Nathalie Mallet: The Princes of the Golden Cage

Title: The Princes of the Golden Cage
Author: Nathalie Mallet (http://www.nathaliemallet.com/)
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher:  Night Shade Books
ISBN: 978-1597800907

1. First off, congratulations on the big novel sale! Give us the elevator pitch. What’s your book about?

Thanks! The Princes of the Golden Cage is the first book in the Prince Amir Mystery Series. The story revolves around Amir, a scholarly and reclusive prince who lives inside a luxurious section of the palace called the Cage with over a hundred of his brothers. They are all imprisoned there until one of them becomes the next Sultan. Put in place to control fratricide and reduce civil uprising brought on by warring princes, the Cage is the most beautiful, lavish part of the desert palace; but for the power-hungry princes confined within its gilded walls it is a deadly trap. Amir doesn’t want to become Sultan, he just wants to survive the process and be free. So he tries not to be noticed and stays out of his brothers’ scheming paths. But when his brothers begin to die from supernatural causes, Amir has to get involved and solve the mystery before he is killed himself.

2. Most new novelists have an interesting story to tell about their journey to publication. What’s yours? Did you use an agent? Make sure to tell us about the day you found out you’d sold a book.

I always wanted to write. I made a few attempts throughout the years, but only really became serious about it recently. I told myself, “If I don’t do it now, it will never happen.” So I got to it and wrote my first novel, The Digging Crew, a sci-fi action adventure, which ended up being published by a small Canadian publisher. Sadly, they closed down right after the book was out. Still, it gave me the confidence I needed to approach agents to represent my second novel, The Princes of the Golden Cage. I was lucky and soon signed up with Jenny Rappaport, now of the L. Perkins Agency. And it wasn’t long before Jenny called me with the news that Night Shade Books, a wonderful publishing house from California, were not only interested in buying The Princes, they wanted a sequel. This was one of the happiest days of my life.

3. Do you have another book in the pipeline? What are you working on now?

I’ve just finished the third book in the Prince Amir Mystery Series, and I’m now busy plotting the fourth. I also have a couple other novels in different stages of development. I like to keep busy.  The second book of the Prince Amir series, titled The King’s Daughters, is coming out in July. I’m very excited about this one because it has a fun Russian-inspired setting that is totally different than the first book, which is Middle Eastern.

4. What’s your writing process like? Morning writer, night writer, or something in between?

I’m a morning person and also a morning writer. I write almost every day-that’s what works best for me. So, I normally start at 6:00 am and sometime work until 3:00 in the afternoon. But on most days I’m done by noon and spend the afternoon doing research, reading or making revisions.

5. There seems to be an unusually high percentage of writers who own cats. Here at the The First Book, we’re doing a study to find out if there’s a direct relationship between writing success and cat ownership. Do you own a cat? If so, tell us about him or her. If not, tell us what you have against cats.

No. I don’t have a cat. I like them, but my husband is allergic. We have a dog, though. She’s very old (seventeen) and doesn’t do much besides eating and sleeping-so in that sense, she’s a little bit like a cat.

Lisa McMann: Wake

Title: Wake
Author: Lisa McMann (http://lisamcmann.com/)
Hardcover: 224 pages
Publisher:  Simon Pulse
ISBN: 978-1416953579

1. First off, congratulations on the big novel sale! Give us the elevator pitch. What’s your book about?

Thank you! WAKE is about a seventeen-year-old girl named Janie who gets sucked into other people’s dreams. She can’t stop it, she can’t tell anybody about it or they’d think she’s a freak, so Janie lives on the
fringe, cursed with an ability she doesn’t want and can’t control.

And there’s a hot guy in it too. Just don’t compare him to Edward, whatever you do. Fights have broken out all across the land.

2. Most new novelists have an interesting story to tell about their journey to publication. What’s yours? Did you use an agent? Make sure to tell us about the day you found out you’d sold a book.

Yes, I found my agent in September, 2006. He’s this wonderfully witty and talented guy named Michael Bourret from Dystel & Goderich and I heart him.

In January of 2007 I had my first offer, immediately followed by a competing offer, and the negotiations went on for a week. It was stressful and wonderful and did I mention stressful? When all was on the table, both offering a 2-book deal, picking one publisher over another was painful. But when we had a deal, I was over the moon. I thought that would be the most amazing event of my life, and it was, until the day I found out that WAKE hit the New York Times bestseller list.

Now, I’m actually not a huge “react-er” to things. I internalize and feel the pride or the happiness or whatever deep down, and I’m known to maintain a pretty level-headed outward appearance. But when my agent called on a Wednesday afternoon, and said editor Jen Klonsky over at Simon Pulse wanted to talk to us both, I had a sinking feeling - I actually thought Jen was calling to say they were disappointed in sales
or something (not that she ever does this! I’m just weird)…I had NO. FREAKING. CLUE what she was about to tell me. And I totally, completely freaked out. It was BY FAR the best day of my life. (My husband said it was okay to say that…isn’t he great?)

And the feeling just doesn’t seem to go away.

3. Do you have another book in the pipeline? What are you working on now?

Well, FADE is the sequel to WAKE. It comes out February 24, 2009. After that, I’m not quite sure…I expect I’ll have an answer in the next few months.

4. What’s your writing process like? Morning writer, night writer, or something in between?

On days I’m writing, I write fast and furiously from the moment my kids head out the door to school (8:22 a.m.) until sometime between 2:30 and 4:00 p.m. If I’m really going strong on something, I might continue writing until the wee hours of the night. I write when there’s something to write, and then I write fast and almost non-stop without editing until I push that entire rough draft out. Obsessive much? Yeah.

