Greetings all--just wanted to let you all know about a new book that hit the shelves from debut novelist, Jenny Gardiner. But before we get to Jenny, I just have to tell you about a book I devoured--could not put down and that is Pat Barker's Life Class just out in hardcover. Set against the backdrop of WWI, this is really some of the finest writing I've ever encountered. Trust me on this one, you won't be sorry.

Okay, now back to our regularly scheduled program...Jenny Gardiner is a first timer who's been getting a lot of attention for her new novel Sleeping With Ward Cleaver! So read on and see what all the buzz is about.

American Title III contest winner released to great responses
(New York, February 1, 2008) -- Claire Doolittle is not a happy camper. The married mother of five seems to have lost her way in life. Swept off her feet years earlier by Mr. Right, she’s dismayed that husband Jack has turned into Mr. Always Right, and the only sweeping happening in her life involves a broom and a dustpan. Jack’s officious, perfunctory way has left fun, spontaneity and laughter at the doorstep, and Claire is beginning to wonder if she’s actually married to a modern-day version of Ward Cleaver, the stuff-shirted father figure from Leave it to Beaver sitcom fame.
Worse yet, she’s so bogged down by her overwhelming life and so turned off by the idea of getting it on with her stodgy father-figure of a husband, she’s simply blocked out all of her memories of the Claire-who-used-to-be. Cue a former fiancé, who re-enters her life when she desperately needs to figure out who she was, who she is, and who she wants to be. And if she wants to salvage her sagging marriage, or fall back on her old fiancé, who’s wooing her with promises of what could have been. Throw in a predatory hottie from Jack’s office who’s set her sights on Claire’s ho-hum husband, and you’ve got the recipe for a mid-life crisis of epic proportions.
Jenny Gardiner’s novel, winner of Dorchester Publishing’s American Title III contest, is sure to lure you into the mundane yet compelling world of Claire Doolittle and will leave you cheering for her marriage.

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"Jenny Gardiner brings to life Claire Doolittle with such vibrancy that I feel I know her. Such was my concern over Claire's and Jack's happiness, that I couldn't put the book down which is a rarity for me.With her sharp wit and hilarious descriptions, Ms. Gardiner has a delightful voice that left me wanting more."

"This is book is the 'Bridget Jones Diary"'for all of us married and harried moms! And perhaps a good gift to give to our younger and single girlfriends. It's a gentle and humorous way to give them a glimpse of what's to come . . ."

"Sleeping With Ward Cleaver is a fun, cheeky, often candid and thoroughly engaging story that hits on relationship issues to which many readers will relate."

"What a fun read from the attention grabbing title to the final elevator scene; I was chuckling and agreeing with every word. How did Jenny Gardiner manage to 'get it"'so right and put married life into such hilarious perspective?! But you don't have to be married to appreciate the humor and witty words of Ms. Gardiner. Her determined character, Claire, is a woman we can all recognize as she raises phoenix-like from the 'every-dayness"'of life! For a fresh, funny, entertaining read; SLEEPING WITH WARD CLEAVER by award winning debut author Jenny Gardiner is sure to delight and amuse."

"Sleeping With Ward Cleaver is the most refreshing book I have read in quite some time."

"Highly relatable characters and situations bring this book straight into suburbia with the reader. Poignant and heartfelt, this book will make you laugh, cry and cheer."

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"I just had to send you a note to tell you how much I enjoyed your book.  It was truly a pleasure to read. I felt like I was reading about my own life.  What wonderful insight you have.  It was refreshing to read a book where  the author takes the time to carry the story to its complete ending.  I want you to know that I usually read at night and was two pages to the  ending but I finished it the morning because I wanted the enjoyment of this book to last overnight."

"I am currently reading SwWC, and I LOVE it. I want to avoid all my housework, just so i can read it. Thanks for the great book. "

"finished it last night. As a woman who has been married for 25 years, I would highly recommend it. It reminded me to not take my dh for granted and to tell him frequently that I loved him. Thanks so much."

"Between a long bath and a very long time sitting in my toddler's room with a flashlight (only way he'll go to sleep and not get out of bed) I finished SwWC in one night. Truly, truly funny and an original take on the one that got away. Jenny really nails 'real marriage' and I think page for page she's the wittiest writer around right now."

