Tuesday, May 30, 2006
      ( 10:28 AM ) Rebecca  
Happy Published Author Day to Me!

Hello Darlings,
Just a note to say thank you thank you for all the phone calls, e-mails, letters; the limos, the champagne! As for the paparazzi, well, I even like you, but I'm gonna get pretty damn sick of you soon, I can tell you that! But for now, snap away! My hair is washed, my underwear is clean, and I'm looking oh so sparkly on this - my special day!

OK. Really it's just the day after a holiday weekend during which I fled town for the mountains, returned late at night, and am now underslept, overtired, and the only person who's called is my mom.

I'm about to take a bus - not a limo - to work and I will probably have to work until such time as I am old and can't wear miniskirts and uncomfortable boots anymore but instead will be dressed in polyster pastels and beige orthopedic shoes.

Nonetheless, today represents the culmination of my biggest childhood dream. The dream I was no doubt dreaming when I demanded to sleep with a sharpened pencil in my bed as child. Perhaps even the dream that my parents were dreaming when they subjected themself to allegations of child abuse by sharpening that pencil for me and letting me embrace it as I slept.

I am a published author! I don't need champagne or flowers (I mean, if you insist!), I don't need adulation or million-dollar sales - though of course I won't turn them down! - all I need is the knowledge that I did it. And I did it.

Finally.

Now go buy it!

xo
BB
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






Saturday, May 27, 2006
      ( 5:59 PM ) Rebecca  
I heart my readers. The positive reviews are flowing in! Who cares what the New York Times says, when reader Amy says this?

"OK so I was up wayyyy too late reading Breakup babe and I LOVE IT!!! Of course, with my recent Great Unpleastness, I can totally relate."

(Capital letters not put in by me).

In other news, I am strung out and underslept and generally riding a rollercoaster in all sorts of ways but my life is a damn fun (if exhausting) adventure right now.

xo
BB
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






Friday, May 26, 2006
      ( 8:28 AM ) Rebecca  
Good Lord, forgive me for abandoning you. I have started two entries in the last week, only to discard them. Just like I have started a zillion books in the last few months and not finished them.

I am, shall we say, distracted. I am not sure how to approach the upcoming book launch. Just another day? The greatest day of my life? A reason to go back on the little pink pills?

Meanwhile, life plows forward in all sorts of ways, including - a birthday and a brand-spanking-new job in a swank office tower in downtown Seattle. Words cannot express my relief at escaping the clutches of that gentle giant, ye olde mighty Geeksofte. Oh the joy at not having to drive to sterile Redmond every day, but to jump on the bus with the smelly, hallucinating masses! The ecstasy of having a job where I write and think about BOOKS - beautiful, wondrous, hardcover, mass market, trade paperback BOOKS and not PROGRAMMER DOCUMENTATION! Hallelejuah!

My birthday was a brief affair, filled with too much tequila in a short amount of time, lots of boys, (Girls, listen, I know a lot of single guys if you want one! I can't vouch for their 1)sanity 2)emotional availabilty or 3)sexual prowess but they are cute and ready to roll so please e-mail me if you want one!) and a delicious German chocolate cake. The next day I was thoroughly hungover and miserable but isn't life too short not to be hung over and miserable?

It has been a bit of a shock having to get to work at a "normal" hour after years of rolling in to the mothership in the 11 to noon timeframe.It's hard, specifically, to get up and "write" before getting in to work, and even though I might not be actively "writing" right now (although that next novel is in the works I SWEAR), but I still reserve the morning for writing-related activities such as preparing my Academy Awards speech, etc.

Oh wait, that's acting. Did I ever tell you about the time I dreamed I won an award for Best Supporting Actress but was super stressed because I was at the Oscars in only a bathrobe, only then I decided to go onstage anyway beause Elijah Wood was also there in his robe and just as I was about to give my speech my teeth started falling out?

Yeah. Anyway.

Can I just say, on a parting note, that 1)THERE ARE STILL BOOKS AVAILABLE IN THAT DAMN CONTEST BECAUSE REALLY NO ONE EXCEPT A FEW DIEHARDS READ THIS BLOG ANYMORE BECAUSE IT IS SO NOT JUICY SO DAMN IT, JUST SEE THE PREVIOUS TWO POSTS AND THEN POST A LINK AND WIN A BOOK! AND 2)I so dearly appreciate comments like the one dear Jennifer posted yesterday, and also the e-mail I received from Anthony the day before telling me how they love my book.

I tell you, their is nothing more a writer craves than to hear how an individual person loved/related to/got off on your writing. The world can be damned. Personal praise is the best thing ever.

