Yesterday, I reviewed Melissa Kantor’s book, The Darlings in Love. Today, I’m thrilled to feature Melissa’s great essay on first kisses, both experiencing them and writing about them. Plus, Melissa is giving away two copies of The Darlings in Love to readers at Mother Daughter Book Club. com. Just leave a comment here with a memory of your first kiss or thoughts of first kisses in general and you’ll be entered to win. Comment before midnight (Pacific Standard Time) on Wednesday, January 25 to be eligible. Addresses in the U.S. and Canada only please. (Please note: the giveaway is closed. Congratulations to Caryn and Kimberly on winning.)

Why I Love to Write A first Kiss

My first kiss was such a debacle that when I blogged about it (http://melissakantorauthor.blogspot.com/2011/02/my-first-kiss-and-most-embarrassing.html), complete strangers wrote in to express their sympathy.

Luckily, though my first kiss was a train wreck, later first kisses (that is, the first kisses I had with the boys who followed that first boy) were not. In fact, when I think back on the Greatest Moments of my life, there are definitely a couple of first kisses that make the Top Ten. Unlike most other memorable experiences—including college graduation (terrifying) a wedding (expensive, stressful) and childbirth (painful/messy)—first kisses have absolutely no down side. After days, weeks, months or even years of back and forth, maybes and maybe nots, suddenly…you know. First kisses are question and answer, taking off and coming home. Time stops during a first kiss even as it races forward. You step back and (if it’s a good first kiss), you find you are grinning in spite of yourself. They are the ultimate Yes!

Sadly, if all your dreams come true and you find yourself happily married to a wonderful man, first kisses are no longer a part of your life. But given that they’re one of life’s greatest pleasures (not to mention free of charge and calories), what’s a girl to do?

It’s a conundrum I’ve resolved by living vicariously through my characters. My books are all about teenage girls, and each of these girls is someone I like and relate to. Sadly, despite my very real affection for these girls, I have to beat them up. Constantly. No sooner do I create them than I give them a crush who doesn’t like them back, parents who are getting divorced or a best friend they’re not speaking to. What we call plot is really sadism—your character wants something and you won’t let her have it.

Which is where first kisses come in. After humiliating, disappointing and generally destroying my characters, I feel I owe them something. And what could be a better reward for all she’s suffered than a perfect, spine-tingling, heart-stopping first kiss. She sees him across a stage, a dance floor, a rec room a…well, you get the idea. Their eyes lock. They cross the space that separates them. And then…sparks fly.

For them and for me, it’s a perfect moment. If you’re a mother, maybe all your first kisses are behind you. If you’re a daughter, maybe all your first kisses are ahead of you. Regardless, isn’t it nice that you can both enjoy reading first kisses as much as we writers enjoy writing them?

To read the first chapter of The Breakup Bible (it’s got a yummy first kiss in it), go to: http://www.melissakantor.com/breakupbible.html .

To tell me about your first kiss (or to read about mine), go to http://www.melissakantor.com and click on my blog.

To read the first chapter of The Darlings in Love (there’s no kiss in the first chapter, but the book’s got two), go to http://www.melissakantor.com/darlingsinlove.html.

Melissa Kantor

When A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness came out in hardcover last February it was an immediate hit. Debuting at #2 on the New York Times bestseller list, it’s been getting rave reviews since. Now, publisher Penguin has released the title in paperback, and you can win a copy by commenting here by midnight (PDT) on Wednesday, January 11. The giveaway is restricted to addresses in the U.S. and Canada.

Here’s a synopsis of the book from the author’s website:

“When historian Diana Bishop opens a bewitched alchemical manuscript in Oxford’s Bodleian Library it represents an unwelcome intrusion of magic into her carefully ordinary life. Though descended from a long line of witches, she is determined to remain untouched by her family’s legacy. She banishes the manuscript to the stacks, but Diana finds it impossible to hold the world of magic at bay any longer.