About Jenny 

Jenny Gardiner’s work has been found in Ladies Home Journal, the Washington Post and on NPR’s Day to Day. She likes to say she honed her fiction writing skills while working as a publicist for a US Senator. Other jobs have included: an orthodontic assistant (learning quite readily that she was not cut out for a career in polyester), a waitress (probably her highest-paying job), a TV reporter, a pre-obituary writer, and a photographer (claim to fame: being hired to shoot Prince Charles–with a camera, silly!). She lives in Virginia with her husband, three kids, two dogs, one cat and a gregarious parrot. In her free time she studies Italian, dreams of traveling to exotic locales, and feels very guilty for rarely attempting to clean the house. Visit her at her website, www.jennygardiner.net, or her group blog, www.thedebutanteball.com, a site that has hosted iconic authors such as John Grisham, Meg Cabot, Meg Tilly and Jodi Piccoult in recent months. 

 A Little Q&A With The Author

RR: When you're not writing, there's a good chance you're...

JG: At the gym or running my kids around.
 

RR: When did you know you wanted to be writer? And did anyone in particular encourage you along the way?
I was writing extra credit reports to salvage my dismal math grades from early elementary school on so I knew it was the only skill that might save my butt!
JG: I had a teacher in high school who really inspired me because of his love and appreciation for literature. He was my English teacher AND my Latin teacher, and the coolest thing was each year right before Christmas break, he read aloud to our class in Latin from Jean Shepherd's IN GOD WE TRUST ALL OTHERS PAY CASH (the movie A Christmas Story was taken from there). I learned to love memoir and first person narrative and learned the value of well-crafted prose and from this I understood how I could be transformed to another time and place simply through enjoyable writing.
 

RR: Are you currently working on a new novel/project? And if so, can you tell us what it's about?

JG:  My agent will soon be shopping MARY KATE GOES OVER THE FALLS, about a somewhat naive woman trapped in an abusive marriage who goes out to pick up her husband's dry cleaning and instead picks up a handsome hitchhiker along the side of the road, the lure of whom reminds her of the lip of Niagara Falls, said to tempt people to jump into the falls. They embark on a road trip of self-discovery, en route to Niagara Falls, where Mary Kate is determined to take the plunge as her first act of defiance in her life.

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?

JG:  I love the potential that starting something new presents to me as a writer. That tabula rosa thing is very exciting. And as you start knocking out some sentences and get into the flow of it and start thinking like your characters and figuring our their motivations, it's such a charge.

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?

JG: I went the unconventional route to publication. I'd entered Dorchester Publishing's American Title III contest in the hopes of expediting getting my book in front of an editor's eyes. Much to my surprise my book was chosen as a finalist in the contest. For the six months following that, I had to hunker down and become a marketing maven, spending many, many hours online especially, trying to enlist support for my book in the contest from all sorts of crazy angles. Little did I know I would be laying the groundwork for marketing/publicizing my book. I was just busy trying to stay in the contest, and because of the nature of the contest, and it was sort of before contests started becoming fairly ubiquitous, people were generally pretty enthusiastic about backing me--they felt somewhat vested in the process.
In the meantime, I had prior to all of this been talking back and forth with a lovely agent who had kind of taken me under his wing. We'd been batting about some book ideas, tried to flesh things out, but he was very busy and things kept being sidelined. But ultimately he facilitated my signing with my agent, as he thought we'd be a good match-up, which we have. At around this time is when I won the contest, which meant that I won a book deal--hugely thrilling and I just didn't realize how lucky I was that on top of all of that, I had built up a potential readership along the way.
So that was the long answer to say this all sort of culminated in the perfect storm, in a good way, the book deal, the agent, everything. And I found out by voice mail because I got the call on my cell phone, which never works in my neighborhood, darn it!
 
RR: Central Casting: If they were to make a movie out of your book, who would you cast to play your main characters?

JG: I keep going back and forth on this. Totally has to be a woman who is not an ingenue type. She's gotta have some meat on her bones and life to her face. I sort of like Emma Thompson but she might be getting too old. Kate Winslett would be nice. For lack of another male lead I keep veering toward Matt Damon because he's got that Ward Cleaver-ish look although he's good looking, too.
 
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.

JG: The Historian. I keep wanting to read it but it's so fat in hardback--too large and unwieldy to read at bedtime and too large to lug along in my purse. I should go back and buy the paperback which is way skinnier LOL

Thanks to Jenny for taking time to stop by and best of luck to her on the new book!