Awesome Authors: Amanda Marrone

Amanda Marrone grew up on Long Island and now lives in Connecticut with her family and talking dog Griffin. You can learn more about her and hear Griffin say “hello” here: www.amandamarrone.com.

Blogs are a central part of the Bradford Novels universe. If you have a blog, why did you start blogging, and how did you come up with the name for your blog? I started blogging after taking an online YA writer’s class that used LiveJournal as its virtual classroom. The instructor, author Lauren Barhnholdt, was a big blogger and I found a lot of other writers there. We were all sharing our writing journeys and successes as well as pictures of our kids and pets. I came up with my blog name after watching a really cheesy reality show called The Surreal Life. Being a mom and wife can be a bit unreal sometimes, so I came up with The Surreal Wife.

What's your favorite thing about blogging?
Meeting other writers and hearing from people who’ve read my books. It also gives me a great place to brag about my dog, Griffin, oh, and sometimes my kids, too.

What's the difference between a blog and a diary? A blog is a place to put yourself out there for the world to see, and a diary is a place to reflect on things privately. I’ve only kept one diary that was used as a sounding board when I had just turned seventeen and spent eight weeks in France as an au pair. I still have it and rereading it makes me cringe! I was horribly homesick, and it’s filled with all sorts of moaning about missing my boyfriend back in the states, doodles, song lyrics, and endless pages about how I was going to be a changed person when I got home. Yeah, that didn’t happen.

Spencer Grace Kelly, the main character in GoldenGirl, is named after her distant relative, the Princess of Monaco. What’s your favorite Grace Kelly movie, and why? It’s been a long time since I’ve seen this, but I loved High Society. I’m a huge musical fan, and Grace Kelly is just stunning in this one. I loved the telling moment when her finance gushes about putting her on a pedestal and you can see the wind being sucked out of her, because she she’s looking for an equal partner not an admirer.

GoldenGirl is full of scandals and exposed secrets. What was the biggest scandal at your high school? Did your classmates discover any of your deep, dark secrets?
There was one deep, dark secret that luckily only a few people found out about, but I sure wish no one had!

What are your most recent books? What new projects are you working on now? My most recent books are Uninvited and Revealers. Right now I’m working on a middle grade series about a twelve year old girl working in a magic repair shop, and I have two new young adult ideas I’m playing around with.