For witches are not the only otherworldly creatures living alongside humans. There are also creative, destructive daemons and long-lived vampires who become interested in the witch’s discovery. They believe that the manuscript contains important clues about the past and the future, and want to know how Diana Bishop has been able to get her hands on the elusive volume.

Chief among the creatures who gather around Diana is vampire Matthew Clairmont, a geneticist with a passion for Darwin. Together, Diana and Matthew embark on a journey to understand the manuscript’s secrets. But the relationship that develops between the ages-old vampire and the spellbound witch threatens to unravel the fragile peace that has long existed between creatures and humans—and will certainly transform Diana’s world as well.”

A Discovery of Witches is the first book in the All Souls Trilogy. The second in the series, Shadow of Night, is due in summer of 2012. To find out more about Deborah Harkness and her books, visit the author’s website. And don’t forget to leave your comment for a chance to win.

When Mari McCarthy was last featured on Mother Daughter Book Club.com, it was to talk about mother-daughter journaling and her eBook, Who Are You? How to Use Journaling to Know and Grow Your Life.

As part of her new Wow! (Women on Writing) tour, she’s back with another intriguing guest post about things you should consider before you decide to partner on writing a journal with someone, and some thoughts about who may want to pair up to keep a journal.

McCarthy also has a new eBook just out called Dark Chocolate and the Journaler’s Soul: 17 Personal Journaling Stories for Healing and Growth, in which some of Mari’s friends and associates share their own stories about keeping a journal. You can win a copy of Dark Chocolate by leaving a comment here before midnight (PST) on Friday, December 23.

Journaling: Purely Personal, or for Sharing?

There are many different attitudes towards the question of privacy when it comes to journaling.

• Do you journal strictly for yourself, and fiercely defend the privacy of your notebooks?
• Do you journal privately but hope that your survivors will read your words after you’re gone?
• Do you use your journal as a place to give your writing a workout, later using bits in a book or other publication?
• Do you journal dispassionately, with no real concern for who may or may not read it?
• Do you journal as a way to communicate with a partner, friend, or successor?

Though we think of a journal as a personal tool, we need not think of it as exclusively private. But before embracing the joy of journaling out of the closet, let’s take a moment to remember that private journaling remains of utmost importance. The aspect of journaling that is expression without censure or repercussions or exposure on any level must forever be respected. A journal may become semi- or fully-public only if its author freely allows it.

That being said, many a journal may be created in the spirit of sharing. In this case, it will written by

• an individual who expressly intends it to be read by others, or
• two or more individuals, each contributing entries to one notebook.

In the latter case, the journal is the result of a compact between two or more parties for fun or profit or both.

It has to be a compact, a contract, a shared promise between people who have confidence in one another. Shared journaling isn’t for superficial situations. Intensity, commitment, persistence are all crucial. Trust is paramount.

As noted in my earlier post here, mothers and daughters can make dynamic journaling partners. Others who may put shared journaling to mutual benefit might be:

• Emergency team members
• Travel tour groups
• Recovery groups
• Mentor relationships
• Journaling as a classroom or project requirement
• New parents, sharing a journal for the first year of their child’s life
• Caretakers of any kind

And, of course, untold more possible groupings. If the compact is backed by sufficient trust, shared journals can be transformative. Our personal stories harbor enormous potential for teaching and learning, while providing welcome comfort in their humble familiarity.

The shared journal is shorthand for exploration and learning.

Again, don’t expect that the process of building a shared journal will be without challenges. Sustained effort will be required, despite setbacks. Commit to your partner(s) but even more, commit to yourself that you’ll complete the agreed-upon course. It’s by staying the course that you can accurately judge its effects.

Which leads me to my last tip: make the course relatively brief, to begin with. Agree to share the journal for a short time. When the time’s up, you can continue, increase, decrease, quit, whatever. Let the harmony build naturally. Enlarge your challenges in small bites, and let it all be a pleasure.

What are some relationships or involvements you suggest as having good potential for shared journaling? Please comment!

