Tag Archive for: little black dress

The House Guests That Don’t Want to Leave

/in /by

by Susan McBride

I was talking with Maggie earlier in the week, and she kindly reminded me that this Friday was my blogging day.  I’m heading out of town for the Southern Indie Bookseller’s trade show in Charleston–um, like right about now–so my mind has been focused on that (what to bring, what to wear, if I’ll miss my connecting flights) and on getting more work done on Little White Lies, which I’ve barely started.  Little White Lies is my next women’s fiction book due on December 1 (yes, you heard right).  It’s been quite a juggling act this year, revising Little Black Dress in January and February, getting a first draft of Dead Address done by the end of July (my young adult mystery for Delacorte also due December 1, and it still needs a rewrite!), dealing with Little Black Dress promotion during most of August (with plenty more ahead of me), and now writing a draft of Little White Lies for HC/Morrow.  Needless to say, the days and weeks are going by WAY too quickly. 

I tell myself to stay cool.  I’ve had to write two books in a year before, most notably during the latter part of 2006 and the first part of 2007 when I was diagnosed with my boob stuff and had to undergo surgery and radiation therapy while working on Too Pretty to Die and The Debs.  I’ve previously mentioned how going to my computer everyday in my jammies helped maintain my sanity and gave me an outlet for all the crazy emotions I was feeling.  But it was also tough.  I wanted to do the best job I could under the most stressful of circumstances at a time when I was supposed to be taking care of my health and NOT stressing out.  But that’s life, I think, and I did what I had to do, although both manuscripts were turned in about a month late.  Somehow, despite my fears, the world didn’t stop spinning. 

Thank goodness, I’m not dealing with any major health crises (knock on wood!) as the deadline for two very different books rapidly approaches.  Regardless, I’ve found myself in a sticky situation.  I need to be able to move from one project to the next without carrying a lot of baggage.  Only, I’ve come to realize I have unwanted house guests.  No, not real ones.  Imaginary ones. The kind of house guests that do not require clean linens or three square meals. They have no desire to visit tourist attractions or sit in my favorite spot on the sofa at night, watching TV.  They don’t even muck up the guest bathroom or drop their dirty socks on the floor.

Instead they intrude upon my mind.  When I started Dead Address late in the spring, I still hadn’t shaken my revision of Little Black Dress from a few months before.  It had been an intense period of about two months where I worked every day (and night), rewriting every page, moving things around, adding new chapters, and otherwise fully immersing myself in the world of Anna and Evie Evans and the magical black dress from the gypsy’s shop in Ste. Genevieve.  I could not get them out of my head.

When I needed to focus on Katie, Mark, and Lisa and their boarding school in Dead Address, I was still back in Blue Hills, Missouri, worrying about the sisters and Toni (okay, and whether the back cover copy did the story justice, or how the font on the cover would look). Somehow, I managed to send Evie, Anna, and Toni packing for long enough to write what happened to Katie after opening up the mysterious box with the severed hand.  But now it’s time to get my head into Little White Lies (and into the heads of Gretchen Brink, her daughter Abigail, and a mystery man from Gretchen’s past), and I’ve still got Katie, Mark, and Lisa hanging around, wondering when I’m going to start paying attention to them again because I haven’t quite finished with them yet.  Oh, and Evie, Anna, and Toni, won’t go away so easily either, not as long as I still have LBD events to do (throughout September and October).

Sigh.

If anyone knows a successful method for removing unwanted imaginary house guests, I’d sure appreciate hearing it.  For now, I guess I’d just better keep the sheets clean, the fresh towels handy, and the fridge full (um, figuratively speaking).  One of these days, perhaps, they’ll all go back from whence they came, and my house–um, my head–will be unnaturally quiet, at which point I’ll have to start inviting new imaginary house guests in.

I Will Survive Alien

/in /by
What? you’re muttering to yourself, that title makes no sense.  Ah, but it must to someone (or rather, a couple of someones) as it’s one of the search phrases used to find The Stiletto Gang.  My best guess is that there’s a post somewhere in the archives mentioning that classic disco tune, “I Will Survive.”  Not so sure about the “alien” part.  Unless the searcher wants to know how he or she will survive an alien visit, or perhaps they’re feeling feisty, like they want to tell the galaxy, “I will survive, alien!”  Okay, I give up.  Your guess is as good as mine.
Another search phrase that had me reminiscing was “hissing garter snake.”  It brought back memories of several springs ago when I was cleaning leaves out of a window well by the patio.  A tiny garter snake reared its pinky-sized head to hiss at me.  Yes, I screamed, but then I took the dustpan, scooped it in, and flung it into the ivy.  Ah, good times.

