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Bio: Critically acclaimed, bestselling author Julianna Baggott also writes under the
pen names Bridget Asher and N.E. Bode. She has published seventeen books over
the last ten years. Film rights for her forthcoming novel PURE have been acquired by Fox
2000. The Provence Cure for the Brokenhearted, written under pen name
Asher, was published in spring 2011. There are approximately 50 foreign editions
of her novels to date.
Julianna began publishing when she was twenty-two
and sold her first novel while still in her twenties. After receiving her M.F.A.
from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, she published her first
novel, Girl Talk, which was a national bestseller and was quickly
followed by Boston Globe bestseller The Miss America Family, and
then Boston Herald Book Club selection, The Madam, an historical
novel based on the life of her grandmother. She co-wrote Which Brings Me to
You with Steve Almond, A Best Book of 2006 (Kirkus Reveiws) optioned
by producer Richard Brown and adapted by Keith Bunin with Matthew Warchus set to
direct.
Her Bridget Asher novels include The Provence Cure for the
Brokenhearted, The Pretend Wife, My Husband’s Sweethearts.
More info can be found at her Bridget Asher blog.
She
also writes bestselling novels for younger readers under the pen name N.E. Bode
as well as under Julianna Baggott. The Anybodies trilogy was a
People Magazine pick alongside David Sedaris and Bill Clinton, a
Washington Post Book of the Week, a Girl’s Life Top Ten, a Booksense
selection, and was in development at Nickelodeon/Paramount; The Slippery
Map (fall 2007), and the prequel to Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium
(2007), a movie starring Dustin Hoffman, Natalie Portman, and Jason Bateman. For
two years, Bode was a recurring personality on XM Sirius
Radio.
Julianna’s Boston Red Sox novel The Prince of Fenway Park
(HarperCollins), was published in spring 2009. It is on the Sunshine State Young Readers
Awards List for 2011-2012.
The Ever Breath (Random House) was
published in December, 2009.
Baggott also has a highly acclaimed career
as a poet, having published three collections of poetry and having been
published in the best literary publications in the country, including
Poetry, The American Poetry Review, and Best American
Poetry in 2001, 2011 and 2012.
Baggott’s work has appeared in over a
hundred publications, including the The New York Times, The Washington Post,
The Boston Globe, Glamour, Ms., Real Simple, and read on NPR’s Here and
Now, All Things Considered and Talk of the Nation. Her essays,
stories, and poems are highly anthologized.
She is an associate professor
at Florida State University’s College of Motion
Picture Arts.
In 2006, Baggott and her husband co-founded the
nonprofit organization Kids in Need – Books
in Deed, that focuses on literacy and getting free books to underprivileged
children in the state of Florida.
What inspired you to write your first book?
–Long, long ago… I think every book entails — approximately — 17.5 million moments of inspiration and 4.2 billion moments of force of will and/or grunt labor. It’s a book about mothers and daughters, mostly, and oddish.
Pressia barely remembers the Detonations or much about life during the Before. In her sleeping cabinet behind the rubble of an old barbershop where she lives with her grandfather, she thinks about what is lost–how the world went from amusement parks, movie theaters, birthday parties, fathers and mothers . . . to ash and dust, scars, permanent burns, and fused, damaged bodies. And now, at an age when everyone is required to turn themselves over to the militia to either be trained as a soldier or, if they are too damaged and weak, to be used as live targets, Pressia can no longer pretend to be small. Pressia is on the run.
Burn a Pure and Breathe the Ash . . . There are those who escaped the apocalypse unmarked: Pures. They are tucked safely inside the Dome that protects their healthy, superior bodies. Yet Partridge, whose father is one of the most influential men in the Dome, feels isolated and lonely. Different. He thinks about loss–maybe just because his family is broken; his father is emotionally distant; his brother killed himself; and his mother never made it inside their shelter. Or maybe it’s his claustrophobia: his feeling that this Dome has become a swaddling of intensely rigid order. So when a slipped phrase suggests his mother might still be alive, Partridge risks his life to leave the Dome to find her.
When Pressia meets Partridge, their worlds shatter all over again.
Believing his mother was living among the Wretches, Partridge escaped from the Dome to find her. Determined to regain control over his son, Willux, the leader of the Pures, unleashes a violent new attack on the Wretches. It’s up to Pressia Belze, a young woman with her own mysterious past, to decode a set of cryptic clues from the past to set the Wretches free.
An epic quest that sweeps readers into a world of beautiful brutality, Fuse continues the story of two people fighting to save their futures–and change the fate of the world.
| I totally loved this book even though I felt emotionally drained after reading it. The unique story line is captivating and dark. The darkness of it brings forth a level of beauty though. Definitely one of the best books I’ve read! |
Thank you Julianna for taking the time for the interview.
Ty for this giveaway!
What a great interview. Thank you for your time.
Thank you Julianna for the interview!
Thank you for the interview! I always love reading author interviews, because I always wonder how I'd answer the questions. Somehow, never as cool or intriguing as the answers I read. 🙂
Thank you Juliana for this interview!!! And thanks a lot for the giveaway! I'm dying to read Pure!!
Thank you Juliana for this interview.