Mari L. McCarthy, journaling therapy specialist and author, owns Create Write Now, a website dedicated to all things journaling. The site includes hundreds of journaling prompts, personal journaling stories, interviews, a blog, and many other resources. Mari has published nine books to date; her most recent ebook is Help for the Holidays: 7 Days of Journaling to Ho! Ho! Ho!

Today is National Family Literacy day, the start of a whole month devoted to families reading together. To celebrate, I’ll be giving away one copy each week of my guidebook, Book by Book: The Complete Guide to Creating Mother-Daughter Book Clubs. While Book by Book is geared to book clubs made up of moms and daughters, the tips you find there can be adapted to most any kind of reading group you want to start. That includes father-son and parent-child as well as kids only and adults only.

What’s so important about family literacy? For one thing, being able to read and understand well are crucial skills that help both kids and adults be successful at both school and work. And reading for fun is especially important, as a study by Scholastic, Inc. found that children who read for fun are more likely to think of themselves as good students and be successful at school. Book clubs are a way to keep reading fun.

Throughout November, I’ll be sharing tips on ways you can get your family reading together and talking about what you read. Along with the book lists I publish with suggestions by age group, you can use these tips as inspiration to start your own mother-daughter book club, family reading group or something else that promotes reading. For more in depth advice on getting a group off the ground, you’ll want your own copy of Book by Book. So don’t forget to leave a comment on this post talking about anything related to literacy. You could list some of your favorite books or say why reading is important to you. If you’re already in a book club you may want to say what you like about your group. Each Friday, I will choose a winner from the comments posted. If you don’t win the first week, your comment will be considered among the list of entries for the next three weeks.

I already like to cook, and most of the time I think I do a pretty good job whipping up things in the kitchen. So when I started to read The Kitchen Counter Cooking School: How a Few Simple Lessons Transformed Nine Culinary Novices into Fearless Home Cooks by Kathleen Flinn, I thought I would enjoy her story but not find much to learn about cooking. From the first chapter, I knew I was wrong.

Flinn’s narrative about working with 10 women who didn’t feel comfortable in the kitchen is fascinating on many fronts. It all started with Flinn’s encounter with a woman in a grocery store who was buying mostly boxed foods to prepare at home, because she didn’t feel she could cook anything that would taste as good. From there she recruited 10 volunteers who opened up their pantries and fridges to Flinn, then prepared her something they would often cook. The lessons that followed were geared toward novices, but they hold something worthwhile for experienced cooks as well.

The volunteers learned everything from how to hold a knife and chop vegetables, to how to cut up a chicken, use leftovers, make soup and more. Each chapter of the book recounts the lesson and comes with recipes at the end. Flinn’s style is conversational, and she includes little bits of fascinating information about cooking and food throughout the story.

I found myself reading passages out loud to my husband and checking my own cupboards each time Flinn went through a new lesson. And I was inspired to make several of the recipes even while I was reading the book. Things I previously thought were too much trouble to make, like chicken stock and homemade bread from scratch, Flinn demystifies and makes easy. I really enjoyed taking the opportunity of getting out of my rut in the kitchen and learning new things that I believe will serve me for a long time to come.

I’m keeping my copy of The Kitchen Counter Cooking School right alongside my Joy of Cooking and my Cajun cookbooks. I’m also planning to give this as a gift to several friends who have commiserated with me over their lack of skills at the stove.

Want to win a copy for your own kitchen? Just leave a comment about something you do or don’t like to cook and you’ll be entered into a drawing for a giveaway. Be sure to comment by midnight (PDT) on Thursday, October 27. Addresses in the U.S. and Canada only please. Please note: the giveaway is closed. Congratulations to Jen on winning.

The publisher provided me with a copy of this book for review.

