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Above The Fold - November 9, 2009
EVE PALUDAN
Inquisitive Author & Adventurer
Eve Paludan is an editor of scholarly works by day and a novelist by night. She is currently attending Arizona State University (online) and is working on earning a Web Developer Certificate from Northern Arizona University. She is also writing a romance novel.
When she isn't on her computer, Eve is hiking in the mountains of northern Arizona or visiting family. She relaxes by reading (especially on the Kindle Reader!), collecting rare and scarce art books, baking cookies, and painting with watercolors.
To learn more about Eve, visit:
BOOK VIDEO TRAILER:
Letters From David
(Eve Paludan)
Letters From David
(Eve Paludan)
Official Apex Reviews Interview: Eve Paludan (Letters From David)
Apex Reviews: Eve, thanks for joining us for this interview. We're looking forward to learning more about your book.
What inspired you to craft this quite moving, emotionally rewarding tale?
Eve Paludan: Writing fiction is like worrying about imaginary people and then solving their problems. Here’s some background about my personal life: I’m an internet news junkie, which is the main impetus for my what-if extrapolations as pure fiction. Underlying my inquisitive nature is a sincere compassion for people who experience and overcome tragedy and unexpected life detours. Real-life news stories sometimes pierce my subconscious with a need to create the “rest of the story.” I dream a lot and surmise that in my dream life, I try to create solutions for human problems that touch my heart in my conscious life. Perhaps crafting fiction is the only way I can make sense of or provide closure for problem-stricken people who, above all, deserve another chance to love, succeed, and live their lives in happiness. I can’t let certain things go until there is a satisfactory conclusion, even if I have to write one. Telling a heartfelt story with a happy ending is the greatest driving force of my life.
Before I wrote Letters from David, I watched videos of a major tornado, witnessing the utter destruction and aftermath in the Midwest. I felt incredible compassion for the people who lost everything and had to start over -- I wondered how they would do that. This is where the big “what-if” bang originated for this novel. I began to have dreams that narrowed down specific characters who emerged with unique voices. They haunted me until I wrote the first draft of their story in a burst of about a month, during an annual novel in November challenge (see http://www.nanowrimo.org/). I also worked a full-time day job at the same time, and I still do.
AR: How did you come to the decision to use letters as an integral part of relaying the overall narrative?
EP: I’ve always liked stories driven by letters or diaries. Two of my favorite novels, structured like this, are by James Patterson: Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas and Sam’s Letters to Jennifer. I also enjoyed a popular movie, The Lake House, which was driven by letters. I collect antique books and I own a 1905 copy of Kate Greenaway, which includes years of correspondence between this famous artist and John Ruskin. My love for letters as a literary form of expression was the major inspiration for the structure of my own novel. I am also a habitual diarist and realize that people write down things in their personal diaries and in letters that they would never say aloud. Some of the internal revelations or external resolutions of my own life come from letters that I wrote but never sent. Of course, in Letters from David, all of the letters are sent, because that helps to inform the reader about what is going on behind the scenes, moves the plot along with these little gems of “what really happened,” raises questions, and provides closure for plot and character elements. I’m sure that I’ll use letters or diary entries in another novel because it worked so well in Letters from David.
AR: Our reviewer commented on just how realistic and believable Claire's character is. Is she based on real people in your life?
EP: Nearly everyone asks me that. They ask if I’m a widow and one reader even offered condolences! I assure you, Claire is entirely fiction. I have been happily married to the same live man for 22 years. When readers assume a novel is based on the author’s disguised life, perhaps that stands as a true testament to an author’s storytelling skill and perseverance in creating multi-faceted, realistic characters. As Noah, the murder mystery author (and love interest) in Letters from David reveals to Claire, “I spend hours on the Internet every day, reading online blogs and newspapers, from the financial to the absurd. I write down plot points from real life, to put in my murder mystery novels. It is where I get my ideas. For God’s sake, I’ve never murdered anyone. I couldn’t make up this bizarre stuff for forty books.” Noah’s statement was my subtle ‘fifth wall’ to the reader about reality in novels. If any of the characters are ‘based’ on anyone, not Claire, the heroine, but Noah Greystone, the mystery novelist, is the character who most resembles me.
