Allison Rushby

Featured Book Interview - February 2005

In this site-exclusive interview, Allison Rushby reveals how she got international book publicity for her holiday tie-in novel, Hating Valentine’s Day.

1. Which came first for you when you thought up Hating Valentine's Day: the idea to use the holiday as a ticking clock, or Liv's phobia of the day?

Most definitely Liv's phobia of the day. I was sitting on the couch watching A Christmas Carol one Christmas Eve (as you do – I'm sure it's a Christmas Eve 'the shops are open till midnight you know!' ruse by retailers to make you feel like Scrooge, drop everything as soon as the movie's over and you've shed a few tears for Tiny Tim and rush out to the shops waving your credit card) and this is when the thought occurred to me that Scrooge chose the wrong holiday. I mean, Valentine's Day is way, way worse than Christmas. Everyone seems to have a terrible Valentine's Day, whether they're single, dating someone or married. Even Easter's worse – trying to keep away from all that chocolate (like I could ever do that!). And then there's Secretaries' Day and… oh, the list goes on and on.

2. What kind of promotions are you and your publisher doing around the theme of Hating Valentine's Day?

Quite a few things as it turns out. I've established a way for readers to have a vent about their own worst Valentine's Day on my web-site for a start. On the Australian front, Harlequin have been fantastic, placing ads in magazines, hiring the best Australian publicist I've ever had, whipping booksellers up into a buying frenzy and getting a photographer to take some ultra cheesy rose-snapping and heart-shaped balloon popping pics which I love! They've really given me an extra push this time around and for that I'm more grateful than they'll ever know. I'm also really excited about Hating Valentine's Day being released in the USA, because I spent a large wodge of my advance on hiring an independent publicist in NYC (Carol Fass) and she's working wonders already. Carol and her staff have gone to amazing lengths to get Hating Valentine's Day noticed.

3. In the US you have chick-lit novels out with both the Red Dress Ink and the Strapless imprints. Do these imprints have a difference in tone?

This is hard to say because RDI is really my 'home', while Strapless simply bought the US rights to my first novel, allmenarebastards.com, which was initially published in Australia in 2000 (it was re-titled Friday Night Cocktails for the US market). Thus, I haven't had much contact with Strapless, but have made myself comfy at RDI. Also, most of the Strapless books don't seem to be available in Australia, so I can't really comment on the tone.

4. Can you tell us about any works in progress we can look forward to?

Well, I always have another book in the works! I have books lined up with RDI for 2006 and 2007 (tentatively titled Mad About Moo and The Inner Gentleman). I've also been working on a Young Adult trilogy and finished writing the first book in the series this year. My agent is shopping it around as I type.

5. Any advice for new chick lit writers?

There are no rules. Write what you want to write, have a great time doing it and hopefully give someone else a fun read in the process. At the end of the day all any editor wants is a (legible) rollicking good story. Fonts, margins, envelopes and the setting don't really matter if that editor can't stop turning those pages and her sides hurt from laughing too much!

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