| Interview with Jennifer Echols |
First off, thanks so much for joining us for an up-close and personal interview for TeensReadToo.com!
My name is Jen, and I’ll be your server toda…oh, wait, wrong job! Anyway, thanks so much for taking time
out of your writing schedule—which I’m sure is busy!—and answering a few questions for your readers and
fans.
Let’s get some of the typical interview questions out of the way first. When did you first know that you
wanted to be a writer?
I was writing poems in third grade and stories in fifth. By sixth I had started my first novel, about squirrels (I
must have been influenced by Watership Down, which is about rabbits). But I was also interested in art
and music. When I started college, I was a music major. I quickly found out that I was not a virtuoso like the
other music majors. I could compete a lot better with my writing than my oboe.
Can you tell us a little bit about your road to publishing?
I wrote a lot of novels and toyed with a lot of different genres before I decided in 2004 to get published in
romance or bust. I signed with my agent, Nephele Tempest, in February 2005. She sold the teen romantic
comedy MAJOR CRUSH and a second teen novel to Simon Pulse in July 2005. MAJOR CRUSH will be
available in July 2006, and the second novel will be published in 2007.
Tell us a little bit about either your latest or upcoming release. If you could only tell your readers one
thing about the story that had to convince us to buy the book, what would it be?
A lot of teen novels are billed as romances, but they don’t have enough romance in them to suit my taste.
I’m very interested in the heroine’s relationships with her friends and her mom, but I’m flipping the pages to
get back to her relationship with the boy! In MAJOR CRUSH, I’ve written the type of book I want to read,
with the focus squarely on two teenagers falling in love.
What, or who, has been the greatest inspiration for your stories?
My husband. When we were growing up, he was the only Asian in our school. He has taught me so much
about trying to fit in, struggling to be something you’re not, putting up a good front, and coming to terms
with yourself. We have all been through these things to some degree, but he experienced them more
overtly. They have become themes in my writing.
Let’s hear about your family, who I’m sure are thrilled to have a published author among them!
I am proud and grateful to come from a family of introverted nerds. Family night for us was sitting together
in the den, reading our separate books, or gathering around the TV to watch Carl Sagan’s Cosmos.
Now for some fun facts. What’s your greatest comfort food?
Chocolate icing. If no one is watching, I throw away the cake to make room for more icing.
What are the first three things you do when you wake up in the morning?
I get up at 4:30 to write while the house is quiet. I make coffee and write for two and a half hours
(ecstasy!), then make breakfast at 7:00.
If I came to your house and looked in your closet/attic/basement, what’s the one thing that would surprise
me the most?
An empty closet! Most of the rest of the closets are only half full. I think I live in fear of becoming my
parents in this respect. Their basement is bursting with God knows what. Visiting them recently, I found a
jar of baby cream (is this even sold anymore?) from 1965.
Everyone asks the question about “if you could be a tree, which tree would you be?” so I want to know: If
you could be a color, which color would it be, and why?
Blue. My grandmother, a writer and English teacher and huge Faulkner fan, loved blue. Almost all her
clothes and every room in her house was blue, and I feel comforted when I see that shade.
Who is your favorite cartoon character? Which cartoon character is most like you?
Snoopy is my favorite, and I look up to him. Charlie Brown and the gang have something else going on,
and Snoopy is in the doghouse, quietly doing something at cross-purposes with them. It’s not that Snoopy
refuses to follow the crowd. Following the crowd never occurs to him.
If you could beam yourself to anywhere in the world (“Beam me up, Scotty!"), during any time in history,
where and when would it be—and why?
I will stay in 2006, thank you. I have typed and revised an entire 100,000-word novel on a typewriter,
before computers were cheap. I do love modern technology. And I can’t imagine a more fascinating era
than the one we’re experiencing right now. As for place, put me in Key West. I live in Alabama, and the
winters are killing me!
So what’s your favorite type of music to listen to? Favorite musical artists? Do you listen to music while
you’re writing?
I love and listen to all kinds of music—pop (Kelly Clarkson), rock (Nickelback), country (Rascal Flatts),
bluegrass (Nickel Creek), classical (Bach). My favorite type is probably old-school soul, and for that you
can’t beat Earth Wind & Fire. I make a “soundtrack” of each book I write and listen to it on my iPod while
I’m jogging, because that helps me get ideas. But when I’m actually sitting down to write, it’s usually quiet in
the house, or I’m wearing earplugs.
Do you have any favorite T.V. shows? Movies you watch over and over again? What was the last movie
you saw at the theater?
I don’t watch much TV. I love it, but I just don’t have time! I do try never to miss an episode of American
Idol. I’ve enjoyed COPS, Reno 911, The Daily Show, and The O.C. in the past, and I wish I could catch
them more often. As for movies, I love romantic comedies: The Sure Thing, When Harry Met Sally, French
Kiss. I also love Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back (for the relationship between Han and Leia, yo). I
used to live down the street from a theater that showed all kinds of movies—mainstream, indy, foreign,
gay—and I saw practically everything they showed. I miss it so much! Now I have a small child, and it’s
hard for me to see movies in the theater. I last saw Pride and Prejudice. Loved. It!
You have the chance to give one piece of advice to your teen readers. What would it be?
Don’t be afraid to try new (legal) experiences. The reason a lot of people don’t find their perfect career
until they’re 40 is that they were never exposed to that possibility.
One last question. What stories can we look forward to from you in the future?
I have just completed another romantic comedy, BOY IN BLUE. To avoid prosecution for a high school
stunt, a 17-year-old spends spring break assigned to night patrol with the 19-year-old rookie cop who
arrested her.
