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By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 7/10/2015
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When Jessica Shoffel speaks, I listen.
She's the sort of person who makes you feel seen. The sort who, as a Penguin publicist, didn't just oversee the campaigns of mega-watt writers like Laurie Halse Anderson and Jacquelyn Woodson, but also took time to read my novel
Small Damages, to tell me how the story worked within her, and to
create a glorious press release and campaign on its behalf. The sort who stood with me through a difficult time. The sort who found me alone at the Decatur, GA, book festival and included me in conversations, in a dinner, in
a memorable hour with Tomie dePaulo. The sort who makes time in a hugely busy life to reach out to young people who have experienced loss, to
run marathon races on behalf of medical research, and to talk to a dear family member, Kelsey, about what it is like to work among books. Jess is smart and gracious and kind and hard working. She is there. She is present. She is with you; she is
for you. She is a rare kind of sisterhood.
And so when Jess wrote a few weeks ago to tell me about a book she had just read in her new role as Director of Publicity for Little Brown and Company's Books for Young Readers, when she said it was my kind of book, I didn't for one instant doubt her. Can I send it to you? she asked. Of course, I said.
And so it arrived. And so I have read it.
This book—this gorgeous, intelligent, moving, seamless, award-destined, Andrea Spooner edited book—is a debut middle grade novel by Ali Benjamin called
The Thing About Jellyfish. Everything about this story enwraps, engages, enraptures. Its frizzy-haired, science-leaning, universe-scanning narrator who has lost her former best friend. Its obsession with the jellies that bloom incessantly within our seas, leave the big whales hungry, endanger us with their undying stings. Its child-hearted hopes and its big-minded mix of science and mystery. Its neat division into paper parts—purpose, hypothesis, straight through to conclusion. Its language—just the right bright, the right curious. (I could quote from every single line and prove that to you; Ali Benjamin never writes anything less than a wonderful sentence.) The science itself—impeccably (never intrusively) filtered into this story about friendship, family, school, and school teachers who care.
And then—watch—Diana Nyad appears. Diana Nyad, the endurance swimmer who refused to give up on her dream. The endurance swimmer who braved the countless jellyfish stings and made it to the other side. Symbol, hero, character. There she is, in this most exquisite book.
(For more on Diana and her relationship with my friend and agent Amy Rennert, read
here. And look for Diana's much buzzed memoir,
Find a Way, out in October).
In this summer of contemplation, this summer of weighing the odds, of wondering through the writing again, of maybe or maybe not trying again, of not knowing, it is a glorious thing to be reminded of what is possible with books. The thing about
The Thing About is what says about what possible is.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 11/20/2014
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A year from now, Temple University Press will release
Love: A Philadelphia Affair, a collection of thirty-six essays on the intersection of memory and place. Thirty-eight of my black-and-white photographs will accompany the text.
Some twenty of those essays first appeared in the
Philadelphia Inquirer—pieces I was lucky enough to write for
Inquirer editors Avery Rome and Kevin Ferris.
Others have been written over the past few months for the book itself, taking me into and around the city on days of rain and sun to consider the streets, the architecture, the gardens, the sidewalks, the highs, the lows, and the communities that have played such a powerful role in the ways that I see, the books that I write, and the stories I teach.
Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River, Dangerous Neighbors (1876 Philadelphia)
, Dr. Radway's Sarsaparilla Resolvent (1871 Philadelphia),
Small Damages, Handling the Truth, and even
One Thing Stolen all reflect, in different ways, my love for this region and the people I have met here.
My great thanks to Micah Kleit, Ann Marie Anderson, and Gary Kramer at Temple University Press for helping me to see this dream through. My deep gratitude to Kevin Ferris and Avery Rome, who made my writing about this region such a pleasure. And huge appreciation to my agent Amy Rennert, who saw the details of this project through.
Micah and I wrapped the book up yesterday, from an editorial and photography perspective. I can't wait to hold this book in my hands, to be able to tell the world again and in new ways why I love where I live.
