Please welcome the Amazing, Kristin Higgins!!!

Hello, everyone! It’s so nice to be back here, and thanks to Cindy for having me. I first met Cindy because we have the same fabulous agent, and from the very first moment, she has just been the nicest and greatest friend a new writer — or any writer — could have. (That will be $20, Cindy.)

I was out for a run when I came up with the idea for The Next Best Thing…well, more of a stagger, since I’m about the least athletic person on earth. Anyway, I was staggering along, thinking about what to write next. How about a widow? I thought. A widowed heroine is a classic theme in romance…second chance at love and all that. But what if she didn’t really want to fall in love this time? What if she was looking for Mr. Not-That-Bad? And the hero…who would be the worst choice for a young widow still aching over her first love? How about…hmmm…how about her dead husband’s brother? Here I shuffled to a stop, gasping like a tuna pulled from the ocean. That’s good, Higgins, I thought. Write that down when you get home.

Thus was born The Next Best Thing, which just hit the shelves last month. Lucy Lang is most definitely not looking for love. Nah. She’d rather have a guy with low cholesterol and a Volvo than someone who makes her heart beat faster. First order of business…end things with Jimmy’s all-too-lovable brother, Ethan. And by things, of course I mean…well, you know. Nooky. It’s their little secret, this friends with benefits arrangement. And because Ethan is way too loveable, and because she’s already married and buried one Mirabelli boy, Lucy figures she should look elsewhere.

One of the things I really love to do in my books is to write about family, especially the loving, nosy, opinionated type that I myself come from. I think that families add so much to a book — who else can torment you with such accuracy, after all? And so we have the Black Widows, Lucy’s mother and two aunts, widows all. They’re not quite sure that Lucy should be looking for a husband when none of them felt that particular need. We also have the Mirabellis, Lucy’s in-laws, who have a shrine to their dead son in the kitchen of the restaurant they own. Jimmy was perfect in their eyes…Ethan’s another story. We have Corinne, Lucy’s younger sister, who’s obsessed with her own husband’s health and is basically worrying him into a premature grave.

The Next Best Thing contains a first for me — a cat! Please bear with me while I say something to Cinnamon, my own feline: You got your way. There’s a cat on the cover. Will you please stop bringing me mice with their heads chewed off? (Thanks, I’m done now). I’ve already had letters from people saying, “I wasn’t sure it was really your book, since there was no dog!”

So yes, a cat. Now, for the record, yes, I am a dog person, but I also love cats. Some cats. The kind who don’t ask to be let in and out fourteen times an hour. The kind who don’t start yowling at 4:09 every morning. The kind who never scratch the children, the furniture or me. In other words, fictional cats. Lucy’s cat is named Fat Mikey…and I love Fat Mikey. He has the soul of a Mafia don…and really, what cat worth his salt doesn’t?

So what do you think? Cats or dogs? Give me something specific…“My dog doesn’t laugh at me when I pull on Spanx” would be a good one. Or, “My cat shredded that ugly sweater my mother-in-law gave me, saving me from ever having to wear it.” I’ll give away a signed copy of The Next Best Thing to a commenter.

Can’t wait to hear your stories!

Kristan

www.kristanhiggins.com

www.facebook.com/KristanHiggins

Guest Author: Kristan Higgins

Hey everyone. The super talented, super sweet, and sometimes wacky, Kristan Higgins is joining us in the convertible today. I had the pleasure of reading and blurbing Kristan's first HQN, Fools Rush In. What a treat! It was also a treat visiting with Kristan when our shared agent hosted a dinner in SF this past July. So please give Kristan a warm, Top Down welcome, okay? I'm sure you're gonna love her and her books.

Hello! I am so pleased and proud to hang out with the convertible-lovin’ ladies from Riding with the Top Down! I’ve always loved the name of this website…the first car I drove was my father’s red Triumph convertible, a little two-seater with a faulty exhaust system, a wooden dashboard and an 8-track tape deck (the height of cool, I assure you). That Triumph might not have started all the time, had a tendency to cough out clouds of black smoke and veer off the road if you weren’t pulling on the steering wheel with all your might…but as an accessory, she was superb!

So thanks for having me! I have to tell you, I absolutely love being a romance writer. It’s much, much better than my old jobs, which all involved getting out of my pajamas, showering and brushing my teeth. Not any more! Now I get to be that odd woman who works in a little room in the basement, talks to the dog and forgets to brush her hair. It’s a dream come true!

Another great thing…my job requires me to fall in love over and over without breaking any marriage vows. I get to play with my imaginary friends every day, and these imaginary friends tend to look like Jude Law and Daniel Craig and the like. So when my husband comes in and says, “Honey, why are you staring at that picture of Clive Owen again?” I get to say, “Sweetie, please. I’m working here.”

As a romantic comedy writer, I find myself thinking not just about handsome men, but about humiliation. I got a lovely letter the other day from someone who said, “What I like best about your writing is that you describe things we’ve all done but would never actually admit.” (I’m not quite sure what that says about me, but it felt true.) I think a lot of humor does spring from embarrassing or awkward moments…all my favorite TV shows and movies seem to center on this belief, too — The Office, The New Adventures of the Old Christine, Death at a Funeral.

So when I start writing a new book, I usually start with a question — “What have I done that I probably shouldn’t admit to?” — and then I proceed to write a hundred thousand words on that subject. Not the best way to keep things confidential, but hey. It’s a living

In my first book, Fools Rush In, the experience was stalking. Not the scary, bunny-on-the-stove stalking…the more benign type. The type where you wait in the parking lot until he drives in and then leap out of your car in an incredible show of coincidence. “Oh, hey, how are you? What are you doing here? You come here every day at 10:37? I had no idea!” (You’ve all done this, too, right? It’s not just me, is it?)

My second book, Catch of the Day, captures the cringing embarrassment of having a public crush on someone completely inappropriate — Maggie meets the perfect man, she thinks, only to find out that he’s a Catholic priest. I can’t tell you the number of e-mails I’ve received from women who’ve had crushes on their own version of Father What-A-Waste. In fact, I’m giving a talk at a Catholic church this week, since the Ladies Guild was so tickled with that idea.

Too Good To Be True (out in February), is about a woman who invents a boyfriend when her ex-fiancé starts dating her sister. Again…we’ve all made up a boyfriend, yes? Not just me? (Er…Note to the guy who sat next to me on the plane ride to San Francisco all those years ago — I was not actually engaged to a cellist in the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. I didn’t want to hurt your feelings. Sorry. I’m just not a Dungeons & Dragons type girl.)

So how about you folks? Anyone pull any stunts while in the

throes of romantic misery? Fall for someone off-limits? Go full throttle in order to attract the attention of someone who wasn’t noticing you? I’ll pick a name from those of you who respond and send you an autographed copy of Just One of the Guys as a reward for your confession.

Thanks, folks! Looking forward to hearing your stories!

All the best,

Kristan

www.kristanhiggins.com