JESS REDMAN INTERVIEW AND THE MIRACULOUS GIVEAWAY AND IWSG POST

Happy Wednesday Everyone! Today I have debut author Jess Redman here to share about her MG contemporary/fantasy THE MIRACULOUS. It sounds like a heart-warming story about loss, hope, and friendship. With my own issues of loss, I’m really looking forward to reading it.

FOLLOWER NEWS

This week's news is not about a book but about a podcast by long-time follower Robert Kent. Here's a little blurb about it: 

Rob Kent has expanded his popular site, Middle Grade Ninja, to include an excellent podcast featuring 1-2 hour interviews with authors and publishing professionals, including various literary agents, editors, and more. The Middle Grade Ninja Podcast is available for free on YouTube, Soundcloud, Stitcher, Spotify, itunes, Podbean, Podblaster, RadioPublic, blubrry, Listen Notes, Google Play, and many other fine locations.

IWSG POST

Before we get to Jess' interview, I have my IWSG post 

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Posting: The first Wednesday is officially Insecure Writer's Support Group Day.

The co-hosts this month are:  I'm excited to be a co-host with  Erika Beebe,  Jennifer Lane, MJ Fifield, Lisa Buie-Collard, and Ellen @ The Cynical Sailor!

I'm going to skip the question this month and just share about my progress. I've been consistently writing at least on the weekends for awhile now and have five new solid chapters done. I'm about 1/3 of the way done with my manuscript. Still a lot to go, but it feels good to be making progress. And I'm enjoying the process. I also started reading a book on the craft of writing and went to my SCBWI monthly shop talk.

What about you? How's your writing going?

Jess Redman's Interview

Here’s a blurb of THE MIRACULOUS from Goodreads:

In the tradition of heartwrenching and hopeful middle grade novels such as Bridge to Terabithia comes Jess Redman's stunning debut about a young boy who must regain his faith in miracles after a tragedy changes his world.

Eleven-year-old Wunder Ellis collects miracles. In a journal he calls The Miraculous, he records stories of the inexplicable and the extraordinary. And he believes every single one. But then his newborn sister dies, at only eight days old. If that can happen, then miracles can't exist. So 

Wunder gets rid of The Miraculous. He stops believing.

Then he meets Faye―a cape-wearing, outspoken girl with losses of her own. Together, they find an abandoned house by the cemetery and a mysterious old woman who just might be a witch. The old woman asks them for their help. She asks them to believe. And they go on a journey that leads to friendship, to adventure, to healing―and to miracles.

The Miraculous is Jess Redman's sparkling debut novel about facing grief, trusting the unknown, and finding brightness in the darkest moments.

Hi Jess! Thanks so much for joining us.

Hi, Natalie! Thank you so much for having me on Literary Rambles. I’m a long-time reader!

1. Tell us about yourself and how you became a writer.

I am a lifelong book nerd. I’m also a licensed mental health counselor and mother to two young children. I’ve worked with kids in the foster care system, in community mental health centers, and in private practice with girls and young women.

As far as my writing journey, I always knew that I would become a writer someday. When I was a kid, I wrote and read constantly. I had dozens of journals filled with character backstories and outlines and stories, and I dreamed of getting a Newbery Award by the end of middle school (spoiler alert: I did not).

But in college, I didn’t take a single creative writing class.

I’d become much more critical of my writing, to the point that there were long periods where I didn’t write anything, and the idea of sharing my work with a class (or anyone) was terrifying. In spite of this, I still thought I’d become a writer someday.

It wasn’t until I was pregnant with my first child that I started to feel that someday was now, and that I needed to take some chances and push myself. I finished my first middle-grade manuscript during that pregnancy and then starting doing what I had been avoiding for all those years—sharing my work and getting feedback.

2. I didn't even know I wanted to be a writer when I was younger. So I never took a writing course in college either. Where did you get the idea for THE MIRACULOUS?

The idea for THE MIRACULOUS came to me while I was pregnant with my second child. It was a pregnancy that was difficult at times, with medical complications for both of us. I was thinking a lot about fear and loss and asking myself those Big Questions that often come up when life gets dark and uncertain.

