Say hello to the driving force behind the Girlfriends Cyber Circuit, Karen Neches. She's taken time out of her busy schedule to pay a visit before  her newest novel, EARTHLY PLEASURES  hits bookstores this February. And the early word is that she's got something really special here which is why she's already been  selected as a Booksense Notable for February.

"...Appealingly unorthodox... a heaven where angels lust, drink and follow terrestrial celebrity gossip… A tangled story of cold ambition and true love unspools. Neches’s funny and sweet novel shows that to err is human and angelic as well."
Publishers' Weekly

Welcome to Heaven. Use your Wishberry to hustle up whatever you want. Have an online chat with God. Visit the attractions such as Retail Rapture, Wrath of God miniature golf and Nocturnal Theater, where nightly dreams are translated to film.

Your greeter might just be Skye Sebring who will advises her newly dead clients on what to expect now that they’re expired. “Heaven is like a Corona Beer commercial” she assures her charges. “It’s all about contentment.”

So different than Earth where chaos reigns. Unfortunately for Skye, she’s been chosen to live her first life. She’s required to attend Earth 101 classes, which teach all of the world’s greatest philosophies through five Beatle songs.

Skye has no interest in Earthly pursuits, until lawyer Ryan Blaine briefly becomes her client after a motorcycle accident. Just as they are getting to know each other, he is revived and sent back to Earth.

She follows his life via the TV channel “Earthly Pleasures” but discovers he has a wife as well as a big secret. Why then does he call a show for the lovelorn to talk about the lost love of his life?

In Earthly Pleasures (Simon and Schuster, February 2008, $14) great love can transcend the dimensions, narrowing the vast difference between Heaven and Earth.

"What a treat!  Earthly Pleasures more than lives up to its name.  I was glued to the pages of this delightful little gem of a novel, and wish it could have been twice as long!"
-- Megan Crane, author of Frenemies


”Karen Neches' Earthly Pleasures is a rare treat. I laughed from the first page and cried in all the right places. Do yourself a favor and curl up with this book. Heaven knows, you won't be sorry!"
--Julie Kenner, author of Demons Are Forever

"Equally hilarious and poignant, Earthly Pleasures is a little powerhouse of a novel about love, life...and what comes next."
--Melissa Senate, author of See Jane Date and Love You to Death
"Karen Neches’s novel is an intriguing love story with a rare combination of both wit and depth. In her fresh voice Neches gives us an innovative version of heaven where the one true thing still remains: love that transcends both time and space."

--Patti Callahan Henry, National bestselling novelist of Between the Tides

“Earthly Pleasures is more than just a novel. It's a dream, a calling, a divine trip from which you won't want to come home. I loved it!—Valerie Frankel, author of I Take This Man and Hex and the Single Girl.

RR: What do you when you're not writing?

KG: When I'm not writing, there's a good chance I'm reading and swilling red wine. Usually at the same time.
 
RR:  When did you know you wanted to be writer? And did anyone in particular encourage you along the way?

KG:  When I was ten, a boy threw a rock at my head and I wrote an essay called “The Blood Curdling Experience” The kids were howling in the aisles. I thought  “hmm, maybe there are something to this writing jazz.” I didn’t get serious about writing until ten years ago though.
 
RR: Are you currently working on a new novel/project? And if so, can you tell us what it's about?
 
KG: I’ve written a book about a group of 40-something friends who revive their 80s rock band.


RR:  What's your favorite part of writing?  Starting something new? Revising what you've already got drafted? Developing characters? The plot?  Something else all together?
 
KN:  The finally polish. I like to scrutinize every word to make sure it belongs. Starting a book is horrifying to me because I know that almost every word I write will be changed in the end. I have to try  and forget that and plunge onward.

RR:   Do you remember where you were and what you were doing when you got the call--I'm talking, the call--when you learned that you had sold your novel/project?
 
KN:  I was a special ed teacher and had just come home from a trying day (let’s just say spit balls were involved). The call came that afternoon. It was the single most exciting moment of my life. I drank massive amounts of wine and had to call in sick the next day.
 
RR:  Central Casting: If they were to make a movie out of your book, who would you cast to play your main characters?
 
KN:  Kate Hudson as my main character, Skye Sebring (a greeter in Heaven) because she has a sunny, angelic look. Matthew McConaughey as her love interest, Ryan because he’s so good with Kate and Ryan can be cocky at times.

One of the main characters is a 85-year old black woman named Caroline and I’d like to Cicely Tyson in that role (with appropriate make up of course.) God, who is female in my novel, would have to be played by Bette Midler, becasue she never takes herself to seriously.
 
RR:  What's the one book that you wish you'd read because everyone tells you should. This is  the one book that you keep attempting to read, the one everyone praises, but alas the one you just can't get through.
 
KN:  Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson

Karen Neches was single for over twenty years. She used to tell people she was in the “hospice stage” of being single as she never expected to recover. Then at the age of forty-three she finally met her soul mate. Earthly Pleasures is dedicated to him. She maintains a web site at www.karenneches.com
Neches also writes under the name Karin Gillespie and is the nationally bestselling author of The Sweet Potato Queen’s First Big-Ass Novel with Jill Conner Browne and three novels in the critically acclaimed Bottom Dollar Girl series. She’s founder of the virtual tour The Girlfriend Circuit as well as the grog for Southern authors A Good Blog is Hard to Find. She is a former lifestyle columnist for the Augusta Chronicle.

Thanks to Karen for stopping by and please checkout her website: www.karenneches.com