Sales: Matchbox Twenty. Though maybe not Matchbox Twenty, because I would be so overwhelmed I would probably hyperventilate.
Coutts: Probably Bon Iver, but I’d have to break his heart first. Dead: Bob Marley.
Did you ever consider writing under a pen name? If so, what would your name be?
Sales: No. It was too important to me that people who were mean to me in middle school see my name on a book and feel ashamed.
Bodeen: I guess I already write under a pen name. Although I am thinking about making my children refer to me as S.A. instead of Mom…
Where were you when you first were told you sold your first book?
Coutts: I was driving home from my waitressing job. Earlier that night, I had given my two weeks notice, and I had no idea what I was going to do next. I just knew that I needed to be done waitressing for a while. Luckily, I didn’t have to go back!
Meyer: Yes, actually! For years and years I wrote Sailor Moon fanfiction under the name Alicia Blade, and I’d considered publishing under that name too. But then I thought that being next to Stephenie Meyer on bookshelves was too good an opportunity to pass up.
Bodeen: My first was a picture book I sold back in 1996. I was in western Minnesota in our teeny tiny house and it was winter, about twenty below. I was standing in the kitchen looking out at the frozen lake.
How long do you think you’d make it on Survivor?
Bodeen: Depends on where it was. Dry land, I’d do pretty well because I’m scrappy. But I’m not a water person, so as soon as they made me swim, I’d be like “I’m outta here…”
Sales: Like ONE MINUTE. Recently a friend said to me, “Leila, you are the person I know who would die first in the Hunger Games,” and I think that is definitely true.
Meyer: Like, an hour?
Do you have a signed book that is a prized possession?
Meyer: I have many beloved signed books, but I’m not super attached to them, and still loan them out to friends all the time. I think it would have to be a signed Jane Austen or J.K. Rowling to make me super protective of it.
Coutts: I snagged a copy of the new Paul Pope comic, Battling Boy, at BEA. All of my husband’s friends are really worked up about it.
Sales: When I was 15, Dave Barry signed a hardcover of BIG TROUBLE for me. It said, “Leila – stay out of trouble!” And I have tried to do so, with wildly varying degrees of success, ever since.
If you had to wear the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader costume for a solid week, where would you be sure NOT to go?
Meyer: A Dallas Cowboys game. I don’t think I would fare well when compared to the real thing!
Coutts: My house! (We’re pretty serious Patriots fans around here…)
Bodeen: A Green Bay Packer game.
Be sure to join us September 29th at the Austin Convention Center where you can meet all four Fierce Reads authors! Be sure to make time for a Dark Days vs Fierce Reads game show – fun!