Yesterday, it became official: Callenbach, the glorious Dutch publishing house that released
a gorgeous, translated Small Damages two years ago, has purchased Dutch translation rights to
Undercover, the first young adult novel I ever wrote and published.
Like
Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River, Undercover first appeared in 2007 and taught me several things about risks worth taking. Like
The Heart Is Not a Size,
Undercover is vaguely autobiographical—a Cyrano story of a teen who cannot see her own beauty and who relies on words to bridge her to the world. My Elisa writes poems. She has an English teacher who cares. She skates secretly on a frozen pond. She meets a boy named Theo. Her words, she soon discovers, have power. But so, perhaps, does she.
It is moving to think of vestiges of my own Radnor High and adolescence being transported to the Netherlands, under the auspices of a publishing house established in 1854. It is also telling, and hopeful—a sign of optimism for all of us—that books written years ago still live on, somehow. This idea about longevity is perhaps the lesson for me of this year, as
Flow, seven years later, emerges as an affordable paperback, and as
Undercover begins the process of finding a new audience in the Netherlands, as it has also found in China.
My thanks to Alpha Wong of HarperTeen for negotiating the agreement, and to Amy Rennert, my agent, for letting me know.
Yesterday, while I watched the rain pound the world around me (and awaited
the watery launch of Going Over at Radnor Memorial Library), a note rose up on Twitter, alerting me to this great gift from Dahlia Adler on the Barnes & Noble Book Blog.
The title of the post:
Around the World in Eight YA Novels. Dahlia, amazingly, noted both
Small Damages and
Going Over:
Small Damages, by Beth Kephart
One of my favorite literary writers of YA, Kephart has beautifully re-created the Spanish countryside for this contemporary novel about a teenage girl who’s exiled from her American home in order to hide the secret of her pregnancy. She leaves no sensation unexperienced, from the feel of the earth to the scent of oranges, and it’s hard to imagine getting any closer to Seville without a passport. (Kephart’s newest, Going Over, which alternates between East and West Germany, is another excellent candidate for this list.)
Incredible words, and I am so grateful.
I am also grateful this morning to that clay artist, Karen Bernstein, who not only graced the table last evening with her
amazing Berlin vessel, but who carried a copy of
Handling the Truth to New York City, where Diane Keaton was in the 92nd Street Y House. Keaton's memoir
Then Again is featured in
Handling. I'd always wanted the great actress to have a copy. Last night Karen made that happen. "Signed. Sealed. Delivered.," Karen wrote at the end of her day. This morning, Karen wrote again to say that Diane Keaton had used the word "honored" when Karen gave that bright orange memoir book to her.
One last very cool thing, and then I'm off to read and celebrate the books of others. My agent, Amy Rennert, called a few days ago with the exceptional news that Rich Green, an esteemed film agent who has represented Jonathan Franzen, Matthew Quick, Anne Rice, Andrea Creamer, and others, has agreed to represent
Going Over. A good day. A good life.
On this very beautiful Philadelphia day (blue-drenched skies and clouds a-wisp in both directions), I share news that I've wanted to share for the past many days. Amy Rennert, my long-time agent, is the one who whispered this in my ear. I have her to thank for bridging me toward that very thing that makes me happiest in life—hanging out with urgent, passionate, striving kids and helping them grow.
So here we go. This coming January, I will be joining the glorious YoungArts program in Miami—"the signature national organization that recognizes and supports America's most talented 15-18 year olds in the visual, literary and performing arts." Do you want to fill this very hour with beautiful things (music, HBO film, photography, stories)? Then go to the
YoungArts website, grab a root beer or a cup of tea, and sit back. Just let it happen.
Since 1981, YoungArts has given young people from across the country the chance to learn from giants such as Edward Albee, Robert Redford, Julian Schnabel, Michael Tilson Thomas, Bobby McFerrin, Frank Gehry, Placido Domingo, Liv Ullman, and Kathleen Turner. It has helped nurture stars such as Viola Davis, Elizabeth Kostova, Allegra Goodman, Nicki Minaj, and Vanessa Williams. It has elevated culture. It has made people dance. It has mattered.
