What’s this book about?
Girl of the Moment is about our main character, Lily, who lands an internship for the summer in NYC working for a sixteen-year- old Lindsay Lohan-like teen starlet. Lily must try to survive the summer while thrown into the middle of the actress’ demanding world, yet glamorous world.

What do you have to look forward to? What kind of a ride is this?
An inner look into the world of a young starlet living in NYC from the point of view of a high school girl who must endure the crazy demands that are put upon her. During the summer, our heroine, Lily, learns about friendship and discovers what is truly important to her.

What is the relationship between Lily and the starlet’s character named Sabrina Snow?
It’s Lily’s first internship. Her college counselor told her she needed this to get into her dream college of Brown. She is very green and never had an internship before and Sabrina is incredibaly demanding. One second you love her, the next you hate her. She wears fabulous coutour clothing and she’s a hot, young trendy thing. Every teenage girl in American knows who she is.

Since it takes place in NYC, did you incorporate restaurants and places you love?
I went to high school in Manhattan at Dalton. I definitely imagined my life there while I wrote this book. I also lived near my high school on the Upper East Side on 87th Street and Third Avenue and I imagined that apartment as the one that Lily is living in with her parents. Sabrina Snow lives downtown at the Mercer Hotel. I love Soho so I incoroporated parts of that neighborhood into the story, as well. I loosely based a few restaurants on Balthazars and Pastis. I based the venue for Sabrina’s film party on a club in Los Angeles called Saddle Ranch on the Sunset Strip.

Where did the idea come from for the book?
I was working as an assistant in Hollywood and for work I had to go through some of the fan mail. I started being captivated by the letters that I read and how some people were so obsessed and in love with certain movie stars. It struck me too that there was a sadness because some of these people were telling their deepest, darkest secrets and wishes to these stars, but many of the letters remained unread. That’s when I started having an idea about a young girl interning for a teenage movie star. I had so many internships growing up and I was entrenched in this Hollywood assistant world now and I wanted to explore it in fiction.

How did writing fit into your life as you were growing up and in high school?
I’ve been writing since I was a little kid. When I was about five years old, I started writing poetry. In High School, I began writing short stories and was co-editor of my high school’s literary Magazine, Blue Flag. I learned a lot from both my parents who were very creative and loved to write. They taught me a great deal about writing and storytelling. I also learned a lot assisting my dad when he taught as a guest professor at the Graduate Program for Creative Writing at University of Southern California headed by the wonderful and talented James Ragan. Currently, I am also a member of The Ensemble Studio Theatre and involved in Actor’s Studio of NY.

You workedas an assistant in the biz for many years. What was that like?
I had been an assistant a while in Hollywood and I knew I didn’t want to be an assistant forever. I started dreaming about writing a novel and the themes of the book. I wanted to start realizing my own dreams. Also, personally, I had lost my father a year before I started writing the book’s beginning. He was a writer too, and I suppose I wanted to make him proud.

How does it feel that now when you woke up in the morning and you know your task is to write?
At first, it was surreal. The day the book deal came through, I felt that I had finally accomplished a dream which I had been holding onto my whole life. I walked around all day thinking, today is the day a dream came true. There are so many days in your life that you spend hoping, wanting, and working towards a goal. The moments that I stop to think about how I brought my first book into fruition feel so gratifying. I am thankful to be doing what I love.

What did it feel like the first time you saw the cover of your book?
I got to open up this file on my computer and see this cover illustration that was so intricate and beautiful. I loved looking at all the details in the artwork. Also, it was amazing to see how the artist stepped in and created her own visual interpretation of the words on the page.

What’s on the horizon for you next?
I am busy working on my second book for Viking and looking forward to the release of Girl of the Moment in April ’07. It will be really exciting to have people pick up the book and meet these characters for themselves. I hope they love them as much as I did and get right there into their world.