How about this one:  “obese belly dancer.”  Hmm.  I don’t remember anyone writing a post on the subject.  Maybe I was on vacation (wait, I don’t take vacations). 

A handful of curious people found Stiletto by looking for “caramelized hair color,” which intrigues me.  I’ve always thought I’d love to have caramel-colored highlights in my tresses.  From the looks of things, I’m not the only one.
Then there’s the seeker of “outdoor ground cover w/ 7 leaves and flowers.”  Ah, how fortuitous that such a search led them here!  Because we’re all about, um, ground cover.  And what ground cover is better than that with seven leaves and flowers?  Although if you need to know the right type of mulch to use, I’m guessing a blog about plants might have more answers.

And last but surely not least, there were over 30 interested parties seeking information about being “naked at the mall.”  I do, in fact, recall writing a post called “Walking Naked at the Mall,” after Maggie and I had a discussion about dreams that mean you’re feeling vulnerable.  There were no photos of naked mall walkers inserted nor any physical descriptions, which I’ll bet left most of those interested parties feeling a wee bit let down.  What this tells me is that using “naked” in your title will draw readers who normally wouldn’t visit a book blog.  (I know, you’re thinking, brilliant theory, Einstein.)
Now I’m wondering, what’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever searched for online?  Or if you have a blog, what are the strangest search terms that have led someone to it?  Inquiring minds want to know!
  
P.S.  Little Black Dress is out next Tuesday, August 23…squeeeee!  You can pre-order online from booksellers and e-booksellers now!  Here’s a helpful link.  Or you can Google “book with magic black dress” and see if that’ll lead you to it.  Seek and ye shall find…something.

Ding Dong, Deadline Calling!

/in /by

As I write this, I’m down to the wire on my deadline for Little Black Dress, my tale of two sisters, a daughter, and a magical dress that changes all their lives forever. It’s something different for me after writing series mysteries, a YA nonmystery series, and contemporary women’s fiction. Little Black Dress mixes the past and the present (okay, with a pinch of mystery!), and it alternates between two very different voices.

I just finished proofing 300 pages after staying up late and working through the weekends to get this baby done. It’s weird how deadlines never seem that intimidating until, oh, about six weeks beforehand. That’s when you realize that maybe you shouldn’t have scheduled a fundraiser you’re spearheading that close to D-Day, and innumerable real-life crises rear their ugly heads (never fails).

It’s when you tell yourself, “Hey, this is life. Put on your big girl pants and deal with it.” Only that doesn’t keep the clock from ticking or that danged deadline from looming like Fraggle Rock (wait, that’s a kid’s show, right? Not very scary, huh?).

When I realized I had, oh, five chapters left last weekend, I went into panic mode, staying up way past my usual bed-time, working like a maniac (and, no, I don’t drink coffee!). It helps when hubby has a late night hockey game and doesn’t return until after midnight so I can write until he gets home and finds me with my face on the keyboard, QWERTY squished into my forehead. (All right, it never happened, but it was a constant threat.)

Ed has gotten used to seeing me in my pajamas 24/7, often with my hair sticking out like a rat’s nest. I would mumble inanely, “I swear, I’ll shower after dinner,” and then I’d disappear into my writing room and not emerge until 11 p.m., still a mess. But I would have gotten another chapter done.

If all goes well, by the time you read this deadline-itis inspired babble, I’ll be hitting “send” and turning in Little Black Dress to my agents and my editor at HarperCollins.

At which point, I plan to sleep for days, watch mindless HGTV, read the books stacked on my bedside table, eat chocolate, and pray that they don’t come back and say, “Er, Susan, that thing you sent us? It’s a pile of poo.” (Has anyone ever had that happen, God forbid?) And soon enough, I’ll have to do revisions, turn in a proposal for the next book, and get back to writing again. No rest for the wicked, eh?
With two books due in 2011, I should really take a spin in the nearest phone booth (er, if I can find one) and emerge in my super-powered, superhero suit, consisting of plaid flannel jammie pants, the “rock star” T-shirt Maggie gave me, fuzzy socks, and rat’s nest hair. “Ah-ha-ha,” I’ll say in my throaty–um, squeaky–voice, “I am Deadline Girl! Look out!”

Or else I’ll just take a nap.

Little Black Dress has been bumped up in the schedule and will now be out in June from HarperCollins instead of next fall (or, actually, May 17, 2011 if we’re being particular). You can already pre-order it online, which is kind of funny as of this moment, since I just finished writing it. Toodles and TGIF!!! –Susan