And you, my young friends out there—you still have a
chance to apply. Applications for this could-it-be-any-better-than-this? opportunity can be filed up through October 19, 2012. Those who are selected—in
nine disciplines—are eligible for the week-long immersion in the arts (Miami, early January), for U.S. Presidential Scholar in the Arts recognition, and for monetary awards.
This year, I will be teaching writing to high school students in a botanical garden. Over the course of that same week,
Marisa Tomei, one of my favorite actresses (did you see her in "The Wrestler?"; don't you just love her whole, authentic self?),
Bill T. Jones, that sensational choreographer and teacher, and
Lourdes Lopez, recently named the artistic director of the Miami City Ballet, will be conducting Master Classes as well. The evenings will be filled with performances. A gala dinner will be held. And I will be there, happy.
My young talented friends, consider applying. Amy Rennert, thank you. And Lisa Leone, the real Lisa Leone (vice president of Artistic Programs), you are one talented photo/movement-goddess. I encourage those reading my blog to visit
The Real Lisa Leone and to discover, among many fine finds, a certain Marisa Tomei hula hooping her way to glory.
Gotta go run and touch the sky.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 7/19/2012
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The most important thing about this day is that it marks my son's twenty-third birthday. He came into the world after thirty-six hours of labor. He had a full head of thick, black hair. He reached for my husband's finger and squeezed it tight. The next day, we drove him to my mother's house in a beat-up Ford Mustang—his hat still on despite the July heat.
There's no accounting for a mother's love. There's no math that will contain it. The baby became a boy became a kid became a man—so bright, so inventive, so funny, so adventuresome, so thoughtful, and with a raft of terrific friends, and with a future that seems (thanks to some recent interviews) so close and within reach, and with a talent for loving.
That boy traveled to Spain with me and my husband, several times, to visit my brother-in-law. We together met characters like an old man named Luis, and like a count who raised Spain's prized fighting bulls. We traveled out to a broad cortijo, watched the gypsies dance, sat front row at flamenco shows. We ate paella at midnight on the streets, tapas in tiny bars. We went in and out of bull rings and up cathedral towers and in between the narrow spaces of Seville. We watched the nuns flutter by. We saw children playing on rooftops. And when I started to write a novel with all of this as the backdrop, this son of mine listened to me read out loud—this passage or that at the kitchen table. He steered the ship with his spare comments and would not let me give up in the face of grave disappointments. He said, "Believe in yourself."
I don't think there would be a
Small Damages without this guy, and that brings us to birthday number two.
Small Damages, a book that has always been dedicated to my son, is being launched today. That it is a book, that it has come this far, is all thanks to the extremely extraordinary Tamra Tuller, Michael Green, Jessica Shoffel, and Jill Santopolo of Philomel. That it has been welcomed into this world is all thanks to the generosity of readers and bloggers and reviewers and interviewers, whose goodness is unfathomable and restorative and redeeming and proof that maybe a girl can write and write and write and not be especially famous, but keep writing, and then have a moment in time like this one.
An unforgettable moment in time.
To all of you, and to my agent Amy Rennert, who has been there through all fourteen books, thick and thin (and so much thin), thank you.
Cake is now being served for all.
The icing is here, in these words from the great (truly great)
Pam van Hylckama of Bookalicious.org and in this kindness from the ever-kind and supportive
Serena Agusto-Cox.
From Pam:
It is not often that a book that makes you lose your breath. You read novel that makes you want t
We looked for birds and found this pond. We hurried to the bay at sunset. I stood on the balcony on the cusp of dawn, looking for dolphins and blues.
In the mornings I write Berlin for Tamra. It comes slow, but it comes. Perhaps I don't want to say goodbye to these characters. Perhaps I am dwelling longer than I should. I am in the homestretch now, but I won't rush it. I can't. You don't hurry your way toward story.
