The Elevator Pitch

You have 30 seconds to pique someone's interest in your book. GO!

What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?

“A wrenching but life-affirming novel based on a true story of survival, friendship, and redemption when six girls come together in a Catholic reform school in 1960s Buffalo, NY.”

(How’d I do? Let me know in the Comments.)

How did you decide where your book was going to take place?

The book decided for me! I learned of a real place in Buffalo, run by nuns, where “wayward girls” were sent and forced to work like inmates, up until the early 1970s. Here’s what the Good Shepherd looks like today.

Would you hang out with your protagonist in real life?

Absolutely. By now, Mairin O’Hara would be about ten years older than me, and she’s the ultimate wise woman, shaped, scarred, and uplifted by her long, eventful life. I’d love to hear more about her daring escape from the Magdalene laundry (Catholic run reform school) where she was unjustly sent by her Irish mother and awful stepfather. I’d want her to tell me how you re-make your life after an ordeal like that.

What are three words that describe your protagonist?

Impulsive, free-spirited, irrepressible. The Irish name Mairin (Máirín) is derived from the name Mairéad, which translates to pearl or sometimes “star of the sea.” The character names in my books are never randomly selected. There’s usually a hidden meaning behind the name.

What’s something you learned while writing this book?

Wow, what DIDN’T I learn? I was raised in privilege (a mixed blessing that is admittedly mostly a blessing) and shielded from so much that I didn’t “see” things that were right under my nose. As a child in the 60s, I remember more than one babysitter who “went away,” a euphemism for girls sent away when they became pregnant. The more I learned, the more deeply I felt the helpless pain and rage of these young women. Their stories ignited my imagination, and Wayward Girls became one of my most personal and involving novels to date.

Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?

I try to power through a “discovery draft” without doing too much fine-tuning. But when I get to the end, the fun begins. I revise draft after draft. Then my editor reads the manuscript, and that leads to more revisions. Lather, rinse, repeat.

What can readers expect from you next?

I’ve got a few things I’m juggling right now, including a screenplay I wrote with my best writer buddy. One is a contemporary novel that’s a spinoff of the Calhoun Chronicles, and the other is a historical set in the aftermath of the Vietnam debacle. The best way to stay updated on my books is subscribe to my very occasional, non-annoying Substack newsletter.

Real quick: Liberty Bay Books is offering 10% off AND a free signed mystery title from my backlist! And it’s 10% at Eagle Harbor Book Company, where you can meet me and the incomparable Lynn Brunelle for our “Summer of Love” presentation on July 8 at 6pm.

Your turn! Show us your elevator pitch for your current creative project, whether it’s a novel, a quilt, a painting, a travel plan…sell me on it! GO!