Author Info
My name is Nadine Rose Larter and I was born in a small South African town called Molteno, somewhere in the heart of the Karoo. After my last year of high school I moved with my family to the city of Port Elizabeth where I now live with my son, my fiancé, and my two step children. I’m a bit of a free-spirit and have never been happy having a “day job”. I spend my days writing, or thinking about writing. Sometimes I do a bit of work.
I have always been a writer. I started writing poems and short stories when I was little, and I have intermittently kept diaries since I was about nine years old. In the last two years I have started taking my writing more seriously and have made the decision to become a full-time author. I have no formal education, aside from a year of Literature and Creative Writing study, but I am constantly trying to grow as a writer. Sometimes being a wife and mom makes fitting it all in a little tough but I am learning how to juggle it all slowly.
I chose to self publish simply because it feels like taking my future into my own hands and running with it. There are no excuses when it is just you. The self-accountability can be thrilling sometimes. Being ready and then actually being able to move forward instead of waiting to hear from publishers has been a special kind of blessing. I am not closed to the idea of having a publisher, I am just ready to go on without one for now.
About the book:
“Phillip, Sarah, Kaitlyn, Caleb, Maxine, Grant, Melanie and Josh grew up in a small town where they spent their high school years together as an inseparable clique. But high school has ended, and they are all living their own “grown up” lives, each under the impression that their group has basically come to an end. When Phillip dies in a hit and run accident, Kaitlyn summons the others to all come back home, forcing a reunion that no one is particularly interested in partaking in.
Coffee at Little Angels follows how each character deals with the death of a childhood friend while at the same time dealing with their own ignored demons after years of separation. Events unfold as the group tries to rekindle the friendship they once shared to honour the memory of a friend they will never see again.”
I wrote Coffee at Little Angels after a high school friend of mine died in a car accident. I locked on to the idea that had he died just two or three years earlier his death would have been even more excruciating to deal with. I was devastated by the loss of course. This was the boy who gave me my first kiss. He was a sweetheart with blue eyes and a beautiful smile. And he is missed by many. Including myself. But...in my case I don’t always miss him as though he is dead. I simply miss him as someone I haven’t seen in a while. Someone who I would love to catch up with sometime, should we be fortunate enough to bump into each other in the street. It often feels simply as if we no longer live in the same town.
You may notice that there are few proper nouns in this novel. There are no last names or town names. I didn’t forget to put them in. I left them out because I hope that Coffee at Little Angels will be the kind of novel that absolutely anyone can pick up and feel like they understand it. I hope that you will pick it up and feel like it could be about you.
Official Launch date: Late August 2011 for print copy
Sample Chapter:
Ebook copy available on The Katalina Playroom Website:
Ebook will also be available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBookstore and Sony Readerstore.
Nadine, I would like to congratulate on your latest release, Coffee at Little Angels Is there a behind the book story?
There is kind of. While Coffee at Little Angels is not based on any specific even or person, I did start writing it after a school friend of mine died in a car accident. I was reading Nick Hornby’s A Long Way Down around the time I was mulling over the idea and that is why it is written the way it is. Not that you can compare the two books at all but while reading the book I couldn’t escape the idea that I should write my own book in the same fashion.
Do you plot your stories or lead your characters lead you?
Gosh you know: for a control freak my writing is very much un-plotted! When I started writing I would try to map things out to the very last detail before starting on the actual writing part. Perhaps that is why I have about four unfinished novels gathering dust. With Little Angels I started to learn how it’s OK to just go with it. I remember seeing an interview with Tori Amos once where she said her songs chose to be played by her and that she had very little say in the matter and I kind of snorted and thought how ridiculous. But I now know that it certainly can be like that sometimes. Sometimes you just have to go where the characters take you. It can be hard, but they often do know what’s best for the story.
How long have you been writing and what was your call story?
