Book Review from Sarah E. Hyde (author at Elegantly Random) via Amazon.com and GoodReads.com:
Loved is a novel that will strike many familiar chords with any woman who has ever doubted herself, who has ever fallen in love with the wrong man at the wrong time, who has ever had her heart broken. Kim Carlson is easy to root for – she’s pretty, she’s smart and she’s talented, but never pretentious. Her journey from self-doubting teenager to strong, confident woman is relatable and touching. The story covers a lot of bases, from Kim’s first love in high school to her successful career in Nashville ten years later, and readers will feel like they’re paging through someone’s journal – in a good way.
Though it’s intriguing to watch Kim navigate the waters of her changing relationships with men, friends and the God she never stops believing in, the center of the story is her first love, Chase. Chase changes her forever and permeates every single relationship that comes later, as first loves often do. I found myself nodding my head so many times, pausing to highlight portions of the story that resonated so deeply for me. Chase is so right for Kim in that he understands her and completes her, but they have massive barriers to overcome in terms of their life trajectories. Most women have had this experience at some point or another and it’s always an exhilarating and painful ride.
Kim is the light to Chase’s dark soul, and they fit together beautifully but can’t seem to get the timing right. Kim says soon after meeting Chase, “I always believed I was a happy person with a sad soul…Somehow, without having experienced what he had, his scars resonated with me.” Kim has to make some really difficult decisions about how to chase her dreams, which involves moving 600 miles away, while finding a way to keep Chase in her life. Choosing herself and her dream is often hard, but it’s integral to her ultimate transformation from girl to woman.
Kimberly Novosel is a promising writer, willing and able to delve deep into her heart’s core and share what’s painful and true about love and life. That fearlessness is what keeps you turning the pages, wanting to hear her next observation, waiting for the next sentence that’s so honest you’ll want to scribble it in your journal to remember it later. Though much of her novel feels like a memoir and the plot covers a lot of ground, there are moments when Novosel pauses to really paint a picture, and it’s gorgeous when she does. My favorite moment in the entire novel: “I tucked the Camel coupon from his cigarette pack into my pocket, a souvenir of the moment where he said maybe. I would hold on to his maybe for as long as it would take, even forever.” Having held on to a few maybes in my life, I can relate. Well done, Kimberly Novosel.
Kimberly Novosel was voted one of Nashville’s Best Local Authors in the Nashville Scene’s “Best of Nashville” readers’ poll. Thank you all for your votes!
Book Review by Libby Bruno at The Libspot:
I have been one of the few very lucky people in this world to read Loved in it’s very early stages and I couldn’t be more excited for it’s publication. This book, written over many years by (author) Kimberly Novosel, was so incredibly truthful. I found I couldn’t keep my greedy little hands off of it. It was truly one of those “I can’t put it down and want to read all the time and when I’m not reading it I’m thinking about it” phenomena that I relish. I found that I related so much to the main character. I toogrew up in a small town, I too had big dreams, I too let myself fall in and out of love with men who not only didn’t get me, but certainlydidn’t deserve me, or treat me by any means the way a good woman should be treated. Men that consistently confused me, let me down, and I kept going back for more. I’ve also had those beautiful men in my past that left a permanent stamp on my heart. That will be forever missed, created an everlasting void, and will never replicated identically in another. Dearest Loved, please give me another page to read, please tell me how the story ends, but yet please don’t let it be over. After all, it felt like my story, and I was hungry to know how I would turn out.
Q&A with Books, Tea, and Me:
Almost everyone I know has said at one point in their lives that they want to write a novel. But hardly anyone ever does. The world is brimming with untold stories, but thankfully, Loved is one story we will soon have the chance to read, relish and remember.
Kimberly Novosel recently shared her thoughts with A Novel Place regarding her upcoming novel, anxiously awaiting the day all her hard work can finally be realized and enