This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Susan Sloate will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.
Welcome to It's Raining Books. Why do you write in your genre? What draws you to it?
I’m a multi-genre author (which basically means I couldn’t make up my mind), so I tend to write whatever genre my story idea demands. Right now I’m in the middle of three different middle-grade book series—one for boys, two for girls—one is fantasy, the other two are mystery—but I wanted to write those stories, and the story dictated the genre. I’ve written nonfiction (biographies, histories) and lots of fiction (girls’ series fiction, boys’ series fiction, love stories, historical/alternative fiction, and more). It just depends on the story.
What research is required?
Mostly I research the historical stuff, and with my novel FORWARD TO CAMELOT (about the JFK assassination, co-authored with Kevin Finn), it got really heavy, but in the process we found several wonderful true historical bits that no one else writing about JFK had ever used, so we used them. All these years after we published it, I still have most of that research in my head; it comes in handy when I do a podcast interview on a JFK-related channel! I also did a lot of research for my biography of Amelia Earhart, visited the Oklahoma City archives of the 99’s, the women’s flying group she founded, and worked with people at the National Archives on information about her last flight. That was wonderful.
Name one thing you learned from your hero/heroine.
Jimmy is the nominal hero of SCENES FROM A SONG, since he’s the guy who writes the song in the title. I’ve realized since finishing it that the real ‘hero’ of the novel is the song itself, but since you asked…
What Jimmy taught me in the writing is how powerful music can be, especially in troubling times of your life. It’s amazing, the power of a song to lift your spirits and give you hope, and because he himself experiences this, it helped me to get on board with it, too.
The story was inspired by a YouTube clip of Paul McCartney performing “Please Please Me” to close one of his concerts, and when I watched it, people were crying in the audience. I hadn’t realized a single song could have that kind of power, but it made a real impression on me.
Do you have any odd or interesting writing quirks, habits or superstitions?
Yes, I collect notebooks—the prettiest ones I can find—and then I tend to not use them, because they’re too pretty, in some way, for my writing projects (this on top of also having a great writing software I use all the time to take notes). Eventually I break down and open one up and then feel glad I started it, but when it comes to the next one, I shy away again.
Are you a plotter or pantser?
I thought I was a plotter, but at times like during Nanowrimo, I’m more of a pantser.
Look to your right – what’s sitting there?
Two huge oak bookcases—8 feet high, 8 feet across—filled with books. I had them made years ago and will never live anywhere without them.
Anything new coming up from you? What?
I’m adapting an old novel into a musical! This is the most exciting and scary thing I’ve ever done—script and lyrics—and I have great hopes for it. We’ll see what happens!
Do you have a question for our readers?
What kinds of books are YOU looking to read next? I may have something in my stack of unfinished projects that would suit you perfectly!
On Halloween Eve, 1961, in his dingy Bronx walkup apartment, seventeen-year-old Jimmy Welton hears the opening notes of a song in his head. Jimmy’s still mourning his firefighter father, who taught him to play the guitar but recently died in a house fire, leaving his family destitute. Jimmy takes this song, about all he misses from his life now, to the New York amusement park where he works after school. There, he meets Mark Morgan, a rebellious teen with his own band, who eventually invites Jimmy to join them. And the rest is rock'n roll history...
Their band, The GooseBumps, become a worldwide phenomenon, and the songs they write and sing together become the backbone of rock musical history. And the song Jimmy first heard on Halloween, "Wrapped in Gauze", becomes the song that not only comforts him in that terrible time but also comforts others: Victoria, recently divorced and dealing with an out-of-nowhere family tragedy; Carolyn, whose final flippant words to someone in pain can't be taken back; and Jack, battling back from unimaginable loss with the help of his cheeky therapist and a song he thinks he hates.
SCENES FROM A SONG is the story of a song that makes us smile, that breaks our hearts, that stays with us forever, and the very special band that started it all.
Read an Excerpt
Jimmy hesitated for a moment, then took a good slug and felt it burn down into his stomach. Only then would he trust him-self to strum the first chords of “Bawk Bawk”. He’d written it in a sardonic mood one day, when he heard Debby playing “The Twist” on her record player and wanted to make fun of it. It had never occurred to him he’d end up playing it for a bunch of guys in a seedy bar after midnight.
Jimmy took a deep breath and launched into the song, speaking as well as singing it. After he’d written it, he’d realized he could even dance it a little, too, and he made gestures as well:
Imitating a chicken, clicking his heels together, clapping his hands. His father had told him he was a natural showman, so he gave it his all.
When he began to ham it up in the dance part, the boys be-gan to laugh, and they laughed right through to the end. Jimmy finished with the high whistle he’d learned the previous summer, and a final click of his heels before bowing to them.
Mark, Kellen and Hammy applauded enthusiastically, and Mick, who’d come back to see if they wanted another round, said to him, “Terrific, fella. Funniest thing I’ve seen since ‘The Ed Sullivan Show’. You a comic?”
“Are you kidding? He’s a musician!” Mark roared. “A great musician! And ‘Bawk Bawk’s a number-one hit if ever I heard one!”
He jumped onto the floor and imitated Jimmy, clicking his heels together, arms flailing like a chicken, and making the ‘bawk bawk’ sound. In a minute, Hammy and Kellen were following him.
“Play it again, Jimmy!” Mark shouted. “So we can dance it this time!”
About the Author:
Susan has also written young-adult fiction and non-fiction, including the children’s biography Ray Charles: Find Another Way, which won the silver medal in the 2007 Children’s Moonbeam Awards. Mysteries Unwrapped: The Secrets of Alcatraz led to her 2009 appearance on the TV series MysteryQuest for The History Channel. She has also been a sportswriter and a screenwriter, edited the popular Kyle & Corey young-adult book series, man-aged two political campaigns and founded an author’s festival to promote student literacy in her hometown outside Charleston, SC. She has appeared in multiple volumes of WHO’S WHO IN AMERICA, WHO’S WHO IN ENTERTAINMENT and WHO’S WHO AMONG AMERICAN WOMEN.
Website: https://susansloate.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SusanSloateAuthor
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The book will be $0.99 during the tour: https://amzn.to/3JGG198
Thank you for hosting SCENES FROM A SONG today.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for having me today; wonderful to be here!
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