My Next Big Thing

YA author Kimberly Newton Fusco asked me to participate in an Internet happening called My Next Big Thing. My Next Big Thing is a self-interview where published and non-published writers answer 10 questions about their current work. Many national and international writers have participated. It gives readers a glimpse into the working life of a writer.

Big thanks to Kim for choosing me. So, here is my Next Big Thing. At the end of it, I tag three other writers to carry the torch further into the blogosphere. (By the way, check out Kim's third novel, Beholding Bee, out Feb 12.)

What is the working title of your book? The Last Good State.

Where did the idea come from for the book? My parents moved me and my three sisters around a lot as a kid. I loved seeing new places, but I always wondered what it would be like if our family had never left the house we all grew up in. Then, what would happen if our parents sold the house after we had all moved out but a lot of our childhood stuff was still in it.

From there I started thinking about the different personalities of these kids living in my alternative universe house. I grew up on Cape Cod, where the story takes place. I worked in a restaurant in high school and college. The restaurant was run by this couple and they had three kids who all worked there. I got a real inside view of the business and this family. I had been wanting to somehow incorporate that experience into my writing for a while, and combining these two story-lines into one novel seemed like a no brainer.

What genre does your book fall under? It's contemporary fiction. Family drama, if there is such a category. Or family dramady.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? I have a hard time mapping my characters to actors. But here's what I came up with. There are four siblings and their parents:

Kids:
Ellen Page
Kat Dennings
Allison Williams
Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Parents:
Val Kilmer
Holly Hunter/Lea Thompson

I had no idea the kids were that good looking. The father is a bit unhinged, so Val on a good day could pass. Holly Hunter is great, although I might have to bolster her part a little. If Holly passes, let's give Lea a job. Of course, the part might have to be rewritten. Totally different acting styles.

What is a one-sentence synopsis of your book? After their parents divorce and decide to sell the  family house, four siblings, aged 18 to 28, return home to claim their stuff and run an estate sale before the house is sold.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? I'm still working on it. I'm at 73,000 words, around 70-75% through it. It's taken over 2 years to get to this point.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? I've just discovered Jonathan Tropper. He writes a lot about kids going home again and families coming together in crazy ways. I'm not as funny as him, but I guess I'd love to hit both a comical and dramatic tone. I really loved The Corrections, the comic and tragic of one family. I'm not comparing per se, but if there is a family drama category, Jonathan Franzen blazed that trail, at least for me. I also really liked the brother and sister relationship in Dana Spiotta's Stone Arabia, and the thread of family that runs through Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad, A.M. Homes' This Book Will Save Your Life and May We Be Forgiven, and any novels by Bruce Wagner.

Who or what inspired you to write this book? Initially I was interested in a family that was unlike any other family I could think of. I thought, what if each family member was somehow notorious, either a criminal or a reality tv star or some kind of news sensation. I quickly realized that the tone of a story like that was hard to pull off, and I also couldn't come up with sympathetic characters to write about. That's when this other more realistic family came to mind.

What else about your book might pique a reader’s interest? If you're tired of vampires or zombies or post apocalyptic landscapes, then this book is for you!

When and how will it be published? You would have to ask that.

Enough about my Next Big Thing. Here are three amazing writers who will now tell you all about their Next Big Thing:

Robin Black is the author of the story collection, If I loved you I would tell you this, a finalist for the 2010 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Prize. She is the 2012-13 Distinguished Visiting Writer at Bryn Mawr College and is currently at work on her first novel. You can read her blog posts at Beyond the Margins where she's a contributor. 

Cynthia Sherrick writes adult romantic suspense, although she has written YA along with some short stories and plays, as well. She began writing when she was just six years old. Growing up in a family of writers she knew creating stories was the path she would follow. Cynthia is nearly finished with her third novel and continues to pursue acquiring a literary agent and getting published. She is a member of the Romance Writers of America, New England Chapter of Romance Writers, and Tampa Area Romance Authors. 

Juliette Fay’s latest novel, The Shortest Way Home, was chosen as one of Library Journal‘s Top 5 “Best Books of 2012: Women’s Fiction.” Juliette’s first novel, Shelter Me, was a 2009 Massachusetts Book Award “Must-Read Book.” Her second, Deep Down True, was short-listed for the Women’s Fiction award by the American Library Association. Juliette received a bachelor's degree from Boston College and a master's degree from Harvard University. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband and four children. When she’s not trying to keep track of her kids or daydreaming about her next story, Juliette can be reached on her website, Facebook and Twitter.