I remember when I first started asking those questions as a child, after several smaller life losses. This story blossomed out of my answers to myself, then and now, answers rooted in my belief in the powers of love and memory and imagination and community.

3. It sounds like Wunder and the other characters in your story really tug at the reader’s heart and appear like they’re real people. What is your process of developing your characters so that they are so memorable? What tips do you have for the rest of us?

Truthfully, I am not an organized writer. I don’t do much of pre-writing, I don’t have a method. But I

do spend A LOT of time thinking about my stories and my characters. I think about them while I get ready in the morning, while I drive, as I’m falling asleep. I talk with them. I narrate my activities in their voices. Whenever I’m bored and I feel the urge to fiddle around on my phone, I think about my story.

This is partially because there’s plenty of time where I can be thinking, but not much time to write. When I get that time, I need to be writing the actual story! But it’s also the way that seems to work best for me. I depend a lot on my characters to lead the action, so I have to get to know them pretty well.

I think being a therapist has also helped me in developing my characters. I’ve had the privilege of being a part of many clients’ stories at a heart level, and I’ve learned so much from that.

4. You just made me feel so much less guilty that I don't pre-write either, but think about my characters and book during everyday life. Your book tackles the issue of dealing with grief in a realistic but non-preachy fashion. It sounds like it’s really weaved naturally into your story. Did you struggle with this at all or did it come naturally to you?

I do think being a therapist, a profession steeped in the losses and pains of others, has helped me understand and relay the emotions of the characters. I mean…hopefully! However, I did write and re-write and re-re-write many sections of the story to find that balance, to send the messages I wanted to send, and to try to make sure that I wasn’t unintentionally sending messages that I didn’t want to send.

5. What was one of the bigger challenges you had in writing THE MIRACULOUS? How did you overcome it?

THE MIRACULOUS is a story that truly comes from my heart, and I think when you write from your heart, you always end up doing some emotional work of you own. Writing about the death of Wunder’s sister and the Ellis family’s grief was very difficult at times, but this is the story that came to me and the story that I wanted to tell.

6.  It would be hard to do the emotional work involved in writing a story about grief for me too, especially since I've had so much of it in my life already. From your bio, I learned that besides being a writer, you are a therapist and adjunct professor. You also are married with two children. How do you find time to write and stay productive? What advice do you have for other writers who work and are trying to balance their writing with their other career and family obligations?

This has been a real challenge for me. It often feels like I don’t have enough time and energy to do everything well. After I sold THE MIRACULOUS, I did begin to step down from several work obligations, and I was lucky enough to be in a career that allows me that flexibility.

Something I do that seems to work is scheduling my writing time and getting right to work when that time comes. I can usually get one full workday a week and then nights after my kids are asleep. It means that during this chapter of my life, I have little to no “free time”—but it’s worth it!

7. Your agent is Sara Crowe. How did she become your agent and what was your road to publication like?

Here is a secret that I will tell here on Literary Rambles because I scoured this website endlessly while I was on my agent search:

Sara Crowe was actually the first agent to ever reject me.

It’s true! She was at the top of my agent list when I started querying. I sent out a batch of 20 queries and an hour later, I had my first ever rejection. I don’t remember if I cried, but odds are good that I did.

But here is the thing about writing: there is no time limit on becoming a writer. There are really very few limits at all, except time and ideas. You can keep writing and writing and writing and querying and querying and querying indefinitely.

When I signed with Sara, it was for a story that I had fully re-written and queried three times. That third revision brought me multiple offers of representation.

And then you know what happened? That story that so many agents had wanted did not sell (although it came close, and I have high hopes for it in the future).

While that manuscript was struggling through submission, I wrote THE MIRACULOUS, a story from my heart that has made my dreams come true.

This, I think, is how writing goes. Sometimes the story you have is for Now. Sometimes it’s for Tomorrow. You just have to keep writing and rallying and trusting yourself and trying.

8. That's so great that you didn't give up on Sara after her first rejection. How are you planning to market your book?

Figuring out marketing/promotion has taken a tremendous amount of time, but luckily, a lot of it has been great fun!

