To view the official review, click here.
To view the book on Amazon, click here.
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1. How did you get your start in writing?
Believe it or not, I wrote my first novel at the age of six after reading every book in the children's series The Bobbsey Twins, by Laura Lee Hope. My very original novel was titled The Reznik Twins. In high school I wrote a number of sonnets and in college I was an English major and read all the classics as well as contemporary literature.
My first novel Glorietta was completed in 1983 after studying under the late Rudolfo Anaya (Bless Me Ultima) and the late award-winning author, Tony Hillerman (Native American Detective series). Since that time, I've published three Amazon bestselling novels, The Girl From Long Guyland, The M&M Boys, and Bagels & Salsa.
2. Who or what has been most inspirational in your writing?
My sister Rita and my writing professor Rudolfo Anaya are the two people who have inspired me the most as a writer. Not only is my sister, a former English teacher, a phenomenal editor but she loves the writing process and reads every draft of my novels. She’s the person who keeps my momentum going every day because I know she’s looking forward to me submitting material to her each night.
My creative writing professor, Rudolfo Anaya, also was a major inspiration. I signed up for his advanced novel-writing class when I was a sophomore in college. I was way over my head, as most of the students were master’s level creative writing majors. They tore apart my submissions and called my first attempt at writing a novel "A college girl's diary." I remember riding home on my bicycle with tears streaming down my face after each critique of my work. But I worked really hard on the revisions and learning the basics of novel structure, and it prepared me for the mountain of rejections that most authors must deal with when they try to publish. At the end of the semester, Dr. Anaya awarded me "most improved writer" in the class. His motto was, "A writer writes." I remind myself of that every day.
3. What do you consider most important in a book?
A compelling protagonist and a cast of unique and interesting characters with conflict on every page. If you're successful at creating great characters and keep upping the tension and stakes, readers will follow an author on a journey of adventures, aka your plot.
4. Let's discuss your book Bagels & Salsa. This is a romance between a couple from two different cultures. Why was it important to focus on diversity and its effect on a relationship?
Now, more than ever, the theme of multicultural families struggling to understand, respect and celebrate their differences is of monumental importance in a globally diverse world.
5. Were the characters based on anyone in real life?
Based loosely on my own experience as a Jewish New Yorker who married into a Hispanic New Mexico ranching family, Bagels & Salsa explores the journey of two families at odds with their differences yet bonded by the compelling love of their children.
6. The reviewer mentions that there are phrases in Spanish and Yiddish. Are you fluent in both of these? If not, how did you do the research to make the book so realistic?
My parents spoke Yiddish when they didn't want my sisters and me to know what they were talking about, and when we visited my grandparents who spoke little English, which provided me with a good overall understanding of the language. I took Spanish in high school and have lived in both New Mexico and Texas where I am around many Spanish-speaking people including my husband’s family. I also used Google Translate a lot and had Spanish speakers review the authenticity of the Spanish phrases and my sister, an orthodox Jew, help me with the Yiddish.
7. The book takes place in the '70s. Why did you choose this time period?
I came of age in the early 70's and it's by far the most interesting and crazy time in my life.
8. Tell us a bit about your other works as well as what you have on the agenda next.
One Amazon reviewer called my first novel The Girl From Long Guyland, “Gone Girl in the sixties.” Set against a 1969 psychedelic love-in backdrop, Guyland is shared through the eyes of former hippie Laila Levin when decades later she’s an IT executive and an unsolved murder pulls her reluctantly into her past. A dramatic collision of then and now entwining family, marriage, profession and ethics.
After the breakout success of The Girl From Long Guyland, I published The M&M Boys, a story about little leaguer Marshall Elliot whose joy of making the All-Star team evaporates when his father, busy with his new girlfriend, misses his triumphant opening game, and his mother spirals into a bed-ridden depression. Then Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle move next door as they battle to break Babe Ruth's home run record. The three find solace in each other's triumphs, frustrations, celebrations and disappointments.
I’m currently working on a dark comedy, The In-Laws, The Ex-Laws & The Outlaws. Maya Morris, a Post Doc Linguistics student, has meticulously planned her dream wedding on a houseboat in Austin, Texas. Both she and her fiancé, Liam Wharton, must find a way to keep the peace between their divorced parents and their new significant others, 2nd and 3rd marriage stepparents, eight sets of grandparents and various aunts, uncles, cousins and friends. The menagerie of relatives includes a mix of rednecks, old hippies, old Philadelphia money, lesbians, evangelists and orthodox Jews. Things get complicated when someone is murdered.
I like to end with some fun questions.
9. What was your favorite subject in school?
English, of course.
10. What's your favorite weather?
I love the fall, a mix of warm and cool days and beautiful foliage landscapes even here in Austin, TX although the colors are a bit more subtle than where I grew up in New York.
11. What fictional literary character would you most want to have a meal with and why?
I’d love to meet Rhett Butler, the fictional character in the 1936 Gone with the Wind. Smooth, witty, sexy and charmingly roguish, yet capable of great love, for me he is the perfect man.
12. Regardless of talent, if you could choose any occupation, what would it be and why? Would you always choose to be a writer?
I would love to have been an actress and as a young girl was often the star of my school plays but as I grew older I was too shy to audition.