Again, thanks so much for joining us at TeensReadToo.com!
Thank you for including me!
My name is Jen, and I’ll be your server toda…oh, wait, wrong job! Anyway, thanks so much for taking time
out of your writing schedule—which I’m sure is busy!—and answering a few questions for your readers and
fans.
Let’s get some of the typical interview questions out of the way first. When did you first know that you
wanted to be a writer?
I was writing poems in third grade and stories in fifth. By sixth I had started my first novel, about squirrels (I
must have been influenced by Watership Down, which is about rabbits). But I was also interested in art
and music. When I started college, I was a music major. I quickly found out that I was not a virtuoso like the
other music majors. I could compete a lot better with my writing than my oboe.
Can you tell us a little bit about your road to publishing?
I wrote a lot of novels and toyed with a lot of different genres before I decided in 2004 to get published in
romance or bust. I signed with my agent, Nephele Tempest, in February 2005. She sold the teen romantic
comedy MAJOR CRUSH and a second teen novel to Simon Pulse in July 2005. MAJOR CRUSH will be
available in July 2006, and the second novel will be published in 2007.
Tell us a little bit about either your latest or upcoming release. If you could only tell your readers one
thing about the story that had to convince us to buy the book, what would it be?
A lot of teen novels are billed as romances, but they don’t have enough romance in them to suit my taste.
I’m very interested in the heroine’s relationships with her friends and her mom, but I’m flipping the pages to
get back to her relationship with the boy! In MAJOR CRUSH, I’ve written the type of book I want to read,
with the focus squarely on two teenagers falling in love.
What, or who, has been the greatest inspiration for your stories?
My husband. When we were growing up, he was the only Asian in our school. He has taught me so much
about trying to fit in, struggling to be something you’re not, putting up a good front, and coming to terms
with yourself. We have all been through these things to some degree, but he experienced them more
overtly. They have become themes in my writing.
Let’s hear about your family, who I’m sure are thrilled to have a published author among them!
I am proud and grateful to come from a family of introverted nerds. Family night for us was sitting together
in the den, reading our separate books, or gathering around the TV to watch Carl Sagan’s Cosmos.
Now for some fun facts. What’s your greatest comfort food?
Chocolate icing. If no one is watching, I throw away the cake to make room for more icing.
What are the first three things you do when you wake up in the morning?
I get up at 4:30 to write while the house is quiet. I make coffee and write for two and a half hours
(ecstasy!), then make breakfast at 7:00.
If I came to your house and looked in your closet/attic/basement, what’s the one thing that would surprise
me the most?
An empty closet! Most of the rest of the closets are only half full. I think I live in fear of becoming my
parents in this respect. Their basement is bursting with God knows what. Visiting them recently, I found a
jar of baby cream (is this even sold anymore?) from 1965.
Everyone asks the question about “if you could be a tree, which tree would you be?” so I want to know: If
you could be a color, which color would it be, and why?
Blue. My grandmother, a writer and English teacher and huge Faulkner fan, loved blue. Almost all her
clothes and every room in her house was blue, and I feel comforted when I see that shade.
Who is your favorite cartoon character? Which cartoon character is most like you?
Snoopy is my favorite, and I look up to him. Charlie Brown and the gang have something else going on,
and Snoopy is in the doghouse, quietly doing something at cross-purposes with them. It’s not that Snoopy
refuses to follow the crowd. Following the crowd never occurs to him.
If you could beam yourself to anywhere in the world (“Beam me up, Scotty!"), during any time in history,
where and when would it be—and why?
I will stay in 2006, thank you. I have typed and revised an entire 100,000-word novel on a typewriter,
before computers were cheap. I do love modern technology. And I can’t imagine a more fascinating era
than the one we’re experiencing right now. As for place, put me in Key West. I live in Alabama, and the
winters are killing me!
So what’s your favorite type of music to listen to? Favorite musical artists? Do you listen to music while
you’re writing?
I love and listen to all kinds of music—pop (Kelly Clarkson), rock (Nickelback), country (Rascal Flatts),
bluegrass (Nickel Creek), classical (Bach). My favorite type is probably old-school soul, and for that you
can’t beat Earth Wind & Fire. I make a “soundtrack” of each book I write and listen to it on my iPod while
I’m jogging, because that helps me get ideas. But when I’m actually sitting down to write, it’s usually quiet in
the house, or I’m wearing earplugs.
Do you have any favorite T.V. shows? Movies you watch over and over again? What was the last movie
you saw at the theater?
I don’t watch much TV. I love it, but I just don’t have time! I do try never to miss an episode of American
Idol. I’ve enjoyed COPS, Reno 911, The Daily Show, and The O.C. in the past, and I wish I could catch
them more often. As for movies, I love romantic comedies: The Sure Thing, When Harry Met Sally, French
Kiss. I also love Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back (for the relationship between Han and Leia, yo). I
used to live down the street from a theater that showed all kinds of movies—mainstream, indy, foreign,
gay—and I saw practically everything they showed. I miss it so much! Now I have a small child, and it’s
hard for me to see movies in the theater. I last saw Pride and Prejudice. Loved. It!
You have the chance to give one piece of advice to your teen readers. What would it be?
Don’t be afraid to try new (legal) experiences. The reason a lot of people don’t find their perfect career
until they’re 40 is that they were never exposed to that possibility.
One last question. What stories can we look forward to from you in the future?
I have just completed another romantic comedy, BOY IN BLUE. To avoid prosecution for a high school
stunt, a 17-year-old spends spring break assigned to night patrol with the 19-year-old rookie cop who
arrested her.
Again, thanks so much for joining us at TeensReadToo.com!
Thank you for including me!
