Afterwards we went to lunch in historic downtown Norcross (adorable!) at Mojito - an authentic Cuban restaurant with music on the weekends (I have to go back to hear it). The food was FABULOUS and of course I had to have a mojito, which was truly the best I've ever had.
Illustrator Michael A. Austin organized the event for us, and did such an amazing job tying in John Rocco's How To Train Your Train and Brian Floca's Locomotive along with fun exercises like, draw a train but don't use any straight lines, or, draw a train feeling anger, euphoria, loneliness. Here are mine. The dude is from a lantern that looked like the head of some sort of underwater sea adventurer to me:
But maybe the photos were better.
I don't know what was more beautiful - the trains still in good shape, or the old rusted out ones:
Michael has arranged six of these events for us now, and they are such a blast every time. What a treat for our illustrators! Thank you Michael!
Secondly, writing such different stuff means I always feel challenged. That’s not to say writing ANY book isn’t a challenge in and of itself—but it’s sort of like working out, I guess. You work out different muscles in different ways, so that your body doesn’t get used to the activity.
Writing TSARINA was hugely different than writing the books that came before. I felt an obligation to and sense of stewardship for the real people of Imperial Russia. I didn’t want to mess with their lives for the convenience of a story if it could be avoided, which meant lots of long nights studying the layout of the Winter Palace, reading biographies on each of the Romanovs, and deciding what was flexible and what was sacred. I wasn’t always able to take the most obvious path, plot-wise, if I didn’t feel that path meshed with the history.
Similarly, writing PURITY was very, very different than writing retold fairytales. For starters, I couldn’t drop a werewolf action scene in to spice things up; all the motion had to come from my very-not-magical protagonist. But secondly, PURITY is probably more “me” than my other books, which meant writing it forced me to address some personal demons rather than address the demons of fictional characters.
I felt like I emerged from both projects a stronger writer for being forced outside of my comfort zone. It’s nice to look back at a project and feel proud not only of the final product itself, but of how you changed and grew through writing it.
A. Absolutely! I was just like that crazy, messy little girl. I dedicated this book to my mom "who cleaned up lots of spilled paint," and the dog in the book is based on my childhood pooch named Tam. [I've included his picture!]
A. I crammed in some school visits before school ended last month, and I've had several book signings at my favorite indies and paint parties (of course). My next book signing will be at Parnassus in Nashville on June 28th at 10:00.
I just did a Skype visit with a book group in Blue Ridge, Georgia. Hi Michelle Moran (host and owner of the best restaurant in Blue Ridge - 
Friday evening we helped celebrate the release of Vicky Alvear Shecter's new novel CURSES AND SMOKE: A NOVEL OF POMPEII. She had a volcano cake (smoke came out of it) and lava cupcakes.