AR: What exactly is it about Claire that keeps her going, even in the face of some of the harshest - and most sudden - tragedies?
EP: Claire is the ultimate survivor -- she drags herself up from utter loss and destruction to make her life anew. She’s gutsy, grounded, and determined to make lemonade from lemons. She is also strongly driven by her dreams. One of her dreams is that she has always wanted to live at the beach. As a Kansas farmer’s wife, the most that she could ever talk her husband into was an annual vacation at Virginia Beach. After he dies, she has a chance to fulfill that dream of living at the beach. With no strings, a little cash, and supportive family members who join her quest for the beach, she brings that wished-for life to fruition! In a smaller way, she’s got this other dream, too. She’s wanted to be an interior designer for years and built up a small clientele in rural Kansas. One of the things that she saves from the tornado, at the beginning of the novel, is her design portfolio -- she really embraces the career leap when she is in her happy element in her beach house. I believe that in real life, as well as in books, it is healthy for people to be driven by their dreams and that they should find that magical geographical place where they are the best that they can possibly be. Claire’s beach house provided the setting that enabled her to blossom into that best version of herself.
The human spirit is truly fragile, but the manifestation of our deepest wishes and desires can save us from the worst-imaginable tragedies, especially the ones that take away everything we have ever known. As Janis Joplin once sang, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.” “Nothing left to lose” is a blank canvas, and my opinion is: go paint that canvas!
AR: Please share more with us about your other writings.
EP: I had a series of three nonfiction books (The Romance Writer’s Pink Pages: The Insider's Guide to Getting Your Romance Novel Published) published by Prima. Two of the three books in that series became #1-selling books for Writer’s Digest Book Club, two years in a row, and were featured in Waldenbooks’ magazine for romance readers and reviewed by Booklist and Kirkus.
I also wrote a featured three-part series on self-publishing for Writer’s Digest magazine, for which they paid me handsomely, and published poems in Kumquat Meringue and other small literary magazines. I also wrote or edited content for educational products for Cosmi, a budget software company. Some of the works were e-books distributed with software, such as one on phonics for kids, heraldry, and other educational works such as typing lessons and flash card word games. I also wrote videoscripts for Cosmi, which were produced and distributed on CD with their accompanying software programs. I got to be on set with the director. What fun!
AR: What kinds of reactions has the book received thus far?
EP: So far, my enthusiastic reader base is mostly comprised of men and women in their late 30s or older who like to read contemporary mainstream novels that are realistic, poignant, and heartfelt. Readers who embrace second-chance novels say they enjoyed the gutsy and sexy heroine in Letters from David who makes a fresh start in life and finds true love after losing her home and her husband. She makes a new home and life for herself -- that is what readers tell me is why they liked the book. Reinventing one’s life is a common and very popular concept and it works well for readers of a more mature age group because many of them are starting over, due to divorce or death of a spouse, or especially, loss of their homes in these uncertain economic times. Because the story was so well received, I will be using this reinvent-your-life angle again! What am I embracing in this story? Hope. Every successful novel has it.
AR: Please share more with us about your publisher, NoTreeBooks.com.
EP: NoTreeBooks.com is my own e-publishing company. I’m starting out small, with Letters from David and a few other titles that I’ve resurrected and revamped from out-of-copyright works. Letters from David is published as a Kindle novel (on Amazon.com) and NoTreeBooks.com also sells it as a pdf.
NoTreeBooks.com, as you may imagine, is a publishing company that is concerned about the sustainability of books made from trees and therefore, uses none. According to EPublishersWeekly (http://epublishersweekly.blogspot.com/2009/09/ebooks-save-millions-of-trees-10-ideas.html), one tree yields enough paper for 62.5 books. That same article says that 200 million free e-books saved 3,200,000 trees! Trees are important to our planet’s global climate.
