A guest! Author Lauren Baratz-Logsted in the house.

I am so excited to have a chance to introduce you to one of my author friends, Lauren Baratz-Logsted. When I first sold my book, Lauren was one of the first authors I met, and she was so nice and cool to me, even though she was under no obligation to be!

Lauren is one of those writers of whom I stand in awe, because she has the ability to write book after book in approximately the time it takes me to think up a character name.

Case in point, she is celebrating the release of two books right now:

To promote her releases, instead of answering the same interview questions on multiple blogs, she is answering one question each from a bunch of blogs! So you get to learn all about her thanks to… (drumroll)…

THE ONE-QUESTION INTERVIEW BLOG TOUR!

Katie: I recently celebrated my birthday (no numerical disclosure), so I have birthdays on the brain. Tell me about your favorite or best birthday!

Lauren: Nah, I think I’d rather tell you about my favorite birthday that was someone else’s. When my husband turned 30, I planned a big surprise party for him, invited 20 people which was a lot for the small place we lived at the time. Everyone said they could come. But the day of the party proved to be a perfect storm of bad timing. Eighteen people called with the most original reasons for not being able to make it imaginable, ranging from “I was injured and just put on medication today that’s making me too loopy to drive” to “My inlaws called from the airport to say they’ve surprised us with a visit from Czechoslovakia and I have to go pick them up.” I don’t think anyone was making these things up. I mean, it’s not like the party was for me, someone it’s easy to picture people blowing off. Anyway, that night my husband comes home all excited because he knew there was something up; you can’t hide beer and food for 20 in such a small place. There are exactly two people there. He’s looking behind doors, looking in the attic, sure people are hiding. We had to explain we were it. It was so depressing, the four of us just left the beer and food, and walked down to the local pub to shoot pool.

Five years later, on his 35th birthday, I’m stupid enough to try it again. This time, bigger place, I invite 25 people. I give each person a food or beverage assignment so there won’t be any giveaway of what I’m up to, plus so it won’t be depressing if people can’t make it. No one on the list is notably injury-prone and no one has Czechoslovakian in-laws so I figure I’m safe. I also give people different times to arrive. The night of the party comes and he has no idea. Then, every 15 minutes, the doorbell rings with different people arriving. Every time he thinks that’s it, more people arrive. This time, everyone comes. He sits at the table all night with a huge smile on his face. Best Someone Else’s Birthday Pary Ever. Well, except for birthday parties for my daughter, but that’s another story.

Katie: Ha! I threw a very similar party for a high-school friend of mine. Except she didn’t catch on for the longest time. She just thought all of our friends happened to be stopping by at the same time, LOL.

Visit Lauren at her website, LaurenBaratzLogsted.com, for more info!

Want to read more on the tour? Here’s where Lauren was yesterday and here’s where she’ll be June 7!

Here are her books… be sure to check them out!

THE SISTERS EIGHT BOOK 5: MARCIA’S MADNESS, the fifth in the series for young readers aged 6-10 that she created with her novelist husband Greg Logsted and their 10-year-old daughter Jackie, which was released May 3.

And YA novel THE EDUCATION OF BET, which is set in Victorian England, and due out July 12.

When Will and Bet were four, tragic circumstances brought them to the same house, to be raised by a wealthy gentleman as brother and sister. Now sixteen, they’ve both enjoyed a privileged upbringing thus far. But not all is well in their household. Because she’s a girl, Bet’s world is contained within the walls of their grand home, her education limited to the rudiments of reading, writing, arithmetic, and sewing. Will’s world is much larger. He is allowed—forced, in his case—to go to school. Neither is happy.

So Bet comes up with a plan and persuades Will to give it a try: They’ll switch places. She’ll go to school as Will. Will can live as he chooses. But once Bet gets to school, she soon realizes living as a boy is going to be much more difficult than she imagined.

2 comments June 4th, 2010

Book parties, Beautiful Creatures, and the calm before the storm.

I’m sitting at the dining room table. I was up at 6 a.m., because my body seems to like waking up early these days. I could toss and turn in bed for an extra half hour, but what’s the point?

We brought a rolling chair out here for my mother to use while she was here, and sitting in it reminds me why we don’t have rolling chairs in this room: the floor is slightly tilted. If you roll back from the table, you get the very odd feeling that you’re going to roll all the way down to the window (although you don’t).

Last night, I went to the Beautiful Creatures launch party at Diesel Books in Brentwood. I got to meet (authors) Kami Garcia and Margie Stohl, got my book signed, got my picture took, and met some very nice people. Kami and Margie are Very Special for many reasons, but one clear signal was that they had two of the top three contestants from HGTV’s “Design Star” show decorating for their party! This was very exciting to me, although in my excitement, I thought they were from Bravo’s “Top Design” and told someone so. But the people I told don’t watch TV (!!!) so they will probably never know the difference.

There was a great turnout–I spent some time talking to women who’d braved the LA traffic all the way from Orange County to be there! I also looked around for some of my Twitter friends, but ended up somehow–sadly–missing them. I did buy three books that I’m very excited about–Super Freakonomics, Garden Anywhere, and Snoop, which examines how the things we own and display convey who we are and how we wish to be seen. It sounds fascinating and I’m super excited to get into it.

I also left with Beautiful Creatures, which, if you’re looking for a gift for a teen in your life and *cough*cough* have already bought said teen Bad Girls Don’t Die, could be the perfect gift. It is h-o-t-t–Amazon’s #1 teen book of 2009 and #5 overall!–and very well-reviewed–and just got optioned by Warner Bros.–and besides that, the authoresses are wonderful people with very fun parties.

Well, in just over a week, I’ll be heading to Long Beach for the big dog show! If you’re in the Los Angeles area, you should go check it out. It’s very fun and there are going to be SO many dogs this year.

Just yesterday, I dropped my sewing machine off at a repair shop near my office. I’d been waiting to get a chance to take it back to the place we bought it from, but they only pick up/drop off once a week, and this way is not only cheaper but also easily accessible as soon as the machine is fixed. Once that’s done, I’ll finally choose a winner for my November contest. I’ve waited, because I figured if one person were waiting for her prize (or his, I suppose), that would be far more difficult than many people waiting to find out the contest results. And I haven’t forgotten that I owe Vania and Nathalie their stuff!

Happy Wednesday! And happy December!

2 comments December 2nd, 2009