From the front lines of hysteria,
xo,
BB
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






Sunday, May 14, 2006
      ( 12:06 PM ) Rebecca  
I still hear things from this like readers and it makes me happysad:

"I can't wait to read [your book] because I'm going through BreakupBabe withdrawal now that you don't write the witty tales of your love life."

I've been focused a lot on the negative side of the blog because I'm working on this article about how I got addicted to blogging about my love life and got over the addiction. I spend a lot of ink in the current (19-millionth) draft of the article talking about how the blog turned me into such an awful person and how I "stomped all over unsuspecting men."

This is true to some degree, but I couldn't have been all that bad, right? I must have written stuff that was funny and relatable and true or you wouldn't have liked me. It's been easier to make it all black and white - to talk melodramatically about how blogging brought out my most selfish qualities and drove me to rock bottom until I had to stop before I destroyed my life and the life of anyone who might mistakenly get involved with me. The truth, as usual, is more grey than that. So, on to the 20 millionth draft of the article!

In other news, even if I were writing a dating blog right now it would be boring. These days, for the first time in forever, my love life is going well. And I have never been a good writer when I'm happy. I write uninteresting sentences with lots of exclamation points. Through most of the year that I wrote my novel, I was on the lonelysad side. Especially during the summer. There were days last July when I'd drag myself feeling to the coffee shop like the takeout that time forgot, and writing was the only thing that could make me feel halfway better. And the blog, as you recall, was born out of utter heartbreak and despair.

Of course, I'm always a bit on the lonelysad side even when I'm happy. So I think (hope) that's why I'll be able to keep writing even if by some miracle, love manages to lodge itself in my life again.

So what was my point? Oh yeah. I'm happysad now. Happy that I don't have any drama to blog about, happy that I have an amazing boyfriend, sad that I don't keep you all entertained the way I used to, happy that the book is coming out so you can get your fix, sad that we all die and turn to dust and get our hearts broken one way or the other in the end. Happy that's not right this second.

By the way, you can still win free books! See the last two posts for more info!

XO,
BB
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






Friday, May 12, 2006
      ( 11:37 AM ) Rebecca  
Ho hum, 18 more days until my book comes out.

YOU CAN STILL WIN A FREE COPY.

Either host this nifty banner ad or post a link to my Amazon page with a little blurb about the book.

Preferably you would do this on your sidebar or at the top of your page where it will *stick around* for a while.

SO GO AHEAD. JUST BE ONE OF THE FIRST 50 TO SHAMELESSLY PROMOTE MY BOOK, THEN E-MAIL ME TO TELL ME ABOUT IT AT breakupbabe@msn.com.

Love,
BB
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






Wednesday, May 10, 2006
      ( 11:06 AM ) Rebecca  
So! The moment you've all been waiting for - the chance to win free books!

Here's how it works: All you have to do to win a free copy is be one of the first fifty people to host a banner ad for my novel and/or a link to my Amazon page with with a little blurb about the book.

You can get the banner here and it is guaranteed to look super cool on your site.

Once you've put the banner and/or the link up, e-mail me at breakupbabe@msn.com to let me know and I will check out your site toute de suite. Include your name and address so I can forward the information to my publisher and they can send you your *free book* - if you are one of the first fifty, that is.

Ready. Set. Go!
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






Wednesday, May 03, 2006
      ( 6:11 PM ) Rebecca  
So. This is the month my book comes out. I am going to go crawl under a rock somewhere. Because just how to do you handle having your biggest dream come true? It's gotta be some major kind of anticlimax, right?

Yeah. So I think I'll just avoid it. Meanwhile, forward all royalty checks to my mother, who bless her little soul, works in non-profits, unlike my sister and me - the high-tech sellouts - and needs the money. Bad reviews you can keep. Good reviews, well...my agent will hold on to those until such time as I feel it safe to emerge from underneath the rock.

This is probably a good time to introduce you to my author web site. It is still not completely ready, but hey, it's good for now! 'Tis there you will find an excerpt from my first chapter.

I'm going to try to blog here and there as much as I can between now and the book launch because under the rock there won't be any Internet access.

Love,
BB
| #
E-mail Breakup Babe






My novel BreakupBabe is out! You can buy it here.

Check out my author blog here, and my new personal blog here.


Photo by Bradley Hanson

This blog was the inspiration for my novel. It helped me get through a horrible breakup and kept me entertained for years. But all good things must come to an end. I will recycle oldies but goodies from the archives here, but will blog about about writing here, and about all kinds of other stuff here.

The Nice Peeps Who Link to Me

Powered by Blogger