Lisa McMann Interview and GONE Giveaway

When given the opportunity to interview Lisa McMann, I jumped at the chance (and internally cringed at having to put together interesting questions.) Lisa graciously answered the ones I came up with.

Was the release of Gone bittersweet? Or were you ready to move on to
new characters, a new story? Would you ever consider revisiting Janie
and Cabe?

Writing GONE was bittersweet, but when it was released, I was eager and excited for the end to be told. As for moving on to new characters and a new story, by the time GONE came out Feb 9th, I had written two more manuscripts (usually I’m finished writing a book about a year before it actually comes out and hard at work on what’s next), so in a way I had moved on. I’ve deeply considered revisiting Janie and Cabe, because I do love them, but what more can be told? People have asked if I’ll tell the story from Cabel’s perspective, and I’d love to if he had a story that my readers didn’t know about. But you all know how it ends, and I’m afraid it would be a disappointing book in that regard. And that’s the last thing I want to write.

I loved getting a look inside Cabel’s head. What motivated you to switch perspectives and give Cabe his say?

My publisher, Simon Pulse, asked if I’d write a short story of some sort as a freebie/extra for my fans to help get them through last summer while they waited for GONE. I tossed out the idea that it would be interesting to tell Cabe’s side of the story in that passage where he discovers what’s up with Janie and her ability. They thought that sounded cool so I wrote it.

Miss Stubin is a great character, and while she provided pertinent, necessary information to advance the trilogy’s story arc, it never felt like that was her sole purpose. How much of her background did you put on paper or have in your head while writing?

I know a lot more about Miss Stubin than what is told in the book. Most of her story is in my head, although I always write down biographies of my major characters. If you’ve read all three books, you know bits and pieces of her past, and how something that happened to her when she was a teenager really changed her life. You also know bits about her man… I see Janie’s life mirroring Miss Stubin’s in several ways.

The style the Wake trilogy employs is bold, different. For me, it made the story feel more immediate. Did the style dictate or drive the story and characters in any way, or did the characters/story decide the style.

I think both. When I was first discovering the story and character of Janie, they had this very mystical feel in my mind, and when I started writing it, it just came out like that. I think the style drives the story and the story drives the style, if that makes any sense. For a peek at the very first bit I wrote, read the top half of page 68 of WAKE. Those are the first words that ever came out in the story. When I wrote them, I didn’t even know who “he” (Cabe) was yet.

To borrow a (condensed) page from Inside the Actor’s Studio, five questions:

Your favorite “classic”?
The Count of Monte Cristo

Which book do you think everyone should read?
Author’s Day by Daniel Pinkwater – it’s a brilliant, hysterical, and probably true picture book about what school visits are like for authors.

If you could spend the day with one character from any novel, who would you choose?
Charlie Bucket

What was the last song you got stuck in your head?
Why did you just do that to me? That was mean. Not answering.

If your books were a flavor of ice cream, what flavor would they be?
Chocolate Angst

And now it’s giveaway time! If you’d like a shot at a copy of Lisa McMann’s Gone, leave a comment on this post. (US addresses only, please.) A winner will be selected by Random.org and announced here on Sunday, March 28th. Thanks to Spruce TV for the opportunity and giveaway copy! And to Lisa for answering my questions!

Gone ~ Lisa McMann

Things should be great for Janie—she has graduated from high school and is spending her summer with Cabel, the guy she’s totally in love with. But deep down she’s panicking about how she’s going to survive her future when getting sucked into other people’s dreams is really starting to take its toll.

Things get even more complicated when she meets her father for the very first time—and he’s in a coma. As Janie uncovers his secret past, she begins to realize that the choice thought she had has more dire consequences than she ever imagined. [Summary from B&N]

*There may be spoilers for all three books in this review*

It’s been an interesting run with this trilogy. I picked up Wake and almost put it down again. Turns out, 72 was the lucky (page) number. After that it was all uphill and I became fully invested in Janie and Cabe’s world of dream catching and undercover operations. But last books in anything – trilogies or long running series – are bittersweet things, and it isn’t always easy coming to terms with the expectations placed on them. For me, going into Gone, I wasn’t sure what kind of resolution I was after. I mean, I wanted Janie and Cabe to be happy; what’s more, I wanted them happy and together. But was that possible? Janie, after all, had a major obstacle shoved in her path in Fade, and things didn’t look good.

So I want to get my initial reaction out of the way first: I was underwhelmed. Maybe even slightly aggravated by the way the trilogy ended.

First: It seemed to me that Cabe was a smart guy. It seems to me, though, that a smart guy wouldn’t risk falling asleep near his girl, knowing – or, if not knowing, just on the remote chance – that his dreams might expose his misgivings about the same girl’s awful fate. And then, the one time Janie asks him about the dreams he’s been having, he tells her that, well, he didn’t know what he was dreaming about and, oh, they meant nothing. Would a smart guy think his girl could be that dumb?

Mostly, the Cabe in Gone didn’t feel like the same Cabe from the first two books. He was still sweet, still supportive, but…I don’t know. Maybe I just wanted some big confrontation. Maybe I wanted to know what he would say, how he would handle himself, when confronted and pushed to be truthful about how he felt. Instead, the confrontation was reduced to a sort of hit-and-run mention at the end of the book, and therefore, to me, wasn’t nearly as satisfying. And Cabe never felt like he got back on track.

Second: I always kind of wondered how things could possibly be resolved for Janie. Seriously, what on earth could make it possible for her and Cabe to be together or, more importantly, for Janie to be okay, in light of what she knew would happen? Did I think that her father would enter the picture? Or that she would find herself between a rock and a hard place? As for the former, no, I never imagined that would happen, and kind of thought it was actually too convienient. And the latter, well, that was okay; this series always felt a little gritty, and so immediate that I wouldn’t have wanted an everything-is-sunshine-and-roses ending.

After letting it sit for some time, I’m still not sure how I feel about the book. I still have the same quibbles and still feel slightly less than satisfied. But that said, I really enjoyed the reading experience. This trilogy is different enough style-wise to stand out and, for the first two books at least, I really, really liked the characters. I’m definitely happy to have read them.