Our guest today: Samantha Wilde
Why we love her: Her writing is witty and fun!
Her latest: I'll Take What She Has
The scoop: Nora and Annie have been best friends since kindergarten. Nora, a shy English teacher at a quaint New England boarding school, longs to have a baby. Annie, an outspoken stay-at-home mother of two, longs for one day of peace and quiet (not to mention more money and some free time). Despite their very different lives, nothing can come between them—until Cynthia Cypress arrives on campus.
Cynthia has it all: brains, beauty, impeccable style, and a gorgeous husband (who happens to be Nora’s ex). When Cynthia eagerly befriends Nora, Annie’s oldest friendship is tested. Now, each woman must wrestle the green-eyed demon of envy and, in the process, confront imperfect, mixed-up family histories they don’t want to repeat. Amid the hilarious and harried straits of friendship, marriage, and parenthood, the women may discover that the greenest grass is right beneath their feet.
Our thoughts: We were delighted by this fun novel!
Giveaway: FIVE copies! Leave a comment here and you'll be entered to win. We'll choose the winners on March 3rd after Noon PST.
Fun Fact: Check out the book trailer for I'll Take What She Has here.
Where to read more about Samantha: Her website, Facebook and Twitter.
CHICK LIT IS NOT DEAD PRESENTS...SAMANTHA WILDE'S 5 BEST EVERS
1. BEST SONG: My favorite song! Can I say the ABC song? Have I heard a piece music written in the new millenium? Having young children is like having your head stuck in the sand only it's not sand, it's really bad music played by plastic toys over and over until you are forced to throw the things into the basement forever. I dance with my children to old 0ss music. "Safety Dance," has to get my vote for the all-time best rockin' out-in-your-house-in-an-embarassing-way song. They also love my disco collection. Can anything top Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive?" I put on Cheryl Wheeler for them ("Sylvia Hotel" so poignant) and old Ani Difranco and Indigo Girls because back when I listened to music I loved folk music. December you could hear nothing save Tchaikovsky in our house ("can you kids please turn down the Nutcraker music?). You know what I'm realizing? Right. This. Instant. I'm not a favorite song kind a girl. It's like a box of gourmet chocolate. I simply cannot pick just one.
2. BEST BOOK: Okay. We're back to the chocolate box issue here. I can't choose a favorite book. Don't make me! I'm a book addict. It would feel disloyal. How about a favorite author? I adore Oscar Wilde. He's yet to have an equal in wit and clever plotting. He managed to write with both brilliant humor and scathing social criticism, with charging humor and profound insight. It is not easy to be funny. And funny writers never get taken seriously. Wilde certainly did not. (Also, for the record, I'm not related to him and I don't only like him for his last name.) Even though he wrote a hundred and twenty years ago, his work reads fresh and original--probably why they keep making movies from his plays.
3. BEST MOVIE: For most of my life, I considered Terms of Endearment my favorite film. It occured to me, but not until my third decade on the planet, that this is a depressing movie about a mean mother and dying mother and three kids who end up without a mother and once I became a mother? It had to go. I have a rule with movies (and books). No dead mothers. My personal writing motto: Don't kill the mother. Even if it will make a book a bestseller. I am the mother, after all. I can barely think of my children motherless. My new fav: Joan Rivers' A Piece of Work. I find her drive and determination fascinating. I also think American films show a deplorable disregard to our older performers. Rivers, for whatever you think of her plastic surgery, proves that age has nothing to do with it. An Ideal Husband, based on Oscar Wilde's play, is also a favorite of mine.
4. BEST LIFE MOMENT: I have three favorite life moments. The birth of each of my children. That sounds like the worst kind of cliche. I promise, I wouldn't say it if it weren't the truth for me. From the time I was a little girl, I longed so much to become a mother. I hankered for a large family. Walking down the baby aisle made me swoon! The fantasy of a child is one thing. In reality, motherhood is harder than I could ever have imagined at eight years old, pushing one of my six dollies in a carriage. On the other hand, birth (as opposed to labor)? That moment when a new person comes into the world, takes her first breath? What can possibly compare? I had a hard labor with my first son, thirty-two hours without any intervention. My daughter came in less than four hours. My second son icame out swimming into a birthing tub. These actual moments in time have no comparison in my life, though obviously the totality of my days with them count for much more. Still, sometimes I dream about being back in the hospital. Being waited on. Not having to cook. Lying in bed all day and all night. No cleaning. The birthing center is the best spa vacation I've had in years.
5. BEST PIECE OF ADVICE: The spiritual teacher Bo Lozoff says, "Don't take your life so personally." Great advice if you can take it! My mother, novelist Nancy Thayer, says, "Put it in your work." I use that advice whenever I write. My brother says, "There are few arguments that can't be solved by eating a sandwich." One of my favorite yoga teachers, Maureen McGuire, used to repeat like a mantra during class, "Life is a gift, not a guarantee." My husband's advice, "If the diaper needs changing, go to work." And finally from Mark Twain, "I'd lived through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened." (The advice is implied!)
Thanks, Samantha!