Jeri Smith-Ready

I can't wait to read it. When does it come out?

Posted by:  Kathy at 9/14/2007 2:30 PM

It comes out May 13, 2008. That's only eight months from yesterday!

Am I jumping the gun a little by posting an excerpt now? Oh well. I'll have tons of other content between now and then for y'all to look at. Tie-in short stories, character blogs, playlists, a whole cornucopia of Wicked Game goodness.

Posted by:  Jeri at 9/14/2007 2:33 PM

Deer heads!

So now it's MY office?

Posted by:  Rob S. at 9/14/2007 3:49 PM

Well, just one deer head, actually. But it brings up an example of how to establish a larger setting even when you're starting off with an interior scene. Right away the reader's told this probably doesn't take place in New York City.

Unless, of course, it's your office.

Posted by:  Jeri at 9/14/2007 8:45 PM

Eight months! Shame on you for teasing us this way, Jeri! :) I can't wait to read it!

Posted by:  Leslie at 9/16/2007 1:35 AM

I can't wait for this book. Even more so, now.

Posted by:  Sharon GR at 9/16/2007 5:00 PM

Actually, I have this bad habit of, no matter how things are described, "casting" places and people in my mind, regardless of author description -- and then dressing them up as need be with little details the author provides. For example, not only did I visualize Amy Poehler as "Amy" in Scott Smith's The Ruins, (poor Amy Poehler), but the character of Matthias, described as a short-haired blond, was in my head dark and curly-headed (despite being German), like the guy on Entourage. Eventually -- eventually! -- I was able to right things in his case, but it took a lot of effort on my part. I think this happens because most main-character description happens up front in the book, before I'm really paying close attention -- or at least, when I' have so many other things to pay attention to that physical description doesn't sink in. Characters introduced a little later usually fare better, in my experience.

Anyway, this is the long way round of telling you that the radio station offices were cast in my head as the offices of the newspaper I worked at. Ciara sat in my spot, Dave was in the Managing Editor's office, and so on. It certainly wasn't an exact match to what you described, but it gave me a grounding to visualize the rest of it.

Does anyone else do this, or am I bug-nutty?

Posted by:  Rob S. at 9/17/2007 10:39 AM

I hope you're not bug-nutty, Rob, because I do the same thing. I have maybe half a dozen mental templates of settings in my mind when I read, so everyone in a house lives in:

a) my grandmother's house
b) the house in PA where I grew up, or
c) our townhouse in Columbia

Apartments are either

a) my sister's first apt
b) Christian's and my apt in Baltimore, or
c) my friend Leslie's studio apt in DC

If I'm writing, I make an effort to create a new place that suits the characters, or at least modify one of my current templates.

But in reading I can't manage to carefully note each detail and cram it into my brain if it doesn't want to go that way.

Posted by:  Jeri at 9/17/2007 11:30 AM

Oh, hell -- if you do the same thing then I'm definitely bug-nutty.

Posted by:  Rob S. at 9/17/2007 12:20 PM

Rob, watch it or I'll burn your house down in the next book.

Posted by:  Jeri at 9/17/2007 8:39 PM

Yikes! Whatever house you burn down, it'll probably be my house to me.

Posted by:  Rob S. at 9/18/2007 3:40 PM