Today I’m thrilled to let you know about a new book that can help kids get excited about creating art, and I have one copy of it to give away to a reader. If you’d like to win, just leave a comment with something about art, whether it’s about what you like to create, or your favorite artists, or one of your favorite paintings. The giveaway is open until midnight (PDT), Monday, October 10. Entries from U.S. and Canadian addresses only please. (Please note: the giveaway is closed. Congratulations to Elizabeth on winning.)

Here’s the review:

To inspire her own children to move away from the screen and get creative, professional artist Marion Deuchars put together art projects that would keep them engaged and challenged. Those projects evolved into a book that parents will cheer and kids everywhere will love: Let’s Make Some Great Art.

This oversized book is filled with activities that range from simple, like coloring in drawings, to more complicated, like making a mobile. Taken all together, the projects educate young artists aged eight and above about famous artists, the history of art, and different ways you can make your own art.

For example, one set of activities starts by talking about Alexander Calder, an American artist known for his mobiles and sculptures. The next page gives directions for coloring in a mobile in Calder’s style. The page after that gives instructions on how to make a mobile.

Basic concepts of art—line, color, perspective—are built into many of the ideas as are techniques that help kids learn to draw, such as crosshatching, creating patterns and using grids. Above all, kids are asked to use their imaginations and actively think about what they want to create.

Let’s Make Some Great Art will provide hours of fun for kids, and it’s likely that their parents will want to join in too. This book would also make a great gift for budding artists.

The publisher provided me with a copy of this book to review.

In addition to being in a mother-daughter book club, Clare Havens is also contemplating starting a mother-son group with her 7-year-old son. Here she talks about her reasons for wanting to get this club off the ground and the challenges she expects to face doing so.

Havens is also the author of A Bella Street Mystery: Secret Formula, a “tween noir” novel that she describes as “a fun, suspenseful romp through Manhattan, tying in the worlds of haute couture and 1930s gangsters—think Humphrey Bogart meets Anna Wintour.”

Haven is offering five copies to give away to readers at Mother Daughter Book Club. com. What do you need to do to win? Just leave a comment here by midnight (PDT) on Friday, September 23. Please note: the giveaway is closed. Congratulations to April, Amber and For more info about A Bella Street Mystery, visit Havens’ website. Read on for her perspective on mother-son book clubs.

Starting a mother-son book club? Am I nuts?!

By Clare Havens

Call me crazy but I am seriously thinking about starting up a mother-son book club! Yes, we all hear so much about how boys don’t like to read and the image we have of a parent-child book club is one of mothers and daughters immaculately dressed sipping tea from china cups and saucers while they discuss Jane Austen doesn’t jibe with what we imagine when we think about boys. Gross out jokes. Cartoons. Snot. However, I have been reading recently about some brave souls who not only have started mother/parent-son book clubs but who positively LOVE them!

It seems to me that the key identifying factor of a son book club is the noise and energy level. Boys like to be active, we all know, and they often learn better while they are moving around. It makes sense to me to offer boys activities, related to the book at hand preferably, to occupy them while someone is talking about a certain book. There could be handouts where boys can draw maps showing locations of secret portals or enemy headquarters. There could be mask making or building with Lego bricks or plaster model painting…

There should be food and drink. Boys should be allowed to relax and eat—this isn’t another lesson, it is supposed to be fun! I guess the food could even relate to the book and making it could also be the activity—multitasking boys! Love the idea!

Books needn’t be the only things discussed. Why not comics? Graphic novels? Ebooks—these are much cheaper than paperbacks and many boys can download them onto a computer without buying a specific ereader. Movies could also be discussed, notably how they differ from the book. Boys could also be asked to cast movies for books which have no film version.

Give out the new book at the end of the meeting. No excuses that they couldn’t find the book before the next meeting!

One idea I really like which I read about on http://gettingkidsreading.blogspot.com is to give each person a piece of paper/fabric/bark or whatever on which they have to write the beginning of a story before the next meeting. At the next meeting they swap their piece with someone else and have to continue the story on the other side.

Some clubs have trivia quizzes about the book just read with prizes such as water balloons given for correct answers. At the end of the meeting the boys can go have a water balloon fight outside! The boys can set the quiz questions.

