I have loved and gleaned so much from this conference for the past few years. This year, with The Marriage Act forthcoming and a lot to think about re. what’s next, the changing publishing industry, etc, I’m excited to be a part of the conversation. If you’re heading to AWP in Boston, come check out one of my panels and let’s go to some of the fun social events too.
Don’t things always come full circle? In college, when I knew I wanted to become a writer, I was double-majoring in film and creative writing, planning to pursue a career in screenwriting (as always, if I could figure out how). When I moved to New York after two years in L.A., though, I landed a job in publishing, and started writing the beginnings of the novel that became Mexican High. I figured I would make my way back to screenwriting eventually, somehow, but that it would probably happen on its own when the time was right.
When Alex Garinger, fellow former intern at City magazine got in touch with me after the Profiler essay came out in the Times, with news that his production company wanted to option the story for a romantic comedy (he and I hadn’t been in touch for about six years!) it was one of those right-thing-at-the-right-time situations. Five All in the Fifth and their article on The Profiler.
My mother The Profiler and I were interviewed by Bob Carlson of KCRW’s show UnFictional. KCRW, Southern California’s NPR station, has long been my favorite radio station–I stream it almost daily–so I was really excited when Bob contacted me about doing the Valentine’s Day show. While The Profiler and I spoke with him from the studios of KUSP in Santa Cruz.
Check out the show here! The story is currently being developed into a screenplay and novel!
Back when I was in residence in the fall at the Thurber House, the Columbus Dispatch interviewed me about The Marriage Act and other things. Here is the link to the Q&A!
I’m so excited to announce my second book! From Publishers Marketplace:
December 14, 2012
Liza Monroy’s THE MARRIAGE ACT, about the author’s years spent wed to her Middle Eastern gay best friend in order to keep him in the United States, while her mother worked for the US Government preventing immigration fraud, to Delia Casa at Skyhorse, for publication in fall 2013, by Jennifer Lyons at the Jennifer Lyons Literary Agency (World except German and Korean).
I am going to sorely miss my fiancé, capoeira class, and the new life I’ve started in the lovely beach paradise of Santa Cruz, CA, but I’m very excited to have been awarded a three-week residency by the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts.
I just perused the list of December artists and am looking forward to meeting them, plus diving into another bout of that precious “away” uninterrupted writing time. I’m going to return to the Profiler novel and have some other projects that are getting underway.
It’s a good day for optioning things! Here’s my latest news via Publishers Marketplace
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November 1, 2012
Film rights
Liza Monroy’s THE PROFILER, a fictional, romantic comedy spin off of a novel-in-progress along a similar storyline as Monroy’s NYT Modern Love column “When Mom Is on the Scent, and Right,” about her mother, a professional profiler, who tries to find the perfect man for Liza via profiling techniques only to have it turned around on her, to Douglas Banker and Alex Garinger of Five All in the Fifth Entertainment, by Michael Cendejas of the Lynn Pleshette Agency in association with Jennifer Lyons of the Jennifer Lyons Literary Agency.
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November 1, 2012
Television rights
Liza Monroy’s MEXICAN HIGH, pitched in the vein of Gossip Girl set in an elite upper class international school in Mexico City, starring a teenage American protagonist who gains entree into this exciting, glamorous, and often dangerous world when her US diplomat mother is transferred to the Embassy there, to Charlie Matthau at Matthau Media, by Michael Cendejas at The Lynn Pleshette Agency working with Jennifer Lyons at The Jennifer Lyons Agency.
I had a great time talking with Doug Dangler, who hosts this series of conversations with authors from a studio at OSU. It aired on Wednesday, October 17, on WCBE radio, central Ohio’s NPR station, and is now up on Writers Talk’s YouTube channel.
Check out the interview here.
I’ve hacked the Profiler!
Three months after my mother began searching for viable relationship prospects for me via the blog she started in the aftermath of my latest Modern Love column, the Profiler project is over. In an interesting little role reversal, I’m the Profiler now. Check it out.
I’m at the end of my second week at the Thurber House. While I have to admit that my expectations for being the writer-in-residence here this month, inaugurating the annual John E. Nance Nonfiction writing residency, were high to begin with, so far they have only been exceeded. I’ve been joking that they won’t be able to get rid of me at the end of the month, I’ll chain myself to the house in protest of ever having to leave this magical historic home, or Columbus, Ohio, for that matter.
For starters, the house is haunted. It has even appeared on that Ghost Hunters show. I don’t believe in ghosts, never have, but there is definitely something at least verging on paranormal amiss here. I found an apple in the middle of my living room floor, okay? After putting away all the apples in a bowl in the kitchen, nowhere near the living room. (Nor do you have to pass through the living room to get to the kitchen.) Also, one morning I was typing away on my book, the very lines I was writing began deleting themselves backward. I kid you not.
Besides the haunting, being here has been exceptionally productive. I set a goal of ten pages a day and so far have kept to it, though I’m taking a break today to go check out a capoeira class and bike around. The city of Columbus is a hidden gem–the cafes and shops of the Short North, the Wexner Center and Ohio State campus, and the historic homes and Discovery District downtown, the area where this house is open daily as a museum.
The staff is here until 5pm, and after that, I have the run of the place! I often find myself wandering the halls, marveling at whatever fortuitous power led me to the privilege of spending an entire month in the historic Victorian mansion once belonging to James Thurber and family.
So far, I’ve been interviewed by the Columbus Dispatch and Writers Talk which airs on Central Ohio’s NPR affiliate (will post a links when the pieces come out in a week or two), and dispensed some advice about finishing a novel to high school students who are participating in NaNoWriMo. I’ll also lead a workshop on Wednesday, October 24 at OSU.