NoTreeBooks.com is a social, environmental, and a business experiment to see if a publishing company that offers only e-books can succeed. So far, the numbers are promising and I expect that sales will increase as more readers see that quality novels and nonfiction books DO come from e-publishers, and that this is a wonderful venue for getting an e-book into your hands in the next minute or two -- instant gratification. While print books are very important, I think that smaller print publishers should be using print-on-demand, and bigger print publishers should do initial print runs that are much smaller than currently estimated, so that trees won’t be wasted on print books that are never sold. There has to be a balance between print runs and sales! I know it is a difficult thing to estimate, but cutting initial print runs for bestselling authors to half or a third would improve return on investment and also help to save the planet.
AR: What are your future writing/publishing aspirations?
EP: I hope to hire a literary agent for my next book. My current work in progress will be perfect for Harlequin, a publisher that understands the need for correct print run numbers. I’ll be sending out queries to agents as soon as the next manuscript is finished! Letters from David was an excellent ice-breaker for my fiction career and I will publish more titles under the NoTreeBooks.com imprint. Nevertheless, I hope to follow up Letters from David with a contract for my next book from a mega-publisher! I’d like to write for Harlequin on a regular basis – that’s the dream and it’s never been a secret. I’ve been publicly chasing this dream since the 1990s. One does not need an agent for most of the Harlequin lines, but I’d like to have an agent again. I enjoyed the services of a very good agent for Romance Writer’s Pink Pages and would like to repeat and exceed that metric of success in my fiction career.
I also want to grow NoTreeBooks.com by publishing unknown authors who show great promise. (I’ll be the editor.) I’ve already discovered that, yes, Amazon.com does pay Kindle royalties in a timely manner. In January 2010, I’ll be posting author submission instructions at NoTreeBooks.com. Stay tuned for that publishing opportunity! By the way, Kindle books can be read on the iPhone and other phones with a Kindle app installed.
AR: In addition to being an author, you also edit scholarly works on the university level. Please share more with us about your endeavors in that field.
EP: I love my editing job at the university. My editing services are free to faculty for nonprofit scholarly works, so my editorial calendar is very full. I edit and polish journal articles and book manuscripts, prior to the authors’ submission to scholarly presses and academic journals. I do fact checking and I make sure the references and notes comply with the style books/style sheets for targeted journals and publishers. Sometimes, I do book layout and work with our department’s artist, photographers, and web designer. In the near future, I will help to acquire new titles for publication under our own press label. I’m privileged to read and edit history, cultural studies, literature criticism, archaeology, anthropology, political science, business, social science, environmental science, and many more subjects. I might have the world’s best day job for an author, because I learn so much about writing by editing the work of others who are the top people in their disciplines -- I get to work with the best and brightest authors in academia. Every single weekday, I learn something new at my job. I’m appreciated more than I can express in this small space. Every weekday, manuscripts are entrusted to me that will change the world in some significant way, when publication is achieved. My faculty authors have an excellent track record for publication. As their official “second pair of eyes,” no news is sweeter to me than their publication announcements! I believe that I have the best of both worlds: fiction author and editor of scholarly works. The contrast keeps me balanced.
AR: How can our readers learn more about you and your ongoing efforts?
EP: Please join my Facebook friends’ list at http://www.facebook.com/evepaludan or visit me at http://EvePaludan.com http://NoTreeBooks.com.
AR: Any final thoughts you'd like to share?
EP: I urge readers to discover new books by seeking out the work of new or little-known novelists. In my own reading experience, the best books of prolific authors are the first six or so, although there are exceptions. If you, as a reader, are discovering disappointment in “bestsellers” from the same famous authors, you’ll find that discovering the work of new authors is one of the finest pleasures of reading.
To authors and aspiring authors: I would urge you to check out a writing technique called scene and sequel. (Google this: “scene and sequel”) I was first introduced to this story-crafting technique by romance author Connie Flynn in novel-writing classes at Mesa Community College – she now teaches a Novelist’s Boot Camp online, along with award-winning romance author Linda Style. Establishing logical patterns in your story ensures that your story moves along without meandering and that readers keep turning the pages to see what happens next!