In the meantime, I am blessed by a certain Jessica Shoffel of Philomel, who is doing so much to ease the path of
Small Damages into the world, and getting remarkable results. I am blessed, too, by my agent Amy Rennert. She knows why.
The word, this week, is magic.
Obviously my agent, Amy Rennert, cannot tell me a lot about what she is doing—not when she's in the run-up to a big sale, at least, or in the heat of auctions. But today while Amy and I were talking about another confidential project (which is A okay, because it happens to be mine), she forwarded a link to something she called special.
I waited. My email pinged. I opened
the link.
Whaaaatttt? I said.
Because, as it turns out, ninety-six-year-old Herman Wouk, who won the Pulitzer Prize for
The Caine Mutiny, has a new novel due out from Jonathan Karp at Simon & Schuster, a novel with Moses at its heart. Mr. Karp and Mr. Wouk are, says Amy, no accidental pairing; in fact, Mr. Karp wrote his master's thesis on Wouk when in graduate school at New York University.
But neither are Amy and Mr. Wouk an accidental pairing. I asked Amy for some behind-the-scenes insights. This is what she said:
The new novel is outstanding. HW has long wanted to write a novel about Moses and in The Lawgiver he approaches the subject with great warmth, wisdom and imagination. It's a tour de force. Some of his earlier novels have long been favorites of mine—including City Boy, The Caine Mutiny (my father introduced me to it and I still have his original hardcover copy from 1951, the year it was published!) and Marjorie Morningstar—and getting to know Herman Wouk and work with him closely has been a great privilege and pleasure.
Impressed? I am.
96-year-old novelist Herman Wouk has sold his latest novel to Simon & Schuster. The Lawgiver follows the production of a movie about Moses through “letters, memos, emails, journals, news articles, recorded talk, tweets, Skype transcripts, and text messages” sent between characters.
Publication is set for the fall. Wouk is the author of The Caine Mutiny, Marjorie Morningstar and The Winds of War. Amy Rennert of the Amy Rennert Agency negotiated the deal with Simon & Schuster imprint publisher Jonathan Karp–who once wrote his master’s thesis on Wouk’s novels.
Karp praised the book in the release: “Within just a few pages I was captivated, once again in the thrall of Wouk’s sharply conceived characters, amusing narration, irresistible command of story, and the wisdom of a lifetime. I found myself marveling at the verve and wit of this great American storyteller, now 96. The insights into Moses have remarkable vitality and depth. His heroine, Margo (‘Mashie’) is a twenty-first century incarnation of one of my favorite literary characters of all time, Marjorie Morningstar.” (Photo via)
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 4/1/2012
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On our way to
"Memphis" yesterday we stopped in the Fashion District, rode the crowded elevator to the second floor of
Mood, and shopped where the Project Runway stars shop—got lost among countless bolts of fabric (does anyone actually know how many bolts of fabric lie supine at Mood?). Oh, this was a great thing to do. Yes, I did come home with Mood feathers and a T-shirt. Next we went to Parsons and stood inside its skinny lobby. All so that I could say (to any who would listen; will you listen?): I stood among the vapors of
Mondo and
Austin.
"Memphis" was just what I needed yesterday—third-row orchestra seats, center, thanks to my brother. I loved the storyline of this show, surged ecstatic about the stage sets, felt the hammering heart of the big dance numbers, totally dug that gospel choir. I loved the two big guys who danced like there are no dance rules and who sang with such peppy abandon.
Just before the show began, I received a note from my agent, Amy Rennert (who always remembers), and another from Tamra Tuller, that dear soul, who was writing to say that my
Small Damages jacket—a sample from the first run—would be waiting for me at home when I returned. It's gorgeous! It's
debossed!! It, in some unpossess-able way, belongs to me. And at this dark hour, dawn, I am still trying to figure out how to take a photograph of it so that you can
see what the fabulous Michael Green calls its "special touches." Philomel made an investment in this jacket. It shows. "You need to frame that one," my husband, the artist of inscrutable high standards, said.
