Local author K.L. Brady talks about current projects and obsessions

Local Maryland author K.L. Brady and her debut novel, The Bum Magnet, are earning accolades among reviewers.  If you missed the first part of the interview, please check it out.

If you were to create a playlist for The Bum Magnet, what would be your top five picks?

1. I Will Survive by Gloria Naylor  (that's actually in the story)
2. So Close by John McLaughlin (in one of the more fairytale-like scenes, LOVE that song)
3. No More Drama by Mary J. Blige (it's what the character was working toward even if she had a rocky road getting there)
4. Show Me Watcha Got by JayZ (also in the book)
5. My Sacrifice by Creed OR Unwritten by Natasha Bedingfield (playing just after the last scene).

As you can see, my tastes are eclectic and totally mood-driven. One funny note for Creed fans, I mentioned Creed never getting back together in one scene (who woulda thunk it?) and dang if when I got ready to release the book did they release their new album. I left the line in though. The reunion might not last (shudder the thought).

Please share a few of your obsessions or writing habits (i.e. a love of chocolate, writing so many words or pages per day, listening to music while writing)?
 
I'm a couch and bed writer. I feel confined at desks. I hate my characters because they never start talking until the middle of the night and into the wee hours of the morning. That's when I'm most creative. So, I sleep with my laptop next to me or on the nightstand so that when they start talking, I can wake up, write, and then get back to sleep. 

I read a little bit of everything, but my love is chick lit of all kinds. Right now, I have Emily Giffin's Love the One You're With and The Little Lady Agency by Hester Browne on my nightstand. I just finished Feminista by Erica Kennedy, which I loved. The character is a bit more edgy than typical chick lit but it's a great book. I also loved Sisters and Husbands by Connie Briscoe, and Who Is He To You? by a debut writer, Monique D. Mensah, which is a gripping, page-turning suspense that addresses some difficult issues like sexual abuse and addiction. Very good. Also, My Horizontal Life by Chelsea Handler. HILARIOUS!
 
I would love to see more African-American books in the mainstream, especially women's fiction. Just because characters are of one race or ethnicity or another doesn't mean the stories won't be relatable to wider audiences. I think Terry McMillan made a lot of headway toward that end, but we've got a long way to go. Perhaps the release of the Waiting to Exhale sequel will remind publishers, booksellers, and readers alike that there is diverse appeal for these stories.

What current projects are you working on and would you like to share some details with the readers?

I have quite a few ideas bopping around my head and I'm working on several projects right now. The first is a sequel to The Bum Magnet that ties up some loose ends, such as what happens with Denise, Charisse's relationship with her father, and where she goes from the end of the first book. Will she truly find her happily ever after? And if she finds it, will it be all it's cracked up to be?  The fun thing about this story is that it is told first-person from a male and female point of view and will play on women's rules for dealing with men and vice versa.  So, we'll get a male's perspective on dealing with Charisse and women in general.

A second project is titled Who Wrote My Script?  It's the story of a very eccentric, quirky character, Miki, who after breaking up with her boyfriend decides that romantic comedies are the Rosetta stones for finding true love and happiness and she starts living them out in her own life's script. She quickly finds out that life doesn't imitate art and things don't work out in real life like they do in the movies.  This project is so much fun.  I'm a Rom-Com-Aholic, but I think we all get swept up in these stories thinking men are supposed to be like the guys in the movies, when the guys in the movies don't really exist.

A third project is about an African American FBI agent who very reluctantly falls in love with her Italian partner while working a spy case. Oh, by the way, her father is a former Black Panther and his father is a jailed Mafia boss. I worked for the FBI for many years in my former life, so I'm hoping to draw from my experience to write a really compelling story. We'll see how that goes.

Please visit K.L. Brady Writes for more information about this author and her book, The Bum Magnet.