Forged in Grace
Author: Jordan E. Rosenfeld
Genre: Psychological Suspense (Adult w/ YA and NA crossover appeal)
Release Date: February 2013
Buy Link: Amazon
Description:
Grace Jensen survived a horrific fire at age 15. The flames changed her: badly scarred in body and mind, Grace developed an ability to feel other people’s pain. Unable to bear human touch, she has made a small life for herself in Northern California, living with her hoarder mother, tending wounded animals, and falling a little in love with her former doctor. Her safe world explodes when the magnetic Marly Kennet reappears in town; Grace falls right back into the dynamic of their complicated friendship. Marly is the holder of many secrets, including one that has haunted Grace for over a decade: what really happened the night of the fire?
When Marly exhorts Grace to join her in Las Vegas, to make up for the years they have been lost to each other, Grace takes a leap of faith and goes. Although Marly is not entirely honest about her intentions, neither woman anticipates that enlarging Grace’s world will magnify her ability to sense the suffering of others—or that she will begin to heal wounds by swallowing her own pain and laying her hands on the afflicted.
This gift soon turns darker when the truth of Marly’s life—and the real reason she ended her friendship with Grace—pushes the boundaries of loyalty and exposes both women to danger.
Q: Your novel portrays a bond between girls that is less than healthy. Why? It's not that I believe all female friendships are negative, it's that the unhealthy ones leave more to scour for a novel, and most of us have a few scars from those early friendships as we tested out our future relationship strategies upon each other.
Q: You have an erratic writing process, care to share? Yes, I write this elaborate outline, sketching out the characters and their problems, and then proceed to completely depart from it. Somehow I take comfort in an outline, no matter that I rarely stick to it. I need to pretend I know where I'm going.
Q: What's the question you least like answering, and why? Easy: "Do your characters come from people you know?" It's a valid question, but the artiste in me laughs because I never consciously set out to model my characters after anyone--they come out of me as themselves, like children, and any resemblance to living people will be denied.
Q: Give a writer some advice, will ya? Say yes to all opportunities, creative and literal, unless they ask you to send your bank account to a foreigner living abroad.
Q: Is there a piece of advice you'd wish you'd known sooner? Not really--writing is one of those crafts where it's better not to know the work ahead of you before you set out.
Q: Whose career do you covet? Joyce Carol Oates, Jodi Picoult... I think of myself as their love child, with a little Alice Hoffman thrown in.
Q: What is the biggest leap of faith you’ve ever taken and how did it turn out? I was going to say quitting my job to work for myself as a freelance writer over ten years ago, which worked out fabulously, but as I sit here thinking about it, the greater leap of faith was having my son. I was 33 when I got pregnant, and my husband and I had been together already for 12 years--that’s a long time to get extremely settled in a lifestyle. My son’s birth rocked everything, changed me, and did that strange thing where your heart busts out of your chest and lives on your forehead forever after, where it is no longer safe from sappy commercials, stories about kidnappings, or light jazz. Now, he’s four and a half and I sort of feel like I’m getting used to this motherhood gig.
Q: Grace can heal others but not herself – something I think a lot of people can relate to in a metaphorical sense. Why do we have such a hard time letting go of our own struggles and hurts even as we encourage others to do so? Yes, you’ve tapped into one of the major themes of this novel. One of the things Grace and I share in common is what I’ve come to call “extreme empathy”--sometimes I identify so strongly with the pain of others that I can’t figure out where my own begins/ends. I think it’s difficult to let go of our own struggles because they’re adaptive, they were our coping mechanisms as children and as adults we still get something out of them. Until we learn new strategies, we’re screwed.
Thanks for joining us on the blog and agreeing to answer some questions for us Jordan!
Giveaway: (1) ebook copy of Forged in Grace - Open Internationally!
The more I read about Forged in Grace, the more I want to read it and my fingers are itching. Thank you for sharing with us and for this lovely giveaway opportunity. BTW, I agree with the do your characters response LOL frankly if someone is based on someone's granddad I really do not want that thought interfering with my imaginary picture I glean from the story ;=D
ReplyDeleteThanks so much! So excited to give away a copy. Thanks for checking in, Denise!
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