I’ve been tagged for the The Next Big Thing Blog Hop by Terry Kirby Erickson, a North Carolina poet. She sent me some questions about my book, which I’ve answered below. Scroll down to see the next three writers I’ve tagged and read about their current writing projects. For those who like to read about dream work, never fear–I’ll be posting about dreams very soon.
1) What is the working title of your book? It’s called Three Cubic Feet, which is a line from “One-Man Guy,” a song written by Loudon Wainwright III and recorded (separately) by Loudon and his son, Rufus Wainwright.
2) Where did the idea come from for the book? My family went to Florida for spring break one year with several other families. One of the only teenagers on the trip was the son of a friend of mine. The main character is based (very loosely) on this teenager. I called him Theo in homage to a story I read of Stephen Elliott’s, “Stalking Gracie.” I wanted to write about the friend I imagined “Theo” was missing back home, and as I mapped more unique characteristics onto Theo (and he became less like the real teenager in Florida), I realized he was in love with the friend back home.
3) What genre does your book fall under? Fiction.
4) Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie version of your book? 
A young Eddie Redmayne for Theo and a young James Franco for Jonathan. Step-mom: Emily Mortimer. Dad: Phillip Seymour Hoffman.
5) What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? Great love requires great risk.
6) Is your book self-published, published by an independent publisher, or represented by an agent? It’s published by a small press in North Carolina called Main Street Rag.
7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? Three years.
8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? A writer friend compared it to In One Person by John Irving. I’ve never read anything like my book, which is why I felt compelled to write it.
9) Who or what inspired you to write this book? I was in a graduate fiction workshop at University of Missouri. We were working through a round of stories that I didn’t like, so I promised myself that my next story was going to be about a character I really liked (Theo), set in a place I really loved (Florida and the Ozark Mountains).
10) What else about your book might pique a readers’s interest? 
While writing the first draft of the book, I took a playwriting class. I had to stop working on the novel because I was so busy with school, but when I realized I had to write a full-length play for my class, I decided to use the four main characters from the book. I didn’t know the ending of the book yet, but I found it – and I found out a lot more about my characters – by writing the play about them. It’s called The Lad Sketches, and it was performed at The Blue Note in Columbia, Missouri, in 2007.
Thanks for reading my slice of The Next Big Thing Blog Hop. Next up…
Daniel Davis (Dumpster Chicken Music)
Mary Maddox (Ancient Children)
Want to hear Rufus sing “One-Man Guy” with his dad and sisters, Martha and Lucy? Check this out…