On the bus home from NYC, our son called. He's an extremely happy kid. No, not a kid. He's a young man with the right friends and a bright future and such a knack for analysis and writing that he earned an A plus on a big paper this week. "What did the professor say?" I asked. Quietly, then, never boastful, my son answered.
"Well," he said. "He actually called it awesome."
"
Awesome," I repeated. "
Wow. Was there more?" I have to ask; my kid is immune to bragging and strut.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 12/9/2011
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I've never been to Brazil, but I have longed to go. For the time being,
You Are My Only is going in my stead, thanks to the good work of Amy Rennert and the Jenny Meyer Literary Agency, Inc. Brazilian-Portuguese rights to the book have been sold to Novo Conceito.
You Are My Only also, as many of you know, went into a third U.S. printing this week. For that enormous bit of good fortune, I have the world of generous bloggers and independent booksellers (and of course Darcy Jacobs, of
Family Circle) to thank. Thanks today especially to Serena Agusto-Cox, who placed
You Are My Only on the D.C. Literature Examiner gift book buying guide. Check out the
entire list for some spectacular recommendations from a very fine reader.
I thank you all. From the bottom of my heart, I do.
Many thanks, too, to Elizabeth Law of Egmont USA, for being the bearer of good news.
It is with tremendous happiness—and a sense of terrific good fortune— that I share the news that I will again be working with Philomel on two new books, a deal that was announced earlier today in both
Publishers Weekly and
Publishers Lunch. My experience throughout the editing and pre-launch of
Small Damages (due out July 19, 2012) has been unparalleled. My respect for Tamra Tuller (my editor), Michael Green (Philomel president), and indeed the entire Philomel team—and author list—cannot be quantified. My appreciation for their kindness and care, their intelligence and wisdom, and their faith in me is unspeakable.
It is a remarkable thing to be believed in by people this smart and this good.
Here is the deal as Publishers Lunch noted it earlier today. My thanks to my agent Amy Rennert for helping to make this happen, and for being there through all the years.
National Book Award finalist and author of more than a dozen books including the new YOU ARE MY ONLY and the forthcoming SMALL DAMAGES, Beth Kephart's two untitled novels, the first of which introduces a teenage graffiti artist living in Berlin in the early 1980s on the eve of a daring escape, to Tamra Tuller at Philomel, by Amy Rennert at the Amy Rennert Agency (World).
Between a lot of work and a lousy flu, I've been at work on yet another read through of my
Dangerous Neighbors prequel,
Dr. Radway's Sarsaparilla Resolvent. My talented husband and business partner has, meanwhile, been at work on the illustrations.
From within the heat of this fury (and fever), then, I share with you an early fragment from the sketches in progress.
It's all going off to my agent, Amy Rennert, today.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 7/19/2011
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I have been so grateful to those of you who have written to me about YOU ARE MY ONLY. You do this author's heart a whole lot of good.
It occurred to me that it might be helpful to answer some questions in a broader format, and so I have prepared this new permanent page for the blog, featuring a Q and A, a list of upcoming appearances, a glimpse of an early review, and contact information.
It can all be found
here.
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Beth Kephart ,
on 6/30/2011
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I began my travels to southern Spain more than 16 years ago. I met an old man named Luis, who cooked for me when I was sick. I found a bathtub full of oranges high up, on an old, odd roof. I met one of the King's best friends, southern Spain's finest breeder of bulls, and he took me out in an open jeep, where the unsuspecting herd was chewing. I watched the flamenco dancers dance; I climbed the towers; I studied the bridge. I read of the war, and I read of survivor, and I tracked down old memoirs from the Franco era, preserving the recipes I'd find clenched within the pages. Seville was home to my brother-in-law, Rodi, his wife, and their children, and so to Seville my husband, son, and I would repeatedly return. I walked through doors few do.