AR: Thanks again, Eve, and best of continued success to you in all your endeavors!
EP: Thank you so much for this interview. It was a pleasure to be interviewed by ApexReviews.net and have Letters from David reviewed.
Apex Reviews: Eve, thanks for joining us for this interview. We're looking forward to learning more about your book.
What inspired you to craft this quite moving, emotionally rewarding tale?
Eve Paludan: Writing fiction is like worrying about imaginary people and then solving their problems. Here’s some background about my personal life: I’m an internet news junkie, which is the main impetus for my what-if extrapolations as pure fiction. Underlying my inquisitive nature is a sincere compassion for people who experience and overcome tragedy and unexpected life detours. Real-life news stories sometimes pierce my subconscious with a need to create the “rest of the story.” I dream a lot and surmise that in my dream life, I try to create solutions for human problems that touch my heart in my conscious life. Perhaps crafting fiction is the only way I can make sense of or provide closure for problem-stricken people who, above all, deserve another chance to love, succeed, and live their lives in happiness. I can’t let certain things go until there is a satisfactory conclusion, even if I have to write one. Telling a heartfelt story with a happy ending is the greatest driving force of my life.
Before I wrote Letters from David, I watched videos of a major tornado, witnessing the utter destruction and aftermath in the Midwest. I felt incredible compassion for the people who lost everything and had to start over -- I wondered how they would do that. This is where the big “what-if” bang originated for this novel. I began to have dreams that narrowed down specific characters who emerged with unique voices. They haunted me until I wrote the first draft of their story in a burst of about a month, during an annual novel in November challenge (see http://www.nanowrimo.org/). I also worked a full-time day job at the same time, and I still do.
AR: How did you come to the decision to use letters as an integral part of relaying the overall narrative?
EP: I’ve always liked stories driven by letters or diaries. Two of my favorite novels, structured like this, are by James Patterson: Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas and Sam’s Letters to Jennifer. I also enjoyed a popular movie, The Lake House, which was driven by letters. I collect antique books and I own a 1905 copy of Kate Greenaway, which includes years of correspondence between this famous artist and John Ruskin. My love for letters as a literary form of expression was the major inspiration for the structure of my own novel. I am also a habitual diarist and realize that people write down things in their personal diaries and in letters that they would never say aloud. Some of the internal revelations or external resolutions of my own life come from letters that I wrote but never sent. Of course, in Letters from David, all of the letters are sent, because that helps to inform the reader about what is going on behind the scenes, moves the plot along with these little gems of “what really happened,” raises questions, and provides closure for plot and character elements. I’m sure that I’ll use letters or diary entries in another novel because it worked so well in Letters from David.
AR: Our reviewer commented on just how realistic and believable Claire's character is. Is she based on real people in your life?
EP: Nearly everyone asks me that. They ask if I’m a widow and one reader even offered condolences! I assure you, Claire is entirely fiction. I have been happily married to the same live man for 22 years. When readers assume a novel is based on the author’s disguised life, perhaps that stands as a true testament to an author’s storytelling skill and perseverance in creating multi-faceted, realistic characters. As Noah, the murder mystery author (and love interest) in Letters from David reveals to Claire, “I spend hours on the Internet every day, reading online blogs and newspapers, from the financial to the absurd. I write down plot points from real life, to put in my murder mystery novels. It is where I get my ideas. For God’s sake, I’ve never murdered anyone. I couldn’t make up this bizarre stuff for forty books.” Noah’s statement was my subtle ‘fifth wall’ to the reader about reality in novels. If any of the characters are ‘based’ on anyone, not Claire, the heroine, but Noah Greystone, the mystery novelist, is the character who most resembles me.
AR: What exactly is it about Claire that keeps her going, even in the face of some of the harshest - and most sudden - tragedies?