Why not start a simple free blog where club members can post photos, reviews, comments, questions, etc. in between meetings? This might appeal to the techno-savvy set. Tying in technology would appeal to many boys, in my opinion.

These are all ideas that would work well for mother-daughter clubs too but would work really well for many boys. Let’s not leave them out of the fun! I think boys enjoy reading more than they are often given credit for—they may often like reading in a different format to girls but they are often just as passionate about a book or a character. I think I may actually start a mother-son book club, I just have to go figure out how many boys throwing water balloons I can fit in my backyard!

King Quentin is bored with his life in Fillory. He’s itching for something, but he’s not sure what. When the chance comes for him to sail off to a little-heard-of island to remind its inhabitants to pay their taxes, it seems to be exactly the kind of adventure that may start him down the road to something else.

That road does indeed lead to something different and totally unexpected for Quentin and Queen Julia, who is on the trip with him. As they journey through this world and magical ones, they test their skills and their resources and question just what it is they’re looking for in the first place.

Fans of The Magicians will enjoy The Magician King, a sequel that sends Quentin off on a quest and fills in Julia’s back story. It’s not crucial for readers to have finished the first book to understand what’s going on, but I believe The Magician King can be enjoyed more as a continuing story than the beginning of one.

While this is not a page-turner, as the action unfolds at a reasonable pace, references to other popular literature filled with magic and strange creatures (like Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings) make this series especially fun for teens. Note that foul language and sexual references can be found throughout the book. You may also be interested in watching this music video Parry Gripp created for The Magician King.

If you’d like to win a copy of The Magician King, just leave a comment here by midnight (PDT), Wednesday, September 7. Entries are limited to addresses in the U.S. or Canada. Please note: the giveaway is closed. Congratulations to Lauren on winning.

The publisher provided me with a copy of this book for review.

Stephanie Stiles is author of the new book Take It Like a Mom, of which Publishers Weekly says “Stiles captures the petty and hilarious dramas that overlay stressed-out suburban lives in her debut, an ode to stay-at-home momdom.” Today I’m featuring a bit of mother-daughter “unadvice” that Stiles has to offer. I’m also offering one copy of Take It Like a Mom to one reader who comments with a bit of her own unadvice at the end of this post. Just leave a note by midnight on Thursday, August 25. Addresses in the U.S. and Canada only please. Please note: the giveaway is closed. Congratulations to Edith on winning.

Here’s the publisher’s description of Take It Like a Mom:

Here’s Stiles’s thoughts on what not to do if you want to have a good relationship with your daughter or your mother:

MOTHERS AND DAUGHTERS: A LITTLE “UNADVICE”

Is there a relationship more notorious for all of its innate conflicts than that of mothers and daughters? Oh, I mean besides the Jersey housewives. But, other than that, can you think of a relationship more fraught with lore and controversy than the infamous mother-daughter bond? I’ve seen whole marriages crumble under the strain of what moms and daughters confront in a single month of (my) adolescence. So, maybe that’s why everyone and her mother feels entitled to weigh in with advice about how best to navigate these murky, estrogen-laden waters. When it comes to moms and daughters, it would seem that everyone is an expert, eager to share  words of “wisdom” on this often incendiary, always inscrutable relationship. And, because I now have a daughter of my very own, I’m on the receiving end of both sides of the equation. So, what follows here is a selection of the choicest suggestions that people have offered me throughout my years as daughter and mother; I like to consider it “unadvice” of sorts, and invite you to determine its merit:

• Don’t be critical of each other’s choices! I once dated a guy who wore black plastic parachute pants. That’s not the sad part. I borrowed them. That is. You know what? I could have used a little criticism. And not just about the pants, either. Because, really, what kind of guy wears black plastic parachutes and then doesn’t mention to you that you look like a Hefty bag in Mia flats when you borrow them? The kind of guy I’d criticize my daughter for dating, that’s who.

