Sunday, July 1, 2012

Ready, set, launch!

by: Joelle Charbonneau

Happy July.  I’m not sure how it is already July.  I mean, I understand the passage of time.  Seconds turn into minutes.  Minutes turn into hours.  Hours into days.  Etc… Etc… Etc…  But despite knowing how it happened, I am still protesting the fact we are halfway through this year.  My to-do list for the year hasn’t gotten shorter, which is the reason I’m totally freaked about the turn of the calendar and this new month staring me in the face.

The month of July also makes me feel nervous for another reason.  MURDER FOR CHOIR launches in 2 days.  I’m excited and panicked and thrilled and about ready to throw up.  (Don’t I make publishing sound totally awesome?)  These are all emotions I’m used to feeling on the opening of a new show and thus far every book that I have published has come with its own set of butterflies. 

Launching this series is particularly nerve wracking because it has so much of me in between the jacket covers.  My heroine, Paige Marshall, is a classically trained singer hoping to land her big break.  To make ends meet, she takes a job as a high school show choir coach and finds a rival choir director strangled with a microphone cord—dead. 

Ok—I’ve never tripped over a dead body, but I know what it is like to go to audition after audition and not land that break you have worked so hard for.  I’ve also taught voice to lots of high school students.  So, while Paige is in no way me, I know her.  I know what kind of drive it takes to face those auditions.  To keep hoping and dreaming.  And how frustrating and rewarding it can be to work with the next generation that are looking to take that same career path.

So, while everything I write has bits and pieces of me in it, this one has a great deal of my soul.  (Probably an odd thing to say about a book with a large standard poodle intent on making the heroine go hungry!)  I hope readers pick up the book.  I hope they enjoy the story enough to read the next one. 

I hope.

9 comments:

Donnell Ann Bell said...

Yay! Joelle! I know you poured your heart and soul and your knowledge into this book. Off to order Murder for Chior, Okay, I know I'm not reading Joelle Charbonneau as this character, but I'm intensly curious to see how the voice differs between your skating series and your show choir and your other writing. Take some antacids and some deep breaths. You're going to do brilliantly

Joelle Charbonneau said...

Thanks, Donnell! I'm curious to see what you think the differences between this voice and the one in the Skating series are. I will tell you they are more similiar than my YA voice. Since you've seen part of THE TESTING you know how different than one is.

And I think the difference between opening day of a show and the launch of a book is that the book is set. It is done. Nothing about it will change. There is nothing I can do to make it better. All the work is done and I can only sit back and see what happens. As we all know, I'm not so good at just sitting back and waiting for anything!

Kathryn Craft said...

Best of luck with your launch, Joelle! You are wise to infuse it with things that matter to you. May your passion translate into many sales! Looking forward to reading it.

Scott D. Parker said...

I've been looking forward to this one since you first created it. And, as I'm finishing up two books in the next day, I'll be primed for this new book. I can't remember: do you have an audio version for this one?

Joelle Charbonneau said...

Scott...no audio for this one. But there will be an audio for the YA books. I hops you like the new series!

Joelle Charbonneau said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Dru said...

Wishing you all the best on the launch of this new series.

Kathleen A. Ryan said...

Congratulations, Joelle, on the upcoming release of MURDER FOR CHOIR. It sounds awesome! Best wishes for a terrific summer :-)

Thomas Pluck said...

Congratulations, Joelle!