I don’t have a call story. I’ve published everything on my own through The Katalina Playroom. I’ve been putting off “being a writer” for so long that when I finally decided to JUST BE ONE I have to admit that the patience to wait for a publisher to come along and “make my dreams come true” was a rather non-existent entity. I took everything into my own hands and have just gone with it, without ever sending anything to any publishers. If a publisher wanted to pick up my work now that would be fine I guess, but I have actually been having quite a ride learning how to do this all myself and have never so much as caught myself wishing that I had one. Perhaps that makes me strange…
What are you currently working on?
At the moment I am working on a novel called The Tequila Thursday Writing Club. It’s a giant mess but I’m hoping it will come together eventually. It’s about a blocked writer whose best friends tricks him into running a writing group.
Of all of your characters, do you have a favorite you identify with and why?
From Little Angels Grant and Maxine are my favourites. Such stubborn characters too! The others in the book allowed themselves to be manipulated – but not those two! Grant for one was supposed to be short and stocky, but he insisted on being tall and thin. Maxine was supposed to be a horrible cow, but she turned out to be pretty spectacular.
What is the best thing about your job as an author? What is the hardest thing?
The best part is that I get to be at home with my kid. He does make things a little difficult sometimes because he has his demanding days but mostly he plays and gets on with things himself and just comes around every now and then for a hug and a kiss. The hard part is the actual working. Because I’m home I do get distracted sometimes, but on the flip side of that coin, because home and work are interlinked I very often find myself working up to fourteen hour days. The hardest thing is to separate home life and writing life. I tend to get stuck into something and then don’t quit until it is done, which can be kind of hard on my family life.
What kind of daily schedule do you have? What types of things interrupt your writing? Describe a day in the life of you.
Life interrupts my writing! Constantly. Unfortunately compartmentalizing only works in theory. I don’t have a specific schedule but I do like to do as much creative work in the mornings as possible. I find that between 8 and 12 I am my most productive. And then after about 8 in the evening I become productive again. I would probably nap every afternoon if I could. If only my nap time would come at night! I can’t really give you any sort of schedule in point form but typically my days consist of a mash-up of writing, networking, making tea for the kid, jumping up to dance with Barney every now and then, getting cereal for the kid (it’s all he eats sometimes! Stubborn like his mother!). Hmmm…if only I could make up something more fabulous…
If a movie was made about your life, who would you like to see play the lead role as you?
Ooh can I pick Lauren Graham? Not because we’re anything alike really but just because I think she is fabulous and sometimes I wish I was Lorelai Gilmore...
What is something you definitely want readers to know about you?
Nothing really. I’m just a person. And I don’t say that to be self-deprecating or anything like that. It’s just that a mistake many of make is to think that you need to be some sort of weird eccentric person who dresses in hessian bags and smokes a corn husk pipe in order to be taken seriously as an artist. I’m all for “individuality” but one of the saddest things I have come across in today’s society is the gross misconception that the arts are reserved strictly for the strange. I am not strange. I dress neither well nor badly. I have average music tastes, I am of average intelligence, I have average interests. And I love to write. That is enough.
When the time comes for you to retire from writing, what would you like your readers to remember the most about you and your writing?
Wow. Don’t be shy with the tough questions huh?! I hope that it will be said that my writing was reliably relatable, that it was always real and that it never tried to masquerade as something that it wasn’t.
What are you currently reading?
Water for Elephant by Sara Gruen
Favorite song?
Kiss the Rain by Billie Myers (don’t’ laugh!)
Favorite color?
Green.
Before I let you go though, is there anything I forgot to ask that you want the readers and fans to know?
Yeah. Please buy my ebook so I can buy my kid food ;-)
Nadine, lol. Thanks so much for stopping by Romance Author Buzz.
For a chance to win a copy of Nadine's ebook, leave a comment here and your email address. Thanks for stopping by Romance Author Buzz. Winner will be announced August 31st. Contest is International
I write regularly on these four websites:
Passing the Open Windows
The Katalina Playroom
The Poetry Project
The Writers Club
You can follow me on twitter (@Nayes1982)
Or say hi on Facebook
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