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Q: Naomi, where did you get the idea for Senses
Working Overtime
Picture this: August 14, 2003, the hottest day of the year
so far. I was standing at a desk in an office building in downtown Detroit
when suddenly the lights went out. "That's funny," said the receptionist
behind the desk, who was talking on the phone. "This woman in Cleveland
said her lights just went out too."
At the time, I thought it was coincidence. Of course, it
turned out not to be coincidence at all, since everyone from New York to Pennsylvania
to Ohio to Michigan and all the way through Ottawa and Toronto lost power
for two days. By the time I finally got home, after driving through a busy,
crazy city with no traffic lights and everyone trying to race back to their
families, I had a mental image that eventually became the first scene in Senses
Working Overtime
Why are they both there? How do they escape? Do they even
get along? That's what I wrote the book to find out!
Q: So your heroine's an army princess? How does that affect
the book?
Kaylee's parents are both in the Army. They're disciplined,
which Kaylee rebels against. She's not only been expelled from school the
previous semester, but she's cut summer make-up classes secretly to come into
the middle of Manhattan on the hottest day of the year. When the lights go
out, she knows she's once again in deep, deep doo-doo . . . and that she has
only seven hours to make it all the way across the world's biggest city before
her dad finds out she's been gone! Each chapter begins with the clock ticking
away toward Kaylee's deadline.
Kaylee's got a lot of grit and drive--she just needs to be
tested to bring it out, and that's why I made her run a giant, city-wide course
with the worst kind of obstacles thrown in her way. The Army background gives
her some advantages too. After a lifetime of running tough obstacle courses
with her dad, walking across a narrow bridge between two buildings six stories
in the air is cake, right?
Q: One of those obstacles is a syndrome Kaylee suffers
from, isn't it
A: Absolutely. She has something rare called synesthesia--not
a disease, not an illness, but a real syndrome in which the brain mixes up
the senses so that it's sometimes hard to tell them apart. Often when Kaylee
hears something, for example, she tastes or smells something at the same time.
The fizzle of the lights going out tastes like sour lemons to her, while Ramon's
voice has the odor of honeysuckle (which is my favorite smell in the world!).
I first learned about the syndrome when I was in high school. In orchestra, there was a girl who sat next to me who experienced musical notes as colors. The more notes, the more colors, all of them different. Sometimes it got a little overwhelming when there was too much coming at her.
And that's part of Kaylee's problem in this book, too. With the blackout,
she's got all kinds of sensory input coming at her from everywhere--sights,
smells, tastes, noises--and it heightens the confusion. She finds she needs
someone else's help to get her home again.
Q: Ramon, right? The strange boy? Tell us about him.
Ramon's a bad boy. A very very bad boy. That's the way he
looks, anyway--scruffy and tough and a little bit scary. Appearances can be
deceiving, though. Ramon's the kind of bad boy every good girl wishes she
could meet. Kaylee begins to find out what a soft heart he has when he talks
about his little sister Rosa, the pride of his life.
In a lot of ways, Kaylee and Ramon are polar opposites. She's
naive, he's street-smart. He's outgoing, she keeps to herself. He's a little
boastful, while she doesn't know her strengths. She's got privileges he can
only dream of. But they're both stubborn and proud and have a common goal,
so it was great fun to watch them first come to terms with each other, and
then begin to fall in love, and then to figure out whether a relationship
is practical, or even something they both want.
It surely doesn't hurt any that Ramon is mighty, mighty easy
on the eyes!
Q: Any other insider gossip on the book?
Oh, I have a few tidbits. Ramon's little sister, Rosa, is
based slightly on my own sister at that age--she had the face of an angel,
but the mouth of a trucker.
The book's title, Senses
Working Overtime
The last time I was in New York City I thought it would be
fun to try to walk the route I'd mapped out for Kaylee and Ramon, just to
see how long it took me. Well, it sounded fun for about three city blocks,
when it started to rain. Then I got distracted by a sale sign in a midtown
store window and gave my credit card a workout instead.
And finally, a general blackout tip that I learned through
(sore) self-experience: don't try to bake cookies on your grill. It only leads
to sorrow and wasted chocolate chips.
Read more about SENSES WORKING OVERTIME!
Good
Luck Spells for the New Year
Celebrity Secrets
Egyptian
Spa-tacuolar Spotlight
Emily's
virtual tour of Paris
Valentine Spotlight
Thanksgiving / Amy Kaye Spotlight
Spotlight on You Are SO Cursed!
Spotlight on My Alternate Life
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