EP: Claire is the ultimate survivor -- she drags herself up from utter loss and destruction to make her life anew. She’s gutsy, grounded, and determined to make lemonade from lemons. She is also strongly driven by her dreams. One of her dreams is that she has always wanted to live at the beach. As a Kansas farmer’s wife, the most that she could ever talk her husband into was an annual vacation at Virginia Beach. After he dies, she has a chance to fulfill that dream of living at the beach. With no strings, a little cash, and supportive family members who join her quest for the beach, she brings that wished-for life to fruition! In a smaller way, she’s got this other dream, too. She’s wanted to be an interior designer for years and built up a small clientele in rural Kansas. One of the things that she saves from the tornado, at the beginning of the novel, is her design portfolio -- she really embraces the career leap when she is in her happy element in her beach house. I believe that in real life, as well as in books, it is healthy for people to be driven by their dreams and that they should find that magical geographical place where they are the best that they can possibly be. Claire’s beach house provided the setting that enabled her to blossom into that best version of herself.
The human spirit is truly fragile, but the manifestation of our deepest wishes and desires can save us from the worst-imaginable tragedies, especially the ones that take away everything we have ever known. As Janis Joplin once sang, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.” “Nothing left to lose” is a blank canvas, and my opinion is: go paint that canvas!
AR: Please share more with us about your other writings.
EP: I had a series of three nonfiction books (The Romance Writer’s Pink Pages: The Insider's Guide to Getting Your Romance Novel Published) published by Prima. Two of the three books in that series became #1-selling books for Writer’s Digest Book Club, two years in a row, and were featured in Waldenbooks’ magazine for romance readers and reviewed by Booklist and Kirkus.
I also wrote a featured three-part series on self-publishing for Writer’s Digest magazine, for which they paid me handsomely, and published poems in Kumquat Meringue and other small literary magazines. I also wrote or edited content for educational products for Cosmi, a budget software company. Some of the works were e-books distributed with software, such as one on phonics for kids, heraldry, and other educational works such as typing lessons and flash card word games. I also wrote videoscripts for Cosmi, which were produced and distributed on CD with their accompanying software programs. I got to be on set with the director. What fun!
AR: What kinds of reactions has the book received thus far?
EP: So far, my enthusiastic reader base is mostly comprised of men and women in their late 30s or older who like to read contemporary mainstream novels that are realistic, poignant, and heartfelt. Readers who embrace second-chance novels say they enjoyed the gutsy and sexy heroine in Letters from David who makes a fresh start in life and finds true love after losing her home and her husband. She makes a new home and life for herself -- that is what readers tell me is why they liked the book. Reinventing one’s life is a common and very popular concept and it works well for readers of a more mature age group because many of them are starting over, due to divorce or death of a spouse, or especially, loss of their homes in these uncertain economic times. Because the story was so well received, I will be using this reinvent-your-life angle again! What am I embracing in this story? Hope. Every successful novel has it.
AR: Please share more with us about your publisher, NoTreeBooks.com.
EP: NoTreeBooks.com is my own e-publishing company. I’m starting out small, with Letters from David and a few other titles that I’ve resurrected and revamped from out-of-copyright works. Letters from David is published as a Kindle novel (on Amazon.com) and NoTreeBooks.com also sells it as a pdf.
NoTreeBooks.com, as you may imagine, is a publishing company that is concerned about the sustainability of books made from trees and therefore, uses none. According to EPublishersWeekly (http://epublishersweekly.blogspot.com/2009/09/ebooks-save-millions-of-trees-10-ideas.html), one tree yields enough paper for 62.5 books. That same article says that 200 million free e-books saved 3,200,000 trees! Trees are important to our planet’s global climate.
NoTreeBooks.com is a social, environmental, and a business experiment to see if a publishing company that offers only e-books can succeed. So far, the numbers are promising and I expect that sales will increase as more readers see that quality novels and nonfiction books DO come from e-publishers, and that this is a wonderful venue for getting an e-book into your hands in the next minute or two -- instant gratification. While print books are very important, I think that smaller print publishers should be using print-on-demand, and bigger print publishers should do initial print runs that are much smaller than currently estimated, so that trees won’t be wasted on print books that are never sold. There has to be a balance between print runs and sales! I know it is a difficult thing to estimate, but cutting initial print runs for bestselling authors to half or a third would improve return on investment and also help to save the planet.