For years, I worked on a book I called
Small Damages, except for the years during which I thought of it as
The Last Threads of Saffron. The novel evolved over time—became a story of gypsies, a story of the deaf, a story of an old cook's love affair. Last summer, just about this time, I shared a draft of the book with Tamra Tuller, an editor at Philomel Books, whose Kathryn Erskine (
Mockingbird) would go on to win the 2010 National Book Award and whose Ruty Sepetys (
Between Shades of Gray) would appear on the bestseller list in her debut week earlier this year. Tamra had ideas about
Small Damages. She encouraged me to keep working. She emerged as one of those rare editors who agrees to read again, who quietly and gainfully encourages.
Tamra shares, with me, a love of travel, a love of exotic foods, even a love of the TV show "Top Chef." Tamra is also, as of today, thanks to the announcement (below) in the
PW Children's Bookshelf, the editor of
Small Damages. I don't think I can express just what this means to me.
Tamra is kind, and she is smart. She works within a team—which includes my dear former editor Jill Santopolo (who introduced me to Tamra by way of Ruta's book) and the remarkable Michael Green—that makes a writer feel at home.
My great thanks, then, to Tamra, to Jill, to Michael, to Philomel, and to my agent, Amy Rennert. My thanks, too, to Kate Moses, Susan Straight, Alyson Hagy, Rahna Reiko Rizzuto, and Ivy Goodman, who read this book over time and kept me believing in it. Maybe it took ten years and eighty drafts to write the book that
Small Damages finally is. But the book feels brand new and just right and full of hope in the hands of Tamra Tuller.
Tamra Tuller at Philomel Books bought world rights to National Book Award finalist Beth Kephart’s YA novel Small Damages, a coming-of-age story set in southern Spain about the difficult choices a teenaged girl faces when she gets pregnant. The publication is scheduled for summer 2012; Amy Rennert of the Amy Rennert Agency brokered the deal.
If there is anything that I've learned from writing the books that I have written, it is this: Take your time. Get it right. Don't send your book out for editorial review until you can't write it any better, or any more.
I have written three novels for adults in the past. One became, after fifteen years of radical reworking, the El Salvador memoir,
Still Love in Strange Places. One, following equally radical shifts and reimaginings, became the young adult novel due out this October,
You Are My Only. The third former adult novel is at the tail-end of a redrafting process; you'll be reading more about that no-longer-an-adult novel soon.
Last year, I sat down to write my fourth novel for adults. This time, I would not tolerate the ersatz in me. This time, I would work the novel and set it aside, work it and set it aside, until finally I asked my agent, Amy Rennert, and my friend, James Lecesne, to read. They had wise things to say, loving things, hopeful things, and I listened to them—reworking the structure of the book at Amy's brilliant suggestion and intensifying the heart of the story, at James's. I worked the book, set it aside, worked the book, and made a decision: Before sending this book to any editor in the land, I would mail the whole to my friend
Marjorie Braman, who recently stepped down from her role as editor-in-chief of Henry Holt to launch a literary consultancy. I value what Marjorie has to say; I have learned from her counsel in the past. I wanted to know what she would make of a story that means so much to me.
This is to say that I made the right choice, for Marjorie's notes, like Amy's notes, proved to be invaluable. It's not just that she was so enthusiastic about this project. It's that she read with care, wrote notes with precision, pointed me to places that needed rounding out and places that needed trimming. She was honest and she was galvanizing. I could not sleep (and I have not slept) for I had been given a new key to my own strange land. I have rounded passages and abbreviated others. I have softened and also clarified.
This blog post, then, is a thank you—to Amy Rennert, for sharing my hope, for believing in this dream, and for so conscientiously delineating ways that I could make this novel better; to James for being the love and light that he is; and to Marjorie for demonstrating her continuing commitment to the clarified page.
You know how it is: You write a book because it is furied up inside you—molten and untouchable but ineluctable, too. You are the huntress. You're after something you don't quite understand, and you're going to win; you're going to conquer; in the process, you're going to get burned. You're going to make up words and fury nouns and add commas where you shouldn't. You're going to mix metaphors.
