YA novelist Kelly Parra is touring the girlfriend cyber circuit this week with her debut novel, Graffiti Girl, published by MTV Books. Yes, MTV, as in I want my. An imprint of Simon and Schuster, MTV Books "captures the real-life stories of today's hottest artists, goes behind-the-scenes of hit shows, and brings you fresh & entertaining fiction." (Strange bedfellows at first glance, but I'm in favor of anything that promotes leisure reading by tweens and teens.)But I digress.
Kelly's enthusiasm about her newborn book and blossoming career are infectious. (As you can see in the better-than-Christmas-morning moment below.) In a heartfelt pub day post on her blog, the Mexican, Filipino, and Italian kid who was "a total art feign" in high school, says:
Today is the official release day of Graffiti Girl...I can honestly say that I am a published author. You see, guys? It can happen. A couple of years ago, when the rejections kept hitting me, I thought it might just be a dream...To get published takes a lot of heart, stubbornness, and imagination. The heart is to believe in your talent and your book. You have to have heart to write characters you care about. The stubbornness because you hit a lot of stop signs on your journey and you have to keep going even though you keep hearing NO. And the imagination part is for writing stories and actually seeing yourself in your mind as a published author. And once you sell, you still need all those aspects to keep selling and competing in this market. Now after about 2 years of interviewing authors in my Words of an Author column I finally get to participate myself.Graffiti Girl is getting great buzz. "This book blew me away," says Anne Frasier, bestselling author of Pale Immortal. "Kelly Parra writes with the keen eye of an artist. Graffiti Girl is warm, gutsy, and true-to-life--an unflinching, honest portrayal of young adults. A seamless and impressive debut." And I'm guessing the story of the gusty young artist who doesn't want to be another brick in the wall isn't far removed from Kelly's own adventures in art and life. Sounds like a great beach read for the MTV set.
Go, girlfriend, go!
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