Monday, February 23, 2009

Distractions are good


So there I was working on my second young adult book, totally at a dead end, not sure where I’m going with the story when I get this email from my editor at The Wild Rose Press. She wants to do an anthology for summer on teen love stories. Would I be interested?

Um, yeah.

It was a no brainer. Something to distract me from my going absolutely nowhere book. It was a godsend.

She wanted a couple sample chapters and synopsis in a few months. I went to work on it right away. I was totally pumped. It was something new and fresh. The story practically wrote itself, but I was hesitant to send my idea off to her to soon. What if I hit the same snag and found myself stuck and a deadline looming overhead? So I waited until I had almost the whole story down before I sent off the chapters and synopsis. In two days she wrote back and said she liked the idea; send the rest as soon as I had it ready.

Since I was almost done with the story it didn’t take me long to complete it. I had my usually proofreaders give it the once over, (thanks Mike, Lynn and Maureen!) and off it went to my editor. Within a month she responded with a contract offer which I happily accepted.

Here’s a blurb on Just Perfect, my short story due out this summer as part of the YA anthology, Summer Lovin’:

Caroline Jane Edmonds, CJ to her friends and family, has the perfect summer planned. She calls it the TSL summer: tanning, swimming and love, and not necessarily in that order. As a matter of fact, she’ll take it in any order, just as long as it comesWhen the first day of summer rolls around, CJ’s on top of the world. But that world gets pulled out from beneath her feet when her father decides, without consulting CJ at all, that she needs a summer job. He even picks out the job: -- working at the miniature golf course and driving range for the park district where he is the director.Now all she has to do is combine her ideal summer plans into her new job and she’ll have a hole in one, otherwise her whole summer will be way below par.Perfect, just perfect!

As soon as I get the release date I’ll post it.

Have a great week!

June

www.junesproat.com

5 comments:

Marilyn Brant said...

Congrats, June! Sounds like another fun premise that will intrigue teens :).

Debra St. John said...

Can't wait to read it, June!

L. Diane Wolfe said...

Congrats! Sounded like you just needed a fresh idea to get excited about for a while. Sometimes it's those little projects that spark us to life. I was just contacted to contribute to a book for Wolfmont Press and it amazed me how fast it pulled it all together...

L. Diane Wolfe
www.circleoffriendsbooks.blogspot.com
www.spunkonastick.net
www.thecircleoffriends.net

Deb Larson said...

Contrats June!
YA is an exciting genre. The book sounds intriguing and fun!
DL Larson

Margot Justes said...

June,
Congratulations!!! Can't wait to get a copy.
Margot Justes
www.mjustes.com