Birthday Sophia Shares Mona Secrets

My birthday is this month!

The Perseids are showering tonight (interesting imagery of a meteor scrubbing its elbows) as they do every year - the Universe's huge, awesome gift for me.

In return, I'm going to let you know whom I modeled Adam's character off of.

I must begin by decrying facebook. One of the myriad reasons why I abhor that particular addiction is the severe melancholy it induces when I see that all my Harvard classmates have not only obtained fantastic careers and are living in fabulous apartments in better cities than mine, but they also married either extremely attractive people, rich doctors or lawyers, or extremely attractive and rich doctors and lawyers. All, sadly, true.

One such acquaintance married someone who is not only photogenic, but also Asian, AND has a prestigious line of work. I can hardly believe someone like this actually exists, and I comfort myself by assuming that he must be incredibly effeminate in person, and probably makes her pay half the rent. This is what I must believe in order to go on in life.

That, and I based Adam's face slightly off this guy's. Shut up, Stephenie Meyer wrote herself into a vampire novel, so there.

Snapshopts from the MFA Debate

Do writers need MFAs to succeed as writers? You can name a boatload of people who didn’t: Hemingway, Tolstoy, Chekhov, etc etc etc. Is that because the MFA programs weren’t out there yet, or because they had other ways of pursuing their writing?

Corey Campbell on the UCLA Extension Writers' Program Blog

Many programs combine the study of literature with the teaching of craft, giving students a well-rounded education. If you don’t need or want this, you may be better off having your novel critiqued by a manuscript consultant or teacher and not worry about getting a degree.

Wendy Nelson Tokunaga

I used to measure the dedication and seriousness of a writer by how quickly they published, and I did NOT feel successful. Now, I measure the dedication and seriousness of a writer by how long they keep writing WITHOUT publishing.

Laurel Snyder, guest blogging on the Happy Booker
this post has some great insight!

In all honesty, some of the feedback steered me off course in my novel–and not being as confident as I ought to have been as a writer, I went off-roading for awhile, excising chapters in my novel that turned out to be valuable, writing chapters that I later threw away.

Jade Park

If you know writing is what you want to do, life-long, you’re going to find ways to keep doing that regardless.

Karen Rigby, interviewed by WOW!

Into the Chrysalis

My novel has been released from the contest, which means it is free to find an agent now!

I'm putting it into its chrysalis, so I can finish editing it and consider a friend's request to rewrite a "less happy" ending. Once it has its new coat of paint (these metaphors are going crazy), I can enter the query gauntlet.

Thank you so much for your support during this bizarre American Idol phase. If anyone knows a great agent who wants to represent an Asian American novel with shelf appeal, send them my way!

Review Posting Issues On Amazon

It's a conspiracy! Many of you wonderful readers are posting your thoughtful reviews, only to have them squired away into the ether.

If you post a review and it doesn't show up instantly, it likely means it's gone forever!

So please copy what you wrote! (Hit Ctrl+C)
If you don't see your review show up, post it again. (Hit Ctrl+V to paste what you copied.)

Erstwhile, some of my fellow quarterfinals have taken to a sneaky little trick of giving their other competitors 3 or 4 stars and wobbly, hypercritical reviews. Yikes. I wasn't planning on playing defensively towards other writers and it's depressing that this is happening, instead of us supporting each other. If a writer truly wanted to be helpful, I would recommend sending the more editorial criticisms via email, and save the praise and "what's working" comments where the judges can see them. Help each other, people. It's all love.

Thanks for the tremendous outpouring of emails, text messages, and reviews. I feel so utterly loved and supported. Big hug for you.

Vote For Mona to get Published!

Click the gold box to see my novel excerpt on Amazon!

Mona Again is a quarterfinalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award 2009! This means that out of 10,000 submissions, Mona Again is in the top 500 and in the running for a book deal with Penguin.

Yes, I cried. And boy do I love crying.

Help keep the waterworks going:
Read the first 20 pages of Mona Again on Amazon and submit a customer review asking for more - don't forget to add 5 stars!

Instructions: Make sure you're signed in.
Hit any of the download buttons on the right of the product page to read the excerpt.

Ready to write your review?
Scroll down to Customer Reviews and hit "Create your own review." That's it!

This is, like life, a popularity contest and the judges want to know that readers like YOU want to see this book published.

It's high-time we had a novel with Asian American lead characters that do more than just talk about ancestors - they're just living life like actual Asians. Woah. Big concept.

Hustle over to Amazon and make this dream come true!

About the Book

Mona Chau always took the reasonable path: she became an investment banker right out of NYU and, five years later, was set to marry Adam Lam, the venture capitalist with to-die-for dimples. So what made her quit her job, break her engagement, and run away to a small town upstate? Unfortunately, she can’t remember - she wakes up in a hospital bed with her memory reset to senior year of college. Now Mona must untangle her past and decide: what choices will she make the second time around?

Mona Again was written in 30 days during my first National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) in 2007, and addresses an audience yearning for Asian American lead characters. I started writing the story while moonlighting as a corporate finance assistant at Bear Stearns, a profession my Chinese father wishes I chose instead of acting.

About Sophia

A graduate of Harvard, Sophia is a playwright and recipient of the ABC/Disney Scholarship for Dramatic Writing. Her plays, stand-up acts and solo shows have been produced on both coasts. She is an editor and consultant for college and graduate school applicants and a member of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA).

Sophia is the first iPod silhouette model ever and was blessed to work with the legendary Desmond Richardson as a dancer in Julie Taymor’s film, “Across the Universe.” If she had to do it again, she would still give Hollywood a run.

To invite her as a speaker or workshop leader, visit: Wise Child Workshops.

Sophia is a foster mommy for pit bulls with Much Love Animal Rescue and sings with community chorales.