Street Food and Love
Genre: YA Contemporary Romance
Release Date: Summer 2014
Publisher: Martin Sisters Publishing
Description:
Sole Eaby, seventeen, has a
few complaints he’d like to lodge against life, the main one being that
his dad, Cedro, has recently quit his job and withdrawn his entire life
savings, which included Sole’s college fund. Why? To launch a food truck
business he knows nothing about.
To cope, Sole uses his knifelike wit to moonlight as a stand-up
comedian, and so far, it’s paying off. He’s not only replenishing his
college treasury, he’s making people laugh; but it’s one person in
particular he performs for. Her name is Ava. When the fated bond of
humor joins the two, and they begin a sort of quasi-romance, things
begin to seem somewhat bearable. Of course, that’s when an ill-timed
event decides to put another spin on things. Just when Sole is ready to
move on with his own life and disconnect himself from his father and the
family business, he suddenly finds himself in charge of the food truck
he desperately loathes. Here is where Sole must realize that the answers
to love and life are not to be found apart but, rather, are more like a
savory recipe: only by combining the ingredients will the wonderful
flavors reveal themselves. When comedy isn’t enough, the future seems
ever bleak, and a fledgling love has barely had a chance to bloom, where
will Sole turn?
Have you always wanted to be a writer?
I've actually known I've wanted to be a writer since I was twelve. The brief excerpt of that mini epiphany is on my website’s FAQ's. As for YA, I didn’t know I actually wanted to write for young adults until about eight years ago. This book made it through the publication portal, but there are other predecessors on my hard drive, many young adults megabyte format wondering why they never got to graduate from being mere Word docs to full blown, bound, edited and printed books.
Novelists who inspired you?
The list is long. In YA we have Sarah Dessen, Gary Schmidt, Caroline Cooney, Ned Vizzini, I will add that not many people mention Vizzini—God rest his talented soul, and it’s shocking. He’s been considered a pioneer of the modern YA lit genre, and I agree. Hopefully, I see him on the other side and we can collaborate.
Are any of the characters in the book based off of someone you know?
Most characters are concoctions of many people in various forms—those we know, those we’ve heard about, those we’d like to know and those we knew. Once you put all that together, my answer, like a writer, would technically be kind of but not really. Not very technical, is it...
Why did you write this book?
I wrote this book because this idea had never been pursued in YA lit, let alone fiction.th When the idea came to me, I thought it was worth telling for others out there. Of course, now there’s a film about a food truck owner operator, but not when I wrote the novel. I wanted to explore the concept of the food truck operator as a person with issues, so that’s when it turned YA because my teenage protagonist Sole became the focus. You can watch The Great Food Truck Race or Eat St. if you just care about someone and their food truck, but life as an owner operator is not the star idea of this narrative.
How often do you write?
As often as I can but not as often as I’d like. This is where you probably want to hear my writing process and such. Really, some days it feels like I’m hacking away like a lumberjack at a petrified tree other days it feels like I’m driving up the 101 outside of L.A, ocean to my left, top down, music son, and the sun holding back some of its heat just because I’m on the highway. Do I go at it daily? At least four days out of the week, but I aim for seven. Writing doesn’t currently foot the bills fully, so I have another gig. I know, I know: when I say that I leave myself open for comments like, “Good thing, then I don’t have to worry about reading too much of your work,” or, “I can see why you keep your day job.” Sure, I get that I’m vulnerable to those criticisms, but it’s just the reality of most writers’ lives. Want to buy a thousand copies and change that? Ha, ha. Kidding.
What kind of books do you read?
I’m a social science junkie. I’m talking an obsession beyond obsessions. As for other genres, I do read lots of YA, of course, lots of it. And, I take in about four literary adult novels a year, one per quarter. I read that in parts between my others.
What writing advice do you have for other aspiring authors?
I’m sort of just lifting off the launch pad. That’s a flattering question, but I’m not quite in a position to answer that yet. One might say, “I’ll take his advice and do the opposite.” Ha. I’m kidding about the mini joke. But really, I feel like I’m still aspiring. I’ll answer better when I’m past the aspiring level.
H.A.'s love for all things caffeinated is what keeps him awake and alert
so he can pursue that glorious tyrant called Nostalgia. And after all,
isn't that what provokes most adult authors to write stories about the
teenage years they long ago left behind (referring to Nostalgia, not the
caffeine...he hopes)? When he isn't writing, H.A. can be found quaffing
coffee (Yes, he might be addicted--don't judge) reading, riding his
bike, snapping photos, making music, working on his theory of
everything, and, on rare occasions, attempting to discover the elusive,
and maybe impossible, secret to time travel. H.A. lives in So Cal.
Street Food and Love is H.A.'s first novel.
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