Author Chat With Meg Rosoff (Friends Like These), Plus Giveaway! ~ US/CAN Only!

Today we are very excited to share a special interview with author Meg Rosoff (Friends Like These)!

Read on to learn more about her, her book, and a giveaway!

 

 

 

Meet the Author: Meg Rosoff

MEG ROSOFF grew up in a suburb of Boston and moved to London in 1989. She spent fifteen years working in advertising before writing her first YA novel, How I Live Now, which has sold more than a million copies in thirty-six territories. It won the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize and the Michael L. Printz Award in the US and was made into a feature film. Her subsequent nine novels have been awarded or shortlisted for, among others, the Carnegie Medal and the National Book Award. She lives in London with her husband, the painter Paul Hamlyn.

Website

 

 

 

About the Book: Friends Like These

New York City. Summer 1983. A summer internship in New York was meant to be everything Beth wanted. But from the moment she arrives in the city she feels wrong: wrong hair, terrible clothes, defective smile, too obviously a virgin. Sharing a hot, cockroach-filled apartment with a couple falling out of love completes the dream picture. Then she meets her fellow interns: ambitious out-of-towner Dan, preppy rich boy Oliver, and Edie — a beautiful, brittle, magnetic, instant best friend. Irresistible people are like gravity. You can’t help being pulled towards them — can you?

Purchase

 

 

 

~Author Chat~

 

YABC: What gave you the inspiration to write Friends Like These?

I lived in NYC between 1980 and1990 – it was a strange time both in my life and in the life of New York. It was still a dangerous, dirty city with amazing clubs downtown, lots of violent crime and a palpable sense of danger. I loved the edgy vibe, rode my bike everywhere (I had five bikes stolen in three years), played bass guitar in an art rock band (we rehearsed in my guitarist friend’s loft in Williamsburg where there was a real danger of getting attacked in the two-block walk between the subway stop and his door). Newspapers reported horrific murders in the city every day and AIDS was the subtext of everyone’s sex life. At the same time, the ‘greed is good’ culture was rising fast, and everyone was talking incessantly about money and stuff. It was surreal. With that background, what kept me going were my female friends. But as we all know, friendship can be tricky as well as wonderful. That’s true now for me as much as it was then.

 

YABC: Which came first, the title or the novel?

The novel.

 

YABC: What do you like most about the cover of Friends Like These?

I absolutely love the cover (which isn’t always true for me….) The photograph of two different girls mirroring each other seems to encapsulate the feeling of the book perfectly.

 

YABC: Which was the most difficult or emotional scene to narrate?

Probably the near rape. There was a lot of that kind of sex around when I was young, with women feeling apologetic, like it was somehow their fault. And now that I have a daughter that age, I’m so outraged that things haven’t changed, that young women are still blamed (and blame themselves) for the actions of men. We were so optimistic back in the 80s, thinking the woman’s movement and feminism would change the world forever in favour of equality. And suddenly we have the repeal of Roe v Wade and a bunch of men restricting women’s reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the culture of pornography encourages violence towards women as an everyday approach to sex. Don’t get me started. Oops, too late.

 

YABC: Which character gave you the most trouble when writing Friends Like These?

It’s always tricky writing a quiet, thoughtful main character without them coming across as weak or boring.

 

YABC: What is the main message or lesson you would like your reader to remember from this book?

I try my best to avoid lessons. Mostly I’m just exploring what it means to be struggling with identity and purpose in life. But every book I write grapples with the idea of what it means to be a person — a good person, living a positive life.

 

YABC:   What advice do you have for new writers?

Write from the deepest place you can find.

 

YABC:   What’s up next for you?

 I’m supposed to be finishing my third summer book. 😱

 

 

 

 

Title: Friends Like These

Author: Meg Rosoff

Release Date: May 30, 2023

Publisher: Tundra Books

ISBN: 9781774881101

Genre: Young Adult Fiction

Age Range: 14 and up

 

 

 

~ Giveaway Details ~

 

Five (5) winners will receive a copy of Friends Like These (Meg Rosoff) and a themed bookmark! ~US/CAN Only!

 

 

*Click the Rafflecopter link below to enter the giveaway*

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway