Top 3 FAQ about my upcoming novel: The Meeting Point
Dear readers,
First of all: thank you for all the early love for my sophomore love story: The Meeting Point!
I am, as always, in awe of your generosity and support. It’s wonderful to see so many of you requesting an early digital copy via NetGalley and to get all your lovely messages on social and via email. I’m always excited to see your posts and reviews popping up in my feed and I am so happy you’re loving Maya’s story. I know I adored spending all this time with her and her mystery ride share driver and I was and still am so thrilled to share it with you all and can’t wait for September!
Weeks after it went live on NetGalley, The Meeting Point is still in top 5 most requested (wow, that’s awesome!) and I’ve seen it quite a few times trending on Amazon and other vendor websites in hot releases in the US, UK, Canada and Australia. happy dance. Thank you so much for pre-ordering! It means so much to me!!
With more and more people discovering it every day, I’ve been receiving quite a few questions from early readers about the story, so I thought I’d start with 3 most common questions.
Was it on purpose for the reader to figure out the ‘twist’ before Maya did? Were you concerned it would take away from the enjoyment of the story?
That’s a great question! Without giving anything away, let’s just say that the early reviewers who compared The Meeting Point with You’ve Got Mail and Sleepless in Seattle have the answer:) When I start writing a new story, I see it unfolding, almost as a movie…I guess every writer has their quirks (or their methods) and this is mine. I see the story from beginning to the end credits as if I was at the cinema (oh, I miss those days!). And yes, one of my all time favorites, You’ve Got Mail (don’t ask how many times I watched it…LOL) is probably the closest to The Meeting Point in terms of ‘vibe’. You, as the person watching, know what’s going on…while Meg’s character will put 2 and 2 together at the end (although maybe she had an inkling or the hope for a while). Now, truth be told, I don’t believe I did this on purpose from the first page; it was my subconscious at work and as the story advanced I quickly realized this was the way to go and I’m happy it worked out like that. The story is as much about finding love as it is about the journey (and I’m not just talking about the few thousand miles between NY and CA), about taking chances, discovering yourself and what you want, about making changes to your life even if they might seem risky or crazy in your pursuit of happiness, and last but not least…about finding home.
And just like Maya, I knew I was taking a bit of a risk…letting readers in to figure out things before the main character gets a chance to, but I’d hoped that wouldn’t take anything away from it…and in fact, it’ll add to it. Knowing what Kathleen Kelly didn’t know made the story so much more enjoyable for me and it made me even more invested in her HEA! (time for me to make some popcorn and watch it again haha).
So, if you figure out the ‘twist’ before Maya does, be patient with her, give her space and time to get to where she need to, on her own terms, and enjoy the journey to love, laughter and back again! And if you don’t, that’s OK too, then just go along for the ride through her eyes and experience everything with her! Either way, I hope this rom com will make you smile, maybe let out an ‘awww’ here and there, perhaps pack your bags for a weekend in Carmel and even believe that love can really happen in the most unexpected ways…
Is the location in Meeting Point a real place? And why did you pick this one?
This is a simple one! Yes! It is real although it seems like a fairy tale town. It’s amazing and magical and absolutely perfect. Carmel-by-the-Sea is a small town in Monterey Bay (Northern California) and it is my go-to (ours, as a family) ever since we’ve moved to California. We’ve spent countless days here, watching the sunrise, the sunset, walking around, going to the beach, going in and out of cute little stores, having dinner, eating ice cream on a bench while people watching. It’s a slice of heaven and I hope I made it justice in the Meeting Point. I chose it because well, it’s my favorite place on the West Coast and as different as it can be from NYC where I’ve also spent quite a lot of time in the last ten years. It’s a town filled with art and artists, it’s relaxed and happy and colorful and dreamy and it’s the place I call my home away from home…and it was quite fitting for Maya to fall in love with it too, just as much as I did.
Is this a story about instalove? Some readers have mixed feelings about the trope…
I actually quite like this question. Is there an insta love moment in The Meeting Point? If insta love is falling for someone at first ‘insert word’ then yes. Is that what the story is about? No. Not in my mind, at least:)
I’ll say this about insta love. I believe in love at first sight. Wholeheartedly. My parents fell in love at first sight and were married a month later. My story with my husband is very similar. Many of my friends found ‘the one’ the same way. It is something that’s very close to my heart for these reasons. Of course, from falling in love to loving with all your heart…there’s a journey and most of the time it’s not a simple, straightforward one. I also believe you can have an instant connection with someone you’ve never seen face to face and that connection can last a lifetime (whether you end up meeting in person or not). With that being said, Maya’s story starts in a way with a meet-cute (text-cute?), insta love but it’s so much more than that, just like every love story is. And there’s of course another meet-cute moment, which I will let you discover if you haven’t read the book yet. One is about Maya falling for someone without seeing them, the other is the opposite. Both moments are life changing…and actually there is a chapter where Maya discusses the instalove concept:)
Needless to say, I am a hopeless and unapologetic romantic. If you’ve read my debut, you know that. And when I set out to write a story, I don’t think about the tropes, to be honest: friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, slow burn, star-crossed, insta love. For me, it’s about the characters’ journeys, how people come into your life in surprising ways. Some to stay for a while, some to stay forever. And all of them change you, and you change them. Because I write love stories, a lot of these relationships are romantic, but not all. Some are friendships and that instant connection is something you can have with both your friends and with the person who is ‘the one’.
If you’re not a fan of the insta love trope, I’d say…give The Meeting Point a chance. Based on the early reviews, I’d say this story might just end up surprising you! ❤️
Next time I’ll answer:
What inspired you to write ‘The Meeting Point’?
Someday in Paris is set in the 50s-70s. The Meeting Point is set in 2018/2019. Why so different? Are you writing historical love stories or contemporary?
Are any of the characters in ‘The Meeting Point’ based on real people?