Recently, I launched a pre-order campaign, which readers can find out about at www.jessredman.com/preorder. Every pre-order or library request gets a sticker, bookmark, and exclusive art card, and there are lots of additional prizes to win.

I developed an extensive Teaching Guide with writing prompts, research prompts, and hands-on actitivites, which can be downloaded here: https://images.macmillan.com/folio-assets/teachers-guides/9780374309749TG.pdf

I also created a book trailer, which can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ktj6_jC_Ew

I’m fairly active on Twitter, where I do giveaways, support fellow authors, and participate in chats, and I’ll be attending some conferences, like the Decatur Book Festival, doing school visits and library events around Florida, and having a book launch event at The Book Cellar on August 3, 2019 at 4 pm.

 9. Sounds like you have a balanced plan that is actually manageable. Share a piece of advice to debut authors who just signed their book contract about creating their social platform and getting ready for their book’s release.

Start small on a site you enjoy (or at least won’t hate!). I opened a Twitter account shortly after signing my contract and that’s been where I’ve focused the majority of my social media attention. I’ve been amazed at the passionate, inspiring, welcoming kidlit community that exists online. I’ve gotten to know librarians, teachers, bloggers, and, of course, other authors. I now have Instagram and a Facebook page, but I am less active on these.

10. That's great to know that you can start small and focus on one platform if that's what you're comfortable with. What are you working on now?

I am DELIGHTED to share that my second middle-grade book, QUINTESSENCE, will be coming out on July 28, 2020. QUINTESSENCE is about astronomy, alchemy, and anxiety, and I love everything about it! Here’s the synopsis:

Three months ago, twelve-year-old Alma moved to the town of Four Points. Her panic attacks started a week later, and they haven’t stopped—even though she told her parents that they did. And every day she feels less and less like herself. 

Then Alma meets the ShopKeeper in the town's junk shop, The Fifth Point. The ShopKeeper gives her a telescope and this message:

​

Find the Elements. Grow the Light. Save the Starling.

​

That night, Alma watches as a star—a star that looks like a child—falls down from the sky and into her backyard. She knows what it’s like to be lost and afraid, to long for home. And if a star really is stranded in Four Points, Alma knows she has to get it back up to the sky. With the help of some unlikely new friends from Astronomy Club and the mysterious ShopKeeper, she sets out on a quest that will take a little bit of science, a little bit of magic, and her whole self. 

  

Thanks for sharing all your advice, Jess. You can find Jess at www.jessredman.com where she’s posted book trailers, a teaching guide, information on the pre-order campaign and more! She’s also on Twitter and Instagram at @Jess__Red.

Website: www.jessredman.com

Pre-Order: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374309749

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40864855

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Jess__Red

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Jess.Redman.Writes/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jess__red/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3he1B_ldE3JKb1Qvzx7wQg/

Amazon author page: amazon.com/author/jessredman

Jess has generously offered an ARC of THE MIRACULOUS for a giveaway. To enter, all you need to do is be a follower (just click the follow button if you’re not a follower) and leave a comment through July 20th. If your e-mail is not on your Google Profile, you must leave it in the comments to enter either contest.

If you mention this contest on Twitter, Facebook, or your blog, mention this in the comments and I'll give you an extra entry. You must be 13 years old or older to enter. This giveaway is U.S. and  Canada.

 Here's what's coming up (FYI I'm starting my summer slow down to spend time planning next year's schedule):

Monday, July 8 I have an interview with author June McCrary Jacobs and a giveaway of her MG historical RES-Q TYLER STOP

Wednesday, July 10 I have an agent spotlight interview and query critique giveaway with Connor Eck

Sunday, July 14 I'm participating in the Christmas in July Giveaway Hop

Monday, July 29 I have an interview with debut author Margaret Owen and giveaway of her YA fantasy THE MERCIFUL CROW

Wednesday, August 7th I have an interview with debut author Gabrielle Kirouac Byrn and a giveaway of her MG fantasy RISE OF THE DRAGON MOON

Monday, August 26th I have an agent spotlight interview and query critique giveaway with Melissa Richeson

Hope to see you on Monday!