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If you'd like to own Sara Hantz's Young Adult novel, THE SECOND VIRGINITY OF SUZY GREEN, leave a comment. One lucky commenter will have his/her name drawn and will win a copy of this great book! I'll probably have Sara conduct the drawing. She's very trustworthy. :)

Here's the write-up from Publishers Marketplace: Sara Hantz's debut THE SECOND VIRGINITY OF SUZY GREEN, about a girl who joins a virginity club in her new town to try to make a new start.

Sara Hantz is my talented agent sister. This means we're both lucky enough to be on Rachel Vater's team. Sara and I will probably meet in real life next summer. How fun is that? And here's the link to Sara's website.

And without further ado, here's the interview.

Me: Would you tell us how you got Rachel as your agent?

Sara: I’d always read Rachel’s blog and was very impressed by her expertise and the way in which she conducted her business. When I parted ways with my previous agent (this was an amicable split, after I sold my first book) I queried several agents and received a number of offers of representation. I arranged to call them all for a chat, and Rachel stood head and shoulders above the rest, especially in terms of getting my writing, and her vision for my future. And she’s really cool too. A perfect match!

Me: What does a typical writing day look like for you? Do you aim for a certain number of words/pages per day/week?

Sara: When writing, my guiding principle is ‘little and often’ as I have a very low attention threshold and am easily distracted. So, I open my manuscript up first thing in the morning and dip in and out of it during the day. Some times I get more done than others, depending on how busy the motel is and how sidetracked I get on the internet. In the past I have set myself a daily page target. Normally, though, I just do what I can.


Me: Do you outline before starting a book?

Sara: YES, absolutely!!! I use part of the snowflake method for plot development (snowflake also covers characters, but I don’t do that bit). Snowflake was developed by Randy Ingermanson, www.ingermanson.com. I love planning and writing in a linear way. At the start of each day I will go over and edit what I did the day before. This means when I get to the end the revisions are less monumental than if I just wrote a ‘dirty first draft’ – the thought of which brings me out in hives ☺


Me: I understand you’re part of an online critique group. How does that work?

Sara: We’ve been together for about three years. The critiquing relationship sort of evolved. The others knew each other before knowing me. We all met face to face for the first time three years ago at the RNA conference in the UK. At that time Amanda and Pat were living in the UK, Christina was in Australia and I was in NZ. It started by us just reading each others work for interest, then we began critiquing. We don’t all write in the same genre but that doesn’t matter. We speak all the time on MSN and email daily. I don’t just see these girls as my CPs they’re my closest friends. This year Amanda moved from UK to NZ and Christina came over and joined us for the RWNZ conference. We all use the critiquing part differently. I send each chapter as I write it. Amanda may send us the first two or three chapters and then we don’t see the book again until the end. Christina does a mixture of both and Pat works more like I do. We not only critique, but also brainstorm, and also if one of us is going off track we’ll steer them back on. A couple of years ago when I was asked to do some revisions by an agent, I (unintentionally) didn’t do them properly and my CPs gave me what for…… I can’t thank them enough for that. But it takes a special kind of relationship for that to happen. And our relationship is VERY special!!


Me: What are you working on now?

Sara: I’m just finishing a book called DATING THE MEGAN RUSSELL WAY, which is about a teenage girl who sells psychic dating advice to make enough money to pay off a huge debt.

And now for the most scrumptious question of all...

Me: What is your favourite cookie?

Sara: Stem ginger biscuits covered in thick dark chocolate.

Thank you, Sara!!

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