthy of a fitzgerald/tennesee williams portrait. I and my fellow readers, Jim Leinfelder and Geoff Herbach, along with select others had dinner in the grand dining room overlooking the tennis courts, where F. Scott Fitzgerald is rumored to have vomited in the bushes. One senses when one is around greatness.
In keeping with the boys club I had a big ol steak, only I couldn't eat even half of it, so I felt a certain failure there.

Geoff read to the group from his forthcoming novel, which is a collection of (hysterical) suicide letters. Leinfelder, in the Irish brogue tradition, told old St. Paul yarns without of pen and paper...he just told us the most amazing stories from heart of growing up in St. Paul. To synopsize them would be unfair...the details were so amazing.

I did my usual deal, let the audience choose where to go, and fortunately the luck of the Irish was with us, and we landed in a great life in Italy. Many drinks were consumed. Afterwards Seamus and I, (hereafter known as "S") went to visit his best friend, a narcotics cop (eep!) who lives in the most gorgeous renovated "queer eyed for the straight guyed" apartment...but this guy was not gay, and he was a cop...so couldn't figure it out. It's funny how being around cops makes ypu nervous even when you have nothing to hide....but especially when you do. Not that I do, but you know what I mean.

Then, so the night was not too Irish, S and I went for Sushi and I had this wicked unfiltered Sake which gave me a wicked hangover. Bad enough, that when I stumbled into the kitchen this morning I saw someone had made sloppy Joes the night before. Sloppy Joes? Gross. High school cafeeria food. So I ate one. Then I ate another.

Now I have to lie down again. Great night tho!!! Thanks to all the kids for coming, and to Carol Connolly for putting the SASe event togetha....

I say, well done chaps.

2007-10-16T08:59:00.000-07:00

The paperback UK version of PLM came out this week, or is coming out soon, I can never remember the time difference. Anyway, isn't it CUTE?? I mean, little hypodermic needles and pills? I broken heart and a bra? I love it.

Thanks to all the lads and birds at Headline Publishing.
Well done.

I am a Discount Date

2007-10-15T22:09:00.000-07:00

So a very nice man working with one of our local Ronald McDonald houses emailed and asked if I would donate "a dinner with Heather McElhatton" for their charity auction. I said...um....sure.
He said they hoped to get $300 for the item, (me) and that seemed steep to me, considering my family and friends don't pay anything. Turns out I was right. I don't know what makes me laugh harder about this (lovely) email...that I'm discounted or that I was on the miscellaneous table next to a snow blower.
___________________________________________

H;

We did much better than $15 for a dinner with Heather, but not the $300 goal I had set.
Someone has donated $205 to enjoy time visiting with you. My clandestine plan was to get down there early enough to bump up the bids, but I was delayed when one of my dogs became ill. I got down to The Depot and the Ron House Gala just 10 minutes before they started shutting down the bids. It just wouldn't have been fair to those who had been bidding the last hour to just trump their $ number for the sake of raising the bid. It would have been awkward to tell you I was the high bidder.
So when I have the name of the individual, contact information, etc., I'll run an FBI and Interpol check on them, as Mr. Bush does.
You and the bidder can determine a great restaurant (I won't cover airfare anywhere) to meet. The bidder can let me know where and I'll set it up with a credit card.

For what it's worth, nearly all bids were down on everything this year. Even Don Shelby's Dinner Backstage at 'CCO only brought $300 (of the $450- asked), so $205 wasn't bad. And the McElhatton item was on a non-themed, misc. table, next to a snow blower and a ladies night spa. What we all learned for next year is that they want to expand to an exclusive table for bidding on sharing time with local notables; authors, artists, TV and radio folk, journalists, Guthrie and other theatre people, etc. So we broke ground and we all appreciate your willingness to participate.

Somewhere down the line later this Fall or Winter, and at your convenience, grab your guy and I'll pop for dinner at YOUR favorite restaurant as a thank you. We can talk about turning the PLM formula into a classroom book(s).

Take care.

B

____________________________________________

I promise I will blog about the dinner. It's going to be a story - no matter who turns up. Especially if they thought they were getting the snow blower.

Celebrating the C-Word

2007-10-15T13:12:00.000-07:00

I'm lucky to do book reviews for the Huffington Post, and here's the latest one....

Book review

Strange Skies

by Matt Marinovich

Celebrating the C-Word

by Heather McElhatton

Ever want to get out of something? How badly? What is the worst thing you've done -- and this of course is between you and your God -- to escape a situation? How big was your lie, how thoughtless was your action? Ok, now compare what you're thinking of to this question: In order to get out of something, did you ever fake having cancer?

