Interview with Lisa Yee

Publisher's Weekly has an interview with Lisa Yee, author of Absolutely Maybe.

How is writing for teens different from writing for middle-schoolers?

I got so immersed in writing the book that I didn’t even think of the audience. It was kind of liberating being a teen for a while, though. I went through a period of swearing a lot. My husband finally asked what was going on, and I told him, “I’m a teenage runaway right now.” As it turned out, I cut out a lot of the swearing. It wasn’t true to Maybelline’s character.

Where did you get the idea of Maybelline being a runaway?

At first the book was mostly going to be about beauty pageants, but when I started researching them, I didn’t find much that I liked. I didn’t think I could give a fair picture of pageants in the book, so I decided I had to get Maybelline out of that scene and out of Florida.

To read the rest of the interview, go here. Lisa is such an interesting person and I can't wait to read her book!