HOUS August 2009 : Page 43
While earning her doctorate, Holladay buried her nose in technical papers.Dry stuff , she says. To break the tedium, she read chick-lit. “I loved the books. As I read more of them, I started thinking, ‘I can do this.’” Applying her background in psychology, she started observing people and noting their mannerisms. Eventually, facets of people she’s known and met in passing would be peppered throughout her novel about career- minded Kate, who substituted love for a closet of expensive designer shoes. “But when the other shoe drops,” Holladay says, “Kate is confronted with the reality of her missteps, and she has to make a choice.” While Holladay’s Kate is chicly tailored, Gwendolyn Zepeda’s main character in Houston, We Have a Problema, released in January by Grand Central Publishing, is anything but. Jessica Luna prefers jeans and T-shirts over designer shoes and labels. Her favorite top is red with a glittery black cat silhouette and “Bad Kitty” emblazoned across the chest. Jessica also relies on a deck of cards for answers to herman trouble—andmomtrouble. She listens not to her heart, but to her psychic,Madame Hortensia. “I got the idea for the book when a colleague brought one of those Magic 8-Balls to the offi ce,” says the doe-eyed author, who’s best known for her bilingual children’s book, Growing UpWith Tamales, published last year by Pinata Books. “Being Mexican, you grew up with stuff like that. You can’t resist it. Is it a toy or is it magic? You don’t know.” Jessica is half-Anglo and half-Mexican like Zepeda, who grew up in the old Sixth Ward along Washington Avenue. T e area now attracts a hip, well-dressed crowd with sleek three-story townhouses, chef-driven restaurants and nightclubs. But back in the ’70s and ’80s, theWashington Corridor was a tight-knit Mexican ’hood, bubbling with Tejano music, taquerias, magical tales from across the border and colorful characters. “I wanted towrite a chick-lit book about a person I grewupwith,” the 37-year- old says. “Jessica is a composite of several women in my old neighborhood. She’s a normal latina who’s looking for answers to life’s problems.” Zepeda fi rst thought Problema would appeal to latinas who wanted to see a refl ection of themselves. But she found a bigger audience in women who want a window into someone else’s world. Zepeda’s fourth book, Lone Star Legend—about an online columnist in Austin—comes this fall. Zepeda’s books actually fall in the category “chica lit,” a variation of chick lit aimed at American latinas. It turns out that, sinceHelen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’ Diary, the chick-lit genre has expanded and subdivided. T ere’s chica lit, Christian lit, nanny lit (T e Nanny Diaries), assistant lit (T e DevilWears Prada), and mom lit. A rising mom-lit star is fi fth-generation Houstonian Katherine Center, a full-timemother to 6-year-old Anna and 3-year-oldT omas.T e petite, strawberry blonde wrote her fi rst book, T e Bright Side of Disaster, on a dare from her older sister. It was followed this year by Everyone is Beautiful; PublishersWeekly said that like “real-lifemarriage with children, this book off ers enough sparklingmoments to compensate for the tedium.” Set in Houston, both books were published by Ballantine Books. Center writes after her teacher husband and kids go to bed—which doesn’t leave much room for sleep. But the situation has its benefi ts: Her kids provide great material! At one point in Beautiful, Center writes of having taken a biz card from a colleague: “I knew that within 24 hours Baby Samwould fi nd it inmy purse, put it in hismouth, chew on it until it looked like a wad of gum, and then leave it on the fl oor where I’d step on it in bare feet. ... But it was okay. I wouldn’t have called her anyway.” “Day-to-day life with kids makes great obstacles,” Center, 37, says. “Kids are also funny, great for comedy.T e stories I’m most interested in have room for comedy and tragedy. ... In real life, they live side by side.” Momlit is a natural progression of chick lit. “I wanted to write a book about what happened afterMr. Right,” the author continues. “I wanted to write a love story about married people.” Whether it’smomlit, chica lit or another subcategory, almost all chick- lit books are depictions of a woman who is redefi ning her life, much like Lacy in Love or Something Like It, published in April by Random House. “Inmany ways, it’s a coming-of-age story, even though themain character, Lacy, is almost 35,” says the book’s author, Deirdre Shaw. Shaw lives in Los Angeles, where the story unfolds. She, however, regularly visits her dad inHouston. InMay, she threw a party atNinfa’s on Navigationtocelebrate thebook’s release.Hermaincharacter’squirky father is loosely based on her dad, whom she describes as “a real character.” T e author and her hero share similar angst living in Tinseltown, along with being “a bit cynical, a bit sarcastic and a bit wry.” Before landing a full-time job as a scriptwriter, “I felt like an interloper, full of self-doubts,” says Shaw, who writes for CW’s new drama series, Life UneXpected. T ere are diff erences, though. While Shaw, 37, is happily married, Lacy is still looking for love. Lacy divorces at a young age, has an aff air with the boss, tries to make sense of a dysfunctional childhood and even winds up having an abortion. She’s chick-lit perfect in her imperfection, and Shaw says she regularly receives emails from strangers praising her honest book about a woman coming of age in her 30s. “Lacy, she’s likeme in a sense,” Shawadmits. “She’s trying to be happy, but she isn’t quite sure how.” H Write Stuff Four emerging novelists have penned new books rife with Houston-centric, female-friendly fun. Here’s a sample: Dropping the Other Shoe Quinn Holladay “T e Galleria was packed with people avoiding the heat. T e fl oor-to-ceiling windows were refl ecting the sunlight, forcing me to keep my sunglasses on until I walked through the doors.…I knew I wanted to fi nd a dress but decided to take a slight detour through shoes.T e right shoes could really narrow down the choices for a dress.” Houston, We Have a Problema Gwendolyn Zepeda “Her friend Toby had told her once that her butt was like J. Lo’s, but with a Quarter Pounder and fries. Guillermo didn’t seem to mind her extra curves, though. He told her that her body was beautiful. And he was an artist, Jessica reasoned, so he should know.” Everyone is Beautiful Katherine Center “You don’t know anything until you’re thirty, and you don’t really know anything until you’re thirty-fi ve. I held on to those words throughout my twenties as I made mistake after mistake with boys and careers and friends. When I get to my thirties, I told myself, I’ ll know what I’m doing. Just wait it out.” Love or Something Like It Deirdre Shaw “We were not exactly in love anymore.… We were often other places besides in it.We were under it, sometimes. Or above it. Or against it. Or in arm’s reach of it.… But not in it. Not lately. Not since Baby Sam was born. Baby Sam was, you might say, the straw that broke the Love Camel’s back. And now that camel was lying in the baking sun. All alone and very thirsty.” August 2009 | | 43
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