• Spend quality time together, doing things you enjoy, rather than fighting! Hah! Good one! Great joke! Oh. Wait. You were serious? Because I thought the fighting was our quality time. Was I wrong here? Do other mothers and daughters enjoy doing something other than this? I suppose there was that one time a while back when we decided to go to a movie, but we spent the whole ride to the theater arguing over the brand of sneakers Dad used to wear to play tennis (I was right: it was K-Swiss), then missed the show because we had to turn back to check his closet. Ahhh, the memories.

• Focus on your similarities, not your differences! Hmm. Similarities, huh? Well, we both wear sleeves in winter. And I’m pretty sure we both owned a lamp at one point or another. That’s a good start, right? Now, if anyone has any ideas about how to spin these into an entertaining conversation around the holiday dinner table, I can be reached at stephaniestiles.com.

• Just give it some time; it’s just a phase! How long can “a phase” last before it becomes “a personality”? I thought “a phase” had to be brief, or if not brief, then at least something short of permanent. Is this not correct? Because it’s uncanny how long the phase of my mother not jumping at my every whim and demand has endured. I’m starting to think she might not outgrow this phase.

• Learn to respect each other! Well, jeesh; why didn’t I think of that? Gosh, I could kick myself! Of course: just respect each other. And I could’ve had a V8, too.

• What she really needs right now is more space! More? Space? Isn’t space infinite? I’m no Stephen Hawking or Albert Einstein, but even I’m smart enough to know that sometimes, even astrophsyics just doesn’t have all the answers.

I may never sort out the how-tos and the how-definitely-not-tos of being a daughter or a mother; but at least, it would seem that no one else has either. Because it would feel just awful to think that all these voices of self-proclaimed authority had truly found the answer, while I was still using crib notes and copying off a brown-noser from the back row. After all, there’s a certain  comfort in knowing that my relationship with mom (and, I’m sure I’ll discover soon, with my daughter, as well) is as perfectly flawed as everyone else’s. Even if it is all her fault—for not taking my advice.

Stephanie Stiles

Yesterday I featured a review of The Grand Plan to Fix Everything by Uma Krishnaswami. This book about a girl who moves to India with her family is a great mother-daughter book club read for groups with girls aged 9 to 12. Today, I’m excited to offer an interview with the author, who offers insight into what it’s like to be part of two cultures.

How did you decide you wanted to become a writer?

UK: I was a writer long before I knew it. As a child, I wrote for fun, made up stories and scribbled them down. Sometimes I’d try to gather the neighbor’s kids (and dog) to act out my stories for an audience. They were an unwilling cast and I soon gave up on that. Later I wrote poems and short stories and mailed them off to magazines–and it still never occurred to me to think of myself as a writer! Not even publication in a children’s magazine did that. I think in part that was because all the books I read were by English writers, and you know, many of them were dead. So it never occurred to me that I could be one, or actually was one already. I’m pretty sure I believed that people like me could not be writers. When I grew up I tried out other careers, and nothing ever seemed to fit. I was a social worker, then a rehabilitation counselor, then I managed a university grant in a teacher training program. It all felt like play-acting to me, as if I were auditioning for careers and trying to find out what I really needed to do with my life. By that time I was married, and living in Maryland with my husband. When our son was born, I began to want to write again. That’s when I came home to children’s books.

You’ve written several books for young readers. What do you like about writing for children?

UK: Children are an amazing audience. To start with, they come fresh to the whole thing. It’s all new to them, this reading business–sometimes challenging, sometimes a discovery. Life is that way too when you’re young. I do believe that children have instincts about story that are hard-wired–think about the first time a toddler gets a joke, for instance. That’s an understanding of story kicking in. It’s why I love writing for children, because it pushes me to reach for those first places of awakening and transition in myself.

I know you were born in India. Do you bring some of your own childhood experiences into the narrative when you write about that country?

