Are you the person that people seek out for advice? Are you the anchor in your group that keeps them grounded, offering the moral high ground or party on lower road, depending on the situation...or your mood? Well then, perhaps you'd love a chance at being an advice columnist! Although, from the sound of things in this novel, you may want to keep it on the down low if you value your privacy...and your life! Ladies and gents, welcome Rachel's Random Resources and today's title in the spotlight...
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Mrs Bambi Knows
by
Chris Mason
About the book...
In a small town in Oregon, everyone wants to kill the local advice columnist, Mrs Bambi. If only they knew who she was.
Mrs Bambi’s advice is so snarky that people have long since stopped asking for it. Instead she eavesdrops on conversations and writes the letters herself. The readers would lynch her, but no one knows who she is.
In fact, Mrs. Bambi is not a woman. The column is written by Richard, a quiet widower with a young daughter.
The uneventful part of Richard's life is nearly over: he begins dating Pam, a well-known realtor and a sports addict. When people begin to learn the identity of Mrs. Bambi, Richard is threatened and humiliated in public. Despite the pleas of his editor, his friends, and Pam, he refuses to stop writing the column.
The only thing that can prevent disaster is for the town to finally learn the whole truth about Richard, which is much larger than the simple mystery of Mrs. Bambi.
Set in 1995, Chris Mason’s skillful storytelling brings a tale of humour and romance – and not a little peril - charmingly to life in the mind of the reader.
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~~~ GUEST POST ~~~
with Author Chris Mason
I attended a well-known writer’s conference while I was working on the second draft of Mrs. Bambi Knows. One of the major draws for this conference was a workshop where a well-known author in your field (poetry, fiction, biography, etc.) would lead a group of other attendees in critiquing each others’ writing. Three things really struck me about this workshop.
The first several chapters of the revision had problems that I understood and could fix on my own, but the fourth chapter was troubling me. So instead of submitting the first chapter for review, as most people did, I submitted the fourth with an explanation and a synopsis of the first three chapters to give context.
This was a convention of writers, so I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised that half of my fellow writers critiqued the synopsis instead of the chapter—for example, saying that it needed to be fleshed out, or that it read like an outline instead of fiction. Some of them penciled in corrections to the grammar or suggestions for better word choices. When I saw these it took all my discipline not to laugh out loud. If it had not been so hilarious, I might have been offended.
Every chapter of the book begins with one of the advice columns that the main character writes, which are intended to be humorous and sarcastic. I wasn’t sure how the sample chapter’s column would be received by my peers.
One of my fellow attendees was a small but tough young woman from Brooklyn, New York. She had buzz-cut hair, and favored sleeveless T-shirts that showed off her impressive biceps. I’m a larger than average man, and fairly fit, but she looked like she could bench press me and then take me apart with a soup spoon.
The day that we workshopped my chapter, this young woman approached me before the class with a scowl on her face. She poked me in the chest and growled, “That was… the fucking…” Long pause, during which I wondered if I would be visiting a hospital soon. Then she broke into a smile. “…funniest thing I have ever read in my life.” She gave me a friendly punch on the arm and went to sit down at her place at the table.
The woman who led our workshop was a famous novelist and essayist, fiercely intelligent and borderline scary. When I had my one-on-one meeting with her, we spent a short time discussing my book. I was worried about the writing style, but she said it was just fine. She thought the idea was fresh, and liked the way every chapter started with a column. After what I’m sure she thought was a decent interval, she said, “You used to work at Microsoft.” I said yes. She said, “What was that like?” And that was the end of the discussion about my book.
I got back at her though. She was rather intimidating, so to deal with my feelings I wrote a sonnet about her thirst for novelty and disdain for cliché, and read it at an informal gathering of the other writers. On the very last day I gave her a copy of the poem, which I think freaked out both her and her assistant.
I said, “It’s not a love poem or anything.”
I do like to leave a good last impression.
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About the author...
Born in Ohio, Chris has moved around too much for anyone's good, living in several places that might be considered tourist attractions. He mines those experiences for the settings of his books.
He lives in Florida with his wife, two dogs, two cats, and a smart-aleck macaw who has pets of her own.
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Special thanks to Rachel at Rachel's Random Resources for the chance to bring this tour to you and to the author for the guest post. (THANKS!) For more information on this title, the author, this tour, or those on the horizon, feel free to click through the links provided above. This title is available now, so click on over to your favorite online retailer to snag your copy today! Be sure to check out the rest of the sites participating for more bookish fun...
Until next time, remember...if it looks good, READ IT!
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