The House on Rock Harbor Road -- Wednesday, July 12

Today I'm posting scans of my father's journal from July 12, 1961.

To enlarge each image below for a better reading experience, right click and select Open Link in new window. In the new window, click the image to make larger or smaller.

The House on Rock Harbor Road -- Tuesday, July 11

The next in my ongoing project to post my father's journals from the early sixties. Today I'm posting scans of his pages from July 11, 1961.

To enlarge each image below for a better reading experience, right click and select Open Link in new window. In the new window, click the image to make larger or smaller. 

 

The House on Rock Harbor Road -- Monday, June 19th, 1961

Entry two in my father's Cape Cod diary:

Yesterday was both my birthday and Father’s Day. Moo packed us a lunch or rather dinner and we drove to Nickerson State Park in Brewster where we swam and sunbathed and ate on the shore of Flax Pond. The park is an extensive wooded area, pine and oak, with two large ponds, the biggest is Cliff Pond, which must be a couple of miles long. 

It is hard to believe this spot is only three miles from our house. The setting looks more like New Hampshire than the Cape, except that there is almost always a gull swooping down over the lake to remind you that the ocean and the bay are mere minutes away. I should imagine that during stormy weather many sea birds seek out these fresh water ponds as shelter from the driving seas and winds. 

On all sides of the lake there are camping areas where many people had already pitched their tents and trailers (if that’s what you do with trailers), and the smell of the wood fires is one of the pleasantest of things about the park. I still have to see about getting reservations for the Lull’s to camp there when they stop by in July. I’m sure that the park is one of the most popular in New England, situated as it is so close to the high-cost summer resort area, of which we are undeniably a part. 

The weekend was clear and sunny, as it is today, and it has been getting increasingly hotter with each passing day. But the wind is always blowing from the south and west, which helps to keep the air continually refreshed. The average velocity of the winds on the Cape is fourteen miles an hour, making this one of the windiest spots in the country. Edwin Way Teale writes on the Cape’s wind at some length in his North with the Spring. He cites the wind forests along headlands where oaks and pines are stunted to knee-high growth even though they may be twenty years of age. He calls them Lilliput woods.

The House on Rock Harbor Road – June 1961 – February 1963

In which Wendell Everett Smith (my father) chronicles a year and a half of Cape Cod living, from in June of 61 through Feb of 63. Included are stories of moving to the Cape with his wife, Muriel, and his girls, buying a cottage colony, raising three daughters, dealing with house guests, all types of weather, painting and setting up a gallery, writing a novel, buying and selling used books, and reading. He turned 38 just after starting this journal.

He wrote the journal longhand and on the typewriter. For the typewritten pages, I’ll scan them and post them as is, graphic images which you can click on to see a larger view. I will transcribe his handwritten pages. 

Every few days or weeks I will post another entry. I may modify the real names he uses to protect the guilty and innocent alike. Let it be known that I was not even a glint in my parents' eye during this time.

June 14…Thursday

A short time ago I started a diary. Like most diaries it was neglected, this one for the reason that I left my job as a editor with the Forest Service, we packed to move, fixed up the house to rent, moved, bought a house, and now two weeks later we just about settled. Of course, it will be many weeks, months even, before we can say we are truly settled. But the house comes close to being 160 years old and although it was “settled” here that long ago, the property has reached its second stage of pioneering and we are in this later era. 

For example, this morning a shelf had to be removed to make room for…but that makes a whole story in itself and is one of the many rather unpleasant things that have taken place in the past three weeks. Nothing serious, actually the move was completed in good health and according to schedule, but the details will not be filled in here.

Our new home is on Rock Harbor Road which borders on a salt marsh between Rock Harbor and the Eastham Rotary (I almost put Traffic Circle), Orleans, Massachusetts. As to general area, we are on the bay side at the crook of the elbow of Cape Cod. So there it is. The principal reason for this record. I am a writer. I have just taken up residence on the Cape so I must write a book about it. Well, I guess if Scott Corbett did it I can too. We Chose Cape Cod is Scott’s first year’s log, and I must say that his book had some little part in our coming to the Cape.