(It's like writing a blog, sort of, without the back-up support.)
Thankfully, then, there are agents like Amy Rennert who calm you down, and editors like Laura Geringer who ask questions, and a team like Egmont USA, which stands behind you, relieves you of you. One of the great gifts, in this process, is the gift of copyediting, which Egmont's Greg Ferguson and Nico Medina handle so well. This time, additionally, Egmont engaged a certain Hannah to read the pages of YOU ARE MY ONLY (due out next fall), and Hannah made sure, among other things, that I didn't have a certain character deciding to take the day off on the day that was already her day off, and that I didn't have the moon wane too quickly.
I've just now finished reading the book through, and can I say (would it be boasting?) how excited I am? I can't wait for this one to be on the shelves. I am so grateful to all of those who are helping it come to pass.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 11/11/2010
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I was standing right here, on the edge of an old cemetery, watching the sun light up the earth, when Laura Geringer's final notes on YOU ARE MY ONLY buzzed in on my phone. I read them through. I looked back up. The sun had rearranged itself, and yet the day was bright.
I began this book three years ago, inspired by the legends of urban explorers and by the haunting stories I had heard about a Philadelphia asylum known as Byberry. I was encouraged to keep writing by the magnificent Lauren Wein, of Black Cat/Grove, and by my sustaining agent, Amy Rennert. I was helped to think harder by memorable conversations with Marjorie Braman of Holt. And after Laura Geringer (Egmont USA) read the book, I reimagined characters into their younger selves and watched to see what might happen.
What happened, in the end, was light.
and that title is YOU ARE MY ONLY. Words taken from the book itself, but calmly discovered by my agent, Amy Rennert, and her assistant, Robyn Russell, during what was, for me, a panic-stricken week. I now have editorial notes and will be spending the next few weeks deep within the book, stretching characters and scenes. If I am less than present in the blog-o-sphere during that time, I hope you will forgive me.
I am very happy, on this day, to be able to announce that I have sold my thirteenth book and my sixth YA novel to Laura Geringer Books/Egmont USA. I've posted fragments from this book on this blog over the past few years. I've written the story—about the irrevocable ways that an unthinkable kidnapping affects the lives of two young women—until it was alive and right, until it became a story pierced through with light. I am entirely grateful to my agent, Amy Rennert; my editor, Laura Geringer; and Egmont USA's own Elizabeth Law for giving me this opportunity. I cannot wait to share this novel with you.
By:
Beth Kephart ,
on 5/20/2010
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Beth Kephart Books
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I'm headed into the Big Apple today (though not by way of clydesdales, sadly) to talk about the power of the Kelly Writers House program at Penn, to read with Kimberly Eisler, one of my truly talented students, and to witness the indomitable Al Filreis teach a poem (that should be something; hope he doesn't call on me). Two days later, I'll head back down into Philadelphia to see my first Penn student, Moira Moody, say I do to the man she loves. I'm banking on Dr. Filreis showing off some highly ecclesiastical moves at Moira's wedding. I'll take hip hop, too. Or even the cha cha.
By mid-week next week, I'll be spending the day at Chanticleer (the site of
Ghosts in the Garden and
Nothing but Ghosts)—teaching memoir to the aspiring writers of Agnes Irwin, thanks to the invitation of Julie Diana, who is not just the head librarian at Agnes Irwin, but the wife of the fabulous writer, Jay Kirk. Thursday and Friday, back in New York, I'll spend some time with editor Laura Geringer and the glorious Egmont team; the book bloggers I have come to love; Amanda King, Gussie Lewis, and Jennifer Laughran, booksellers extraordinaires; and maybe even grab a few moments with Amy Rennert, my west-coast based agent with whom I often speak but whom I rarely see.
