Katherine Center is a New York Times-bestselling author, and a Romantic with a capital R. Her first novel, written in the sixth grade was a fan fiction about Duran Duran, has sadly not yet been published, but she has gone on to publish ten other novels, two of which have been turned into movies – The Lost Husband and Happiness for Beginners. Both immediately went to the top of the Netflix charts almost as soon as they started streaming.

Last week, Katherine’s 11th novel, The Rom-Commers, was published by St Martin’s Press, and we'd love you to buy it from one of Katherine's favorite indie bookstore, Blue Willow Bookshop in Houston, Texas, by visiting the store's website.

You can find out more about all of Katherine's books, movies and other projects, and also sign up for her amazing newsletter, at www.katherinecenter.com

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Music by Oleg Kirilkov - #We StandWithUkraine

July Duffy was a self-confessed frustrated creative writer-who-wasn’t-writing, when she challenged herself to write a story every day of May 2010. Other would-be writers heard what she was doing and asked to join in. And that was only the beginning.

And today - May 1st, 2024 - Julie is launching the 15th year of StoryADayMay.

Since then thousands of writers have joined Julie each May (and lately in September too), to prove to themselves that they can make creativity a priority in their lives. The focus is on writing, creating and improving your craft, not on getting published (though that may be the end result eventually too).

Now, she leads her community of writers at StoryADay, and is a sought-after guest speaker on topics related to creativity, productivity and community. And as a fellow Scot, I had such a lot of fun chatting to Julie for this episode of Authors & Audiences.

So if you are listening on May 1st - go sign up for Julie's daily email writing prompts.

If you are listening later in May - it's still not too late, so go sign up for Julie's daily email writing prompts.

And if you are listening anytime later, Julie has so many other things to get you writing throughout the year, I think you should sign up anyway.

I'm planning to join in and write some stories too - maybe not every day, but as many as I can manage, so make sure you follow me on Instagram and I'll share my progress with you there, so you can share yours too.

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Music by Oleg Kirilkov - #We StandWithUkraine

[It turns out that I incorrectly posted this episode back in April as just a 42 seconds-long clip. Oops! - frustratingly, I have only just realized, but I have now replaced the short clip with the full episode - So sorry everyone!]
Yesterday - on Saturday, April 27th, 2024 I helped celebrate Independent Bookstores Day by becoming one of the Guest Booksellers at Brazos Bookstore, my amazing local indie here in Houston TX at the invitation of Randi Null, the general manager. I'm not sure how many books I helped sell, but I certainly had a great couple of hours talking to the staff, the other authors who were Guest-Bookselling too, and of course, to the readers of all ages who were checking out the shelves and asking for recommendations so I could give you the chance to help us celebrate the indie bookstore network around the world too. I even got to talk to the Inprint Poetry Buskers - all Masters students at the University of Houston Creative Writing Program - who were on duty with their trusty typewriters, ready to produce an original poem to order - just give them a topic and then pick up your piece of original literary artwork a few minutes later.

Of course, because we were recording live in the store, the sound quality is rather louder than usual, and unfortunately, because I was trying out some new lapel mics for the interviews, my own sound is a little distorted at times. Huge apologies, but I hope you'll forgive all that and just enjoy soaking up the atmosphere of a bustling indie bookstore on a busy Saturday afternoon.

My fellow Guest Booksellers on the afternoon shift were Chris Cander and Sydney Dunlap, and the Inprint Poetry Buskers were Adrian Pachuca, Caleb Berg and Anna Barr.

Shoutouts to other indie stores mentioned by my guests:
Blue Willow Bookshop, Houston TX
Kaboom Books, Houston TX
Class Books, Houston TX
Buy the Book, Woodlands TX
Village Books, Woodlands TX
Moe's Books, Berkeley CA
Bad Animal, Santa Cruz CA
Literati, Ann Arbor MI
Dawn Treader, Ann Arbor MI
Curious Books, East Lancing MI
Parnassus Books, Nashville TN
Goldberry Books, Concord, NC

And also to the two libraries mentioned - Aurora IL Public Library, and Ms Nelson, the school librarian at Roberts Elementary School, Houston TX.

And thank you to all the readers and book-buyers who so willingly let me accost them and demand to know what books they'd chosen.

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Music by Oleg Kirilkov - #We StandWithUkraine