UK: Definitely. The house that Dini and her family rent in India, in The Grand Plan to Fix Everything, is a real house named Sunny Villa that I once lived in. What else? When I was out walking once, I had a monkey snatch a snack from my hand. That was in a hill town in a different part of India from Swapnagiri, the town in the book, but the close-up look at unruly monkeys came right out of that experience. In a way Dini’s passion for Bollywood movies parallels my passion for books. I used to write fan letters–to authors. I heard back from P.G. Wodehouse, whose books I discovered as a teenager and loved. I still have that letter.

I remember reading about a study once where they looked at memories of childhood. It turns out that artists and writers remember their own childhoods more clearly than people in other occupations. And they remember them with less sentimentality than most people, which is interesting. Children are us, after all, and we grownups still carry those young selves within us, sort of like backup copies of ourselves at various ages. In a way, writing for young readers connects me with all those versions of my own younger self.

Do you find it difficult to live so far away from the place you were born?

UK: Yes, but it also makes it possible for me to live simultaneously in two worlds, which is an incredible experience. I have learned so much from both the places I get to call home. I wrote a poem about that once titled “Lifeline” that Cicada magazine published. Funny aside: They got an artist who has the same name as me, Uma Krishnaswamy (only notice she spells Krishnaswami with a y at the end?) to illustrate it. We’ve since done a book together as well. Life is so strange. You can’t make up stuff like that.

Are their particular things you do to help keep your cultural roots alive?

UK: I travel to India quite regularly, and with the Internet and Skype I can connect with family and friends there almost on a daily basis. So I can truly call two places home, much as Dini in the book learns to do. I cook Indian food at home. I listen to a wide range of music from India. I’m surrounded by objects and art from India in my home. I don’t think I need to make a special effort. It’s just who I am.

What are some of the biggest misperceptions you see Americans have about India?

UK: I think it’s natural for all human beings to try to think of places and people in ways that we can understand, so we tend to use a kind of mental shorthand of whatever knowledge we already have. So if you’ve heard of Gandhi, and that’s all you know about India, then that image is going to be India for you. Or elephants, or poor people, or big temples, or spicy food, or whatever. But India is a huge country and it’s all those things and much, much more. The bigger problem I have is when people think of India and other developing countries as being frozen in time, so that everything written about them has a long ago and faraway feel.

Do you think your writing helps to change those misperceptions?

UK: I think that’s one of the things that led me to write The Grand Plan and my picture book, Monsoon. I wanted to show India in the here and now. Of course I think maybe outsourcing is now replacing tigers and maharajahs as a stereotype. That has its own issues because it’s still only one snapshot of a very complicated place. I have a whole page on this subject on my web site, with reference to common errors I find in books about India: http://www.umakrishnaswami.com/common-errors. I once had a reviewer complain about the setting in my novel, Naming Maya. That was puzzling, until it occurred to me that maybe she was expecting something more along the lines of, well, Jungle Book.

In The Grand Plan to Fix Everything, Dini and her friend Maddie love to watch Bollywood movies. Is that something you enjoy doing too?

UK: I didn’t watch too many of them growing up, but the music was everywhere, so I knew all the songs. I didn’t have to try, they were just there, blaring out from tea-shops and  street corners. I did watch several Bollywood movies while I was writing the book, just to get the mood.

Do you know anyone like Priya, who can make all kinds of imitating noises?

UK: No. I made that part up completely. I was trying to make Priya come to life–she was grumpy, and that can be unappealing, so I was looking for some trait that she might have that could be developed. I began to think of how unlike myself I could make her, of things I could and couldn’t do. I can sing, but I can’t whistle to save my life. So I made her whistle. That turned into bird calls, and then it grew into all kinds of sounds so now she’s a one-girl audio department. Wish I could do all that!

Is there anything else you’d like to say to readers at Mother Daughter Book Club. com?

UK: Thank you for your interest in The Grand Plan to Fix Everything. I love the idea of mothers and daughters talking about books; it seems so natural, somehow. I can see Dini and her mom in one. Thanks again!