Easy Blog Tour: interview & giveaway

Easy has easily become my favorite new adult novel of 2012 and the book made such a lasting impression on me that every other title I now read in this genre is held up to the standards of this title. When asked to join the tour I literally jumped for joy. We are today's stop on the Easy Blog Tour. Author Tammara Webber has graciously answered our interview questions, there's a link to our review, and there's a giveaway for a paperback copy of Easy (open to US residents only and courtesy of the publisher). Welcome. 

Easy by Tammara Webber

New Adult contemporary*Paperback and e-book, 310 pages

Published November 6th 2012 by Berkley Trade (first published May 24th 2012)

Purchase: Amazon | BarnesandNoble | Indiebound

Rescued by a stranger.

Haunted by a secret

Sometimes, love isn’t easy…

He watched her, but never knew her. Until thanks to a chance encounter, he became her savior…

The attraction between them was undeniable. Yet the past he’d worked so hard to overcome, and the future she’d put so much faith in, threatened to tear them apart.

Only together could they fight the pain and guilt, face the truth—and find the unexpected power of love.

with Tammara Webber

1) How do you tap into the emotional parts of your novel to so successfully (and easily) convey the sentiments in those amazing powerful scenes in Easy? 

As a writer, you don’t have to have lived the exact experience you’re writing about—just something that compares physically and/or emotionally that you can tap into in order to express it verbally. I was in a writing workshop given by Rosemary Clement-Moore where she made a comparison between actors and writers. An actor might need to cry for a scene in which he’s just lost a parent. He needn’t have experienced that loss to know how that grief feels, or to call on it emotionally. He can think about losing a pet, or signing his divorce papers, or something cruel a teacher said to him when he was eight. My experiences were not exactly those Jacqueline and Lucas faced, but I know the feeling of terror, grief, and self-blame, and the sensation of falling in love, or standing up for what I believe.

2) During your writing of Easy, did this novel feel different for you and did you have an inkling how readers would perceive it and how it would take off? What are your thoughts on the cover? 

I knew before I began that this novel was going to be different. I purposefully changed my usual dual POV and first-person narrative to a singular narrator, past tense. I had no idea whatsoever how readers would perceive it. The storyline had age group and romance in common with my BTL series, but it was otherwise a strong departure from BTL. I didn’t think about the readers much once I began writing. I couldn’t. I kept true to what I wanted to write, at times thinking my great idea to take an issue like acquaintance rape and wrap it into a romance novel was the most idiotic thing I’d ever conceived doing, and at other times, thinking it was brilliant. I was scared to death to put it out, but I was proud of it, too. My critique partners loved it, and I had two other writers I trust wholeheartedly for their very frank opinions – Liz Reinhardt and Colleen Hoover – read it before I published it. They both loved it. This novel – the writing, the departure from BTL, the age of the characters, everything, was a leap of faith.

Regarding the cover: Because of the difference between this book and my series, I wanted Easy’s cover to be as unlike the BTL covers as possible. I knew this was my cover the moment I saw the photograph. He’s gazing at her protectively, touching her carefully; she’s not quite looking him in the eye. I commissioned the indie cover from graphic artist Stephanie Mooney. I told her I wanted the title font to look “watercolory” while keeping my name font exactly the same. She added Jacqueline’s earring, corrected irregularities and perfected the image. Penguin decided to keep the photo and Stephanie’s modifications of it. They redesigned the fonts, but the new cover is very similar to what I originally designed.

3) What was your reaction when you heard you were a NYT bestselling author? 

I was shocked. I didn’t know indie-published books could even make the NYT list. I literally just sat right down on the floor of my study when my agent (who I’d just signed to represent me days before) called to tell me.

4) What was the strongest emotion running through you when you learned Penguin would be publishing Easy? 

There was a lot of negotiation beforehand – no immediate offer and acceptance. (To clarify – there was no financial negotiation. I accepted the advance they offered. The negotiation was all about presentation, marketing and audience.) I had four previous offers. Two were financially staggering, but none had cross-marketing plans, and most wanted it slated as “women’s fiction,” which it is not. None of these were accepted. Honestly, I’d all but relegated myself to keeping Easy as an indie-published book, so I could keep the central purpose of it authentic. I wanted to speak to survivors of sexual assault and their often well-meaning but ill-informed peers. At its heart, Easy is a mature young adult “problem” novel covered in a contemporary romance. I wrote it this way purposefully, because I wanted girls and women who avoid typical “issues” books to find humor in the relationship between Jacqueline and Erin, and find comfort in the developing love between Jacqueline and Lucas. The “issue” was the reason I wrote the book; the romance is the cushion around it. I never thought I’d write a book like this, but I did, and it was too important to me to put the marketing of it into the wrong hands. I needed a publisher who would listen to my concerns, and when I talked to Don Weisberg at Penguin, I knew I’d found that publisher.

5) Can you share with us what you're working on next and do you think the "new adult" genre is here to stay (and that you are being credited as being a 'pioneer' of this much-needed genre)? 

I’m working on the fourth (final) installment of my Between the Lines series, which I interrupted to write Easy. After that, I’ll be writing another stand-alone novel.

I’m not convinced “New Adult” will be a separate genre or category, or that it needs to be. What needed to happen has happened: authors are writing novels with characters in the college age range. Where those books should be “shelved” is something retailers will have to figure out. Online retailers are having no problem selling them, even without their own category. Indie authors wrote them, and buyers found them. Publishers have long decreed that novels with main characters in the 18-23 year old age range won’t sell. Clearly, that’s not true. This should have been obvious with the success of the few YA books that took high school characters and ventured into the college years with them (Gayle Forman’s Where She Went and Jenny Han’s Summer series come to mind immediately). For some reason, however, they didn’t get the message. The answer, for publishers, is insanely simple: Stop assuming that only college students would be interested in reading about college students or college-aged characters. Stop telling authors not to write characters in the 18-23 age range.

About the author:

Tammara Webber

Website | Twitter | Facebook

I write romantic Mature Young Adult / New Adult fiction.

EASY is my newest contemporary stand-alone novel. BETWEEN THE LINES is my contemporary series. Available on:Amazon, Amazon UK, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, iBookstore, IndieBound, and the Book Depository.

Reading was one of my first and earliest loves, and writing soon followed. My first book was about a lost bear, but my lack of ability as an illustrator convinced me to abandon that effort and concentrate on passing 3rd grade. I wrote sad romantic poetry in high school and penned my first half-novel when I was 19, for which I did lots of research on Vikings (the marauders, not the football team). It was accidentally destroyed when I stuffed it into the shredder at work.

Addictions: coffee and Cherry Garcia frozen yogurt. Also baby carrots, but not with coffee or frozen yogurt, because that would be disgusting. I love shopping for earrings, because they always fit - even if I occasionally forget to work out. I'm a hopeful romantic who adores novels with happy endings, because there are enough sad endings in real life.

Next stops on the tour:

November 28: ROMANCE JUNKIES BLOG

November 29: OH PAPER PAGES

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