That's exactly what our hero, Paul Mauro, does in Matt Marinovich's slicing debut novel, Strange Skies. Paul realizes he doesn't ever want kids while visiting his beleaguered brother and demon-like nephew, who "glares at me greedily with his glittering blue eyes, his damp brown hair swept to one side, Hitler style." Paul's wife unfortunately, wants kids very much. So after Paul gets a lump removed from his arm, rather than telling his wife he has a clean bill of health (the truth), he instead tells her the cancer has spread to his lymph nodes and he has a 50-50 chance of living. (Big, fat messy lie.)

Paul uses his newfound Cancer Card to gain favors, glean attention and have a rioting affair with another cancer patient. At first having a terminal disease seems like a magic panacea, a cure-all that relieves him from all life's drudgeries and responsibilities. Having "limited time" left makes everything more meaningful and beautiful...except that...he doesn't really have cancer. Paul's case is further confused by the fact he meets a woman and her son at the Mpls/St. Paul airport and suddenly finds himself feeling things he never thought possible.

Unapologetically and with rusty-saw bluntness, Marinovich creates a loveable villain in Paul, a character you'd love to hate, except he's so freaking honest and upsettingly real, you forget to. A character that tells you the truth about what he thinks -- even when it's awful.

I've always found it hard to have a normal conversation with my brother's wife when she's breastfeeding. In fact, I find it hard to have a normal conversation with Terry when she's not breastfeeding. Add the breast to the picture, and that saliva-encrusted rug slug she calls her baby boy, and I just go blank. My wife, Lee, I notice, can go on talking as if it were perfectly natural. My older brother, with his thinning blond hair and outdated goatee, doesn't really notice anything anymore. Eric's brain is in some kind of septic kid shock.

They have three of them already, and to make ends meet, since Terry doesn't work, he's gambling online fourteen hours a day. Through some quirk of the system he clears about three thousand bucks a month, but his expressions have this strange automatic quality that rarely connect with anything that's being said. No matter what I say, I just feel like I'm dealing him another virtual face card.

We're sitting in a living room in South Orange, New Jersey. You can picture it. An old Victorian with vinyl siding, planted next to two other old Victorians with vinyl siding, a bunch of gruesomely colored toys lying on their sides in the patch of front yard, a dozen New York Times still wrapped tight in blue plastic on the front stoop because they don't have the time to read, or go to the movies, or even take a shower, and then you open the front door, with its depressing frosted glass design, and the smell hits you. Last night's grease fire, which is what Terry has been going on about.

"And all of a sudden I look up," she says, bouncing once on the couch to get her breast in the baby's mouth again, "and the whole stove is on fire."
"Literally," Eric says. He's sitting on a chair near the dining room table, hunched over, with a Sierra Nevada in his hand.

"What happened?" my wife shouts. I love Lee, but she drives me nuts. Disasters just excite her too much. Any kind of disaster will do. Sometimes, enjoying my first cup of coffee, I'll hear a low murmuring and realize that Lee is reading off the names of the latest soldiers who have been killed in action in Iraq. What am I supposed to do with this information? Bad luck is just bad luck. My brother's grease fire. Don't want to hear about it.

But I'm listening. I'm looking at my watch. Terry is still talking. The baby is still sucking. My brother still hasn't taken a sip of his beer.

"His whole head could have caught fire," Terry says. And then something strange happens: Eric smiles, just a little, and I know he wouldn't have minded if his whole head caught fire. It would have hurt, yes, no doubt about it. But he would have finally had a decent reason to escape this misery, if only for a moment, as he ran, flaming, across his own lawn. Free for a few yards, at least, before he collapsed.

With lines that made me laugh so loud I upset my dog, Marinovich exposes many of the dirty little secrets and tangled-up thoughts a citizen is supposed to keep neatly locked inside their head, the untidy un-thinkables we sometimes think, which, when uttered, create an air of intimacy and conspiracy with reader. It's like when a close family member gets Tourette's Syndrome and as much as you'd like to leave them in the Sam's Club parking lot while their swearing obscenities, you just can't. They're family.

The more honest and awful Paul is, the more you cheer him on and when you're finished reading the book, don't be surprised if this slim 226-page knife blade hasn't loosened your tongue. You're pretty sure you married the wrong person? You can't go on with your ball-crushing job? You'd rather stick an ice pick in your eye than learn to operate a diaper pin? Go on, say it out loud. Marinovich did. Sometimes it feels good to talk dirty