20 QUESTIONS WITH: Sarah Blakley Cartwright, author of Red Riding Hood

About the Author

Sarah Blakley-Cartwright is twenty-two years old and is a recent cum laude graduate of Barnard College, the greatest place on earth. She is the recipient of the 2008-2009 Mary Gordon Fiction Scholarship Award and the 2009-2010 Lenore Marshall Barnard Prize for Prose. She grew up in Los Angeles and Mexico. She now lives in New York City and writes in Vancouver, BC. Despite what the book may say, she actually prefers wolves to people.

20 Questions with Sarah Blakely Cartwright

1. Bookmarks or dog ears?
I was taught from early on never to dog ear. Now, even when reading a paperback, I don’t have the heart.

2. Dust jacket on or off when reading a hard back?
On. It’s like a family heirloom: If you don’t use it, you’ll never see it and get no joy from it.

3. Favorite author?
James Agee, for his clear-eyed, unironic depiction of American youth.

4. Favorite genre’?
N/A

5. What is the best book you have read in the last year?
N/A

6. What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
Henry James’s “What Maisie Knew,” which I happen to know is in development now!

7. E books: Friend or foe?
I say, embrace technology! Red Riding Hood is actually Little Brown’s first simultaneous enhanced e-book and print publication. It allows for a new, multisensory form of reading, where the reader can watch a video conversation between me, Catherine (the director), and David (the screenwriter); hear a recording of Catherine reading the introduction to the book; peruse set design blueprints of, photos of the set itself, costume design sketches, and the best of the film’s storyboards. Reading the eBook, you’ll really get a sense of how the world was created on film.

8. Was there a book that inspired you to write?
N/A

9. What are you reading right now?
I’ve been making my way, belatedly, through the New Yorker’s 20 Under 40 short story collection – meaning that all writers on the list are age 40 or under. It’s very inspiring.

10. What is the last book you bought just for the cover?
I can’t say I bought them solely for the covers, but I do love the design of Little, Brown’s “Beautiful Creatures” books. Also, Anna Quindlen’s “Every Last One” is pretty perfect.

11. What is the last book you received in the mail?
I had “The Hunger Games” whispernetted to my Kindle. I’m the last person on earth not to have read it!

12. What is the number of books you own?
Too many. But I recently moved out of college and across country (and bought that Kindle), which I expect will lessen my load.

13. What is the first book you remember reading by yourself as a child?
I remember my first chapter book. My father and I were on a road trip up the East Coast. It was so cold that my hair was frozen. And I’m an L.A. girl, used to 65 degree winters. In a small town, we stopped at a tiny, dusty antique store where I became obsessed with a first-edition Bambi. I guess my dad thought I’d earned it. I read the book that night in our cozy lodge, fireside. I finished it over the next day or so in the backseat of our rental car, all the while imagining the deer asleep and nestled in the frozen countryside we were passing.

14. Do you have a favorite place to read?
Bathtub.

15. What is next for you, publishing-wise?
N/A (in other words, Sarah can't say right now)


16. Do you have a favorite place to write?
Bathtub!

17. Is there a sequel? (asked by my readers)
N/A (Mary: I can only hope!)

18. Who the heck is the wolf? (asked by my readers, but don’t answer if it ruins the book)
Check back into redridinghoodbook.com in March!

19. The last thing you Googled?
“Baby porcupine.” Try it.

20. What makes you cringe?
When a writer confuses “your” and “you’re.” When I confuse “lay” and “lie.” The word “slice” associated with any part of the human body. Any form of eyeball injury. A certain uncategorizable type of spinach. The clanking of silverware, which makes it difficult for me to set the table…

You can find Sarah on Facebook HERE
And on Twitter HERE


Sarah, thank you so much for stopping by today! 

Sarah was also featured in Publisher's Weekly HERE


OK, everyone go pre order that book!  You won't be disappointed.