I am not, by nature, a sustainably social person, and so, when I return home next Friday evening, I'll be grateful that one of my very favorite events of the entire year—the Devon Horse Show—will have rolled into town. We moved here in large part because the fairgrounds are just down the road, because these horses do trot by just after dawn, because I like few things more than walking through the shadows of stables, fitting my hand to a sweet mare's nose. I like the sound of clop and whinny, the tinny music that accompanies balloon dart games and Ferris wheels.
Here's the thing about submitting a brand-new novel to editors for the very first time:
You don't know what will happen.
My first novel for adults has gone off today to a handful of editors, thanks to my agent, Amy Rennert. The very best thing for me to do right now is to keep that novel out of my mind. By paying attention to clients. By focusing on my YA Seville novel. By making room in the world for the two books due out in 2010 and room in me for the books of others. By continuing to plumb recipe books for recipes I can manage, and by keeping the house nutsy-quality clean. By dancing. By laughing. By gathering my dear friends near, and chilling.
What will be will now be. One must live in the meantime. Tonight I'll watch
500 Days of Summer, something I've long wanted to do.
As I walked the Penn campus on Monday I was struck by images of endings. This is a close-up of a campus information kiosk—all the advertisements, slogans, promises, queries snatched out from the rust-grip of staples. Come January, it will all be new again.
Here, in between corporate projects and Christmas shopping, between the tree I haven't gotten yet and the countless gifts I have, I am at work on a final round of edits for my adult novel. Come Monday, the book will be ready for prime time, which is to say, for its submission to editors. There's no telling what will happen after that. All I can say for certain is this: Rahna Reiko Rizzuto read it closely, and so did my agent, Amy Rennert. This book is already far better for the time they took with it—for the questions they asked, for the themes they parsed, for the way they told the story back to me.
Thanks to the quick thinking of my Tiburon-based agent, Amy Rennert, I have a piece on the Huffington Post Book Page today, a short song sung in praise of book bloggers as well as a question raised, What can we do to help bloggers continue to do their work in light of the coming revised FTC guidelines?
I hope you'll take a look.
The last time I saw Amy we were sitting in a fabulous diner right down the street from this trolley. Hence the image of the day (or, more rightly speaking, the second image of the day).
Because I do not know where my head will be tomorrow (if, indeed, it will be found) and because I am taking a small break from the sort of work overwhelm that leaves me gasping (sometimes crying), I want to post this thought right now, before I lose it, or lose me—whichever happens first.
When my agent, Amy Rennert, today sent me an email with the subject line "this will bring a smile," I thought, Oh dear, what might this be? I opened the email to find a YouTube URL. Nothing more than that.
Well, of course you already know which YouTube clip I'm referring to. The one I and nearly a million of others have already watched as of this writing. Yes, Susan Boyle. Yes, the British singer, 47 years old, in silver shoes and lolling hair, who had the nerve to declare her dream on Britain's Got Talent and then to sing—magnificently—a song so bittersweet that even Simon Cowell was moved to sincerity. She had been jeered at. Disbelieved. The young among the many had rolled their eyes and sneered. A laughing stock, that's what she was, until she began to sing. And then those who had despised her envied her, perhaps a little, for the thing that she had kept within. For the honesty that she brought to a song about being young once, having a dream.
It was her moment. Her standing O. Her redemption. It was her voice, uncaged. What do we write toward, what do we live toward? The chance at that, just once.
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Ohhh! If only I was still a teenager.
Oh, I wish I wish I wish to go back in time. (I'll let you know how that goes.)
Thrilled for you, Beth. What a blessing you are to so many! xo
You have been preparing for this all your life -- and your students will know right away how incredibly lucky they are to have you there, sharing your passion and quiet wisdom. Huge congratulations.
If I was a teen I would have applied, and I know a soon-to-be teen, so she may have to keep this in mind for the future..about 3 years. Hopefully the program is still around.
So excited for you Beth, sounds like your own Iowa Writers' Workshop lifted from a cornfield and spirited to a garden in sunny Miami! I am looking forward to some beautiful shots posted to your blog, too. For sure you'll be dancing for joy down there...
Pam