Lady Therese

Looking out of a window in Paris to neutral toned building opposite.
Neutral clothes hung up against white wardrobe.

C’est La Vie

Career•Travel
Only a few more days before I take a trip overseas to gather ‘content’ for my eagerly awaited new novel. This journey is essential. It is…. no it is. I swear it is, honestly it is! Listen, if Elizabeth Gilbert could have written Eat, Pray, Love at her kitchen table she would have done, wouldn’t she? As a writer it is vital to have original, authentic experiences. It is. It really is. ‘Absolutely it is’ I hear you say....
River view in Paris.

La Vie Parisienne

Lifestyle•Travel
I’m back in LA after my sojourn in Paris, where, for reasons that made sense at the time, I decided the worst possible thing that could happen would be to be taken for a tourist in St Germain des Pres. I became insanely French very quickly; within hours of landing I owned a navy blue cashmere jacket and several scarves, was walking into galleries with an air of distraction and then focus, totally confident in my Gallic persona unless...

Honky Tonk Woman

Lifestyle•Travel
How’s your week going? Mine’s been pretty busy. I’ve played Nashville (a piano duet at The Loews Hotel does count), I’ve been ordained a Minister in The Universal Life Church Monastery ($12.95 online and yes, that counts too). Oh! And I also had my house taken over by a SWAT team. I’m talking about ‘The Special Weapons and Tactics Team’ complete with sub machine guns and sniper rifles. It’s a long story, but seeing your house on NBC after...

Hey Dude

Career
It has been a very busy couple of weeks. The Fiction Studio and I partnered with Amazon on a free Kindle promotion of my book. There was so much Twittering and Facebooking that I eventually ran out of people to ask and was in serious danger of losing my mind and my friends. I was thrilled we managed such high ratings and so grateful to everyone who rallied to help launch India into the world. Thank you. It has...
New York Literary Torch Award
New York Literary Torch Award

Carrying the Torch

Career
In the few days since the publication of India’s Summer my writing has received the kind of recognition authors barely allow themselves to dream about. The Golden Globes coverage eclipsed much of the news in LA and as my PR, Lucy Hamilton explained, Johnny Depp’s breakup with Vanessa Paradis kept me off the cover of People magazine again this week. She has apologized for the lack of media coverage. Those of you who attended the event will bear testimony...

Published and not yet Damned!

Career
I am at a new and very exciting point in my life. For the first time there’s something tangible to show for my work. I’ve written a novel and it’s published TODAY!!!! Never before have I had so much positive affirmation, so many congratulations, so much delight in what I have achieved and yet this feels like the easiest thing I’ve ever done. Bring on the standing ovation for the years spent teaching, raising my family, running a business,...

Four Days and Counting

Career•Lifestyle
Note-to-Self – Am not door to door salesperson. Next time the publisher asks how many advance copies of my book I want to buy, I might give a moment’s thought to where I plan to store them and whether anyone in the family might like to eat at the dining table. I might also ask myself exactly what I think I’m going to do with four hundred copies. I was thinking the couches could do with being a little...
English countryside.

Five Days and Counting

Career•Lifestyle
Is everyone watching the costume drama Downton Abbey? Get to iTunes fast and catch up if you aren’t. It’s brilliant. It’s a wild success over here. Most Americans are intrigued by the English class system as well they might be. It’s complicated. There are so many British cultural nuances in the series that a quick guide might help. There are broad categories: upper and lower working class, upper and lower middle class, upper and lower upper class. It doesn’t...

Six Days and Counting

Career
“I used to think that what scared me most was the idea of being abandoned until someone said to me, ‘only children can be abandoned. Adults can’t be abandoned because we have a choice’” – Demi Moore, Harper’s Bazaar Don’t you feel for Demi, or anyone who has to go through their heart -break in the glare of the media. Okay, we all know that there’s a love/hate relationship between the paparazzi and anyone craving attention, but the last...

The Terrors of Thérèse

Career
“Very few, if any authors, write prose with the thought that one day they might have to read it standing on a stage in front of an audience hell bent on having a good time” – Howard Marks This was a quote I fell upon by chance the night before my recent debut at Seven and a Half Minutes of Fame. How true, I thought, but it’s okay. It’ll be a small crowd, an intimate setting, informal, a good...