Dear Reader,
Please welcome today's guest author, Amanda Eyre Ward. She is giving away five copies of her new novel, "The Lifeguards." To be included in the drawing, send an email with your shipping information to: aeyreward@yahoo.com
Other works of Amanda Eyre Ward include, Sleep Toward Heaven, How to Be Lost, Love Stories in This Town, Forgive Me, Close Your Eyes, The Same Sky, The Nearness of You, and The Jetsetters. Amanda's New York Times-bestselling novels have been featured in People Magazine, The New York Times, and more. Her work has been optioned for film and television and translated into fifteen languages.
Amanda lives in Austin, TX, and says she currently writes every morning and spends afternoons with her children...except when she's in a seedy motel room.
Why I Write in Cheap Motel Rooms
I am an upstanding mother of three, and try to change out of my pajamas before school pickup. I write wile my children are in school, and then so my best to shape-shift into a mom-in-yoga-pants at 2:45p.m. every day. But there comes a time in each novel-in-progress when I need to dive deep. And then, Dear Reader, I check into a cheap motel.
I once sat on a panel next to a writer who, when asked if she had any advice for female writers, responded, "Don't have children." Then she passed the microphone to me.
I cleared my throat, then spoke the truest words I know about being a writer and a woman. "Be ambitious," I said. "And when you can, book a motel room."
There's something transgressive about leaving your family to check into a motel, the seedier the better. Though I've dreamed of writing at the Chateau Marmont or the Plaza in New York, my recent residencies have included stays at the Candlewood Suites in Austin (just off Interstate 35), and the Katy Freeway Motel 6.
My packing list is short: strong coffee; cans of soup and boxes of Triscuits; a warm wrap given to me by an editor when I forgot to bring a coat to New York; index cards for organizing my plot structure; my laptop; and a box of scrawled notes, maps, menus, and various research materials. Upon checking in as early as possible, I change into my pajamas and spend a few hours watching TV. There's something so wrong about a working mom bingeing "Law & Order" reruns in the middle of the day in a cheap motel that it's got to be right.
And so far, it hasn't failed. I type from morning till happy hour in a state of bliss, and when my time runs out (sometimes after 24 hours, sometimes after five days), I am ready to be a mom again. Those first few days back, I make warm honey milks upon request, spend extra time tucking in each child, do dishes without complaint.
Living a dual life has even become a theme in some of my novels as I attempt to suss out what it means to try to be a mother and a wife and a writer at the same time. For me, right now, it means remembering to be thankful, being ambitious enough to fight for a motel room of my own, and having a seemingly endless supply of tiny bottles of cheap shampoo.
-- Amanda Eyre Ward
Email Amanda, aeyreward@yahoo.com for a chance to win one of five copies of her new book, "The Lifeguards."
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
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