Dear Amazon Readers:
Years ago, when I started to write Water Balloon, my first novel, I thought a lot about the books I loved most as a young reader (which are not very different from the books I love most as an adult reader).
In books and movies, I appreciate nothing more than a chance to get to know a character well. The best of them tend to linger—I think about them long after I finish reading.
They may have lived at different times, have different pastimes—like spying on their New York City neighbors or inventing a secret language or learning how to function in the parentless world of boarding school—but at their core, the characters I love best are people I understand and care about, sometimes very deeply.
There are all kinds of writers, and luckily, there are all kinds of readers, too. The books I write will all strive to deliver that kind of character connection. I hope that for some young reader, Marley Baird will be the friend she would wish alive if she could.
Most publishers frown upon books in which nothing happens, so I knew I needed to give Marley some things to do. And she’s juggling a lot: dealing with her parents’ recent separation, surviving an extremely challenging summer job, getting used to living with her father (who always seemed more spectator than parent), and wondering if her forever best friends are leaving her and their childhood traditions behind.
In other words, stuff happens.
My books will never have last-minute helicopter rescue scenes. Or vampires. No magic potions to magically fix everything on the second-to-last page. No explosions, either.
Unless you consider a bursting water balloon to be an explosion. Then, it turns out, I have, in fact, written a book with a number of explosions.
Life is full of surprises. Kind of like the books we love best.
Happy reading.
--Audrey Vernick