5. There seems to be an unusually high percentage of writers who own cats. Here at the The First Book, we’re doing a study to find out if there’s a direct relationship between writing success and cat ownership. Do you own a cat? If so, tell us about him or her. If not, tell us what you have against cats.

This question is logically flawed! You’re saying if I don’t own a cat, that means I have something against them? Very sneaky, Scott. What if…what if my dear sweet 22-year-old cat — Mathilda — died recently — yesterday, in fact — and that’s why I don’t have a cat? Does that mean I have something against cats? How dare you mock my grief!

Okay, okay. It’s the litter box thing. I live in a refrigerator-box-sized hut with no acceptable or convenient place for a litter box. But I love cats. I have loved all my cats. And now I shall name them all for your entertainment: Blackie, Brownie, Yellowy (why yes, I was a creative child too), Georgia (oh how I loved head-butting Georgia), Russell (who threw up live worms when I was ten but was still my favorite childhood cat), Damian, Key, Madison (who always pooped the wrong way off the edge of the litter box), Buddy, and Spongey. And Smudge, but I did not love Smudge because my sister, Tricia Lynn Gort
Kiepert, is and always has been spoiled and SHE got to choose the kitten from Key’s litter that we would keep. And she picked stupid Smudge when I wanted the black naughty one. Pfft. I’m glad Smudge ran away. There, I said it. Happy?

Anyway, we have a sweet dog right now, that poops outside, where I can send my 11-year-old to clean it up. Jessie — that’s her name. She sleeps at my feet all day while I bang away on the laptop and makes me
feel like a writer. (The dog, not the 11-year-old).

 

Sarah Beth Durst: Into the Wild

Title: Into the Wild
Author: Sarah Beth Durst (www.sarahbethdurst.com)
Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher:  Penguin
ISBN: 978-1595141859

1. First off, congratulations on the big novel sale! Give us the elevator pitch. What’s your book about?

Thanks so much! And thanks for interviewing me. My book INTO THE WILD came out last June from Razorbill, the newest YA imprint at Penguin Young Readers. It’s the story of Julie, an ordinary 12-year-old girl with a not-so-ordinary family. Her mother is Rapunzel (yes, from the fairy tale — long hair, tower, prince, the whole deal), her brother is Puss-in-Boots (he’s a cat; he’s adopted), and her grandmother is the
(former) wicked witch of fairy-tale fame. You see, long ago, the fairy-tale characters escaped the fairy tale to live in secret in our world. But now the fairy tale wants its characters back. And it’s up to Julie to save them.

2. Most new novelists have an interesting story to tell about their journey to publication. What’s yours? Did you use an agent? Make sure to tell us about the day you found out you’d sold a book.

I have wanted to be a writer since I was ten-years-old. Before age ten, I wanted to be either Wonder Woman or a Unicorn Princess. (I’m still not sure if I meant I wanted to be a princess with unicorn friends or an
actual royal unicorn. I think I would have accepted either.) In comparison to my early career goals, “writer” seemed perfectly achievable. Still, it took a long time. For my journey to publication, I took the old-fashioned route: a straight-forward uphill slog. There were no tricks and no shortcuts. I wrote a manuscript, sent it out, got rejected, wrote another, sent it out, got rejected, and so forth until finally I found my current agent, Andrea Somberg from the Harvey Klinger Agency. Once she became my agent, she sent the manuscript for INTO THE WILD out to various publishers, and it was a short six weeks from that point until I got “the Call” from Andrea telling me an editor had made an offer on my book. I had imagined that moment so many times over the years that after I hung up the phone, the very first thing I did was check caller-ID because I was convinced that I’d just been having a really vivid, really cool daydream.

3. Do you have another book in the pipeline? What are you working on now?

Yes! OUT OF THE WILD (the sequel to INTO THE WILD) will come out this June, also from Razorbill/Penguin. It centers on a magical road trip across America and includes a flying bathmat, a very drowsy princess, a
fire-breathing dragon, and several thousand magic beanstalks. I had so much fun writing a sequel. It was like visiting old friends. And then turning their lives upside down.

4. What’s your writing process like? Morning writer, night writer, or something in between?

I am a write-anytime-I-can writer. I don’t believe in waiting for inspiration — if you want to be a writer, you have to write whether or not you feel like it and whether or not it’s going well. There’s always
a point in every project when you feel like you’re doomed, it’s doomed, everything’s doomed!!! The trick is to write anyway. I also don’t believe in waiting until you have that perfect stretch of uninterrupted time. That kind of “spare time” is a myth for most of us. If you want to write, you need to make the time. I’m not saying it’s easy — things get sacrificed, like sleep and yardwork — but writing is my dream so
I’ve convinced myself that it’s okay that my dining room floor is a wee bit crunchy and that weeds and moss really do look almost just like lawn from a distance if you squint…

5. There seem to be an unusually high percentage of writers who own cats. Here at the First Book, we’re doing a study to find out if there’s a direct relationship between writing success and cat ownership. Do you own a cat? If so, tell us about him or her. If not, tell us what you have against cats.

My cat’s name is Perni (short for Copernicus, which we decided was inappropriate once we found out she’s a girl). She likes to wind around your ankles and then roll over onto her back to expose her fluffy, white
belly. When you reach down to pat her, that’s when she lunges at your bare skin with her teeth and claws and tries to rend your flesh from your bones. She’s kind of socially maladjusted. But I love her anyway.