AR: What are your future writing/publishing aspirations?
EP: I hope to hire a literary agent for my next book. My current work in progress will be perfect for Harlequin, a publisher that understands the need for correct print run numbers. I’ll be sending out queries to agents as soon as the next manuscript is finished! Letters from David was an excellent ice-breaker for my fiction career and I will publish more titles under the NoTreeBooks.com imprint. Nevertheless, I hope to follow up Letters from David with a contract for my next book from a mega-publisher! I’d like to write for Harlequin on a regular basis – that’s the dream and it’s never been a secret. I’ve been publicly chasing this dream since the 1990s. One does not need an agent for most of the Harlequin lines, but I’d like to have an agent again. I enjoyed the services of a very good agent for Romance Writer’s Pink Pages and would like to repeat and exceed that metric of success in my fiction career.
I also want to grow NoTreeBooks.com by publishing unknown authors who show great promise. (I’ll be the editor.) I’ve already discovered that, yes, Amazon.com does pay Kindle royalties in a timely manner. In January 2010, I’ll be posting author submission instructions at NoTreeBooks.com. Stay tuned for that publishing opportunity! By the way, Kindle books can be read on the iPhone and other phones with a Kindle app installed.
AR: In addition to being an author, you also edit scholarly works on the university level. Please share more with us about your endeavors in that field.
EP: I love my editing job at the university. My editing services are free to faculty for nonprofit scholarly works, so my editorial calendar is very full. I edit and polish journal articles and book manuscripts, prior to the authors’ submission to scholarly presses and academic journals. I do fact checking and I make sure the references and notes comply with the style books/style sheets for targeted journals and publishers. Sometimes, I do book layout and work with our department’s artist, photographers, and web designer. In the near future, I will help to acquire new titles for publication under our own press label. I’m privileged to read and edit history, cultural studies, literature criticism, archaeology, anthropology, political science, business, social science, environmental science, and many more subjects. I might have the world’s best day job for an author, because I learn so much about writing by editing the work of others who are the top people in their disciplines -- I get to work with the best and brightest authors in academia. Every single weekday, I learn something new at my job. I’m appreciated more than I can express in this small space. Every weekday, manuscripts are entrusted to me that will change the world in some significant way, when publication is achieved. My faculty authors have an excellent track record for publication. As their official “second pair of eyes,” no news is sweeter to me than their publication announcements! I believe that I have the best of both worlds: fiction author and editor of scholarly works. The contrast keeps me balanced.
AR: How can our readers learn more about you and your ongoing efforts?
EP: Please join my Facebook friends’ list at http://www.facebook.com/evepaludan or visit me at http://EvePaludan.com http://NoTreeBooks.com.
AR: Any final thoughts you'd like to share?
EP: I urge readers to discover new books by seeking out the work of new or little-known novelists. In my own reading experience, the best books of prolific authors are the first six or so, although there are exceptions. If you, as a reader, are discovering disappointment in “bestsellers” from the same famous authors, you’ll find that discovering the work of new authors is one of the finest pleasures of reading.
To authors and aspiring authors: I would urge you to check out a writing technique called scene and sequel. (Google this: “scene and sequel”) I was first introduced to this story-crafting technique by romance author Connie Flynn in novel-writing classes at Mesa Community College – she now teaches a Novelist’s Boot Camp online, along with award-winning romance author Linda Style. Establishing logical patterns in your story ensures that your story moves along without meandering and that readers keep turning the pages to see what happens next!
AR: Thanks again, Eve, and best of continued success to you in all your endeavors!
EP: Thank you so much for this interview. It was a pleasure to be interviewed by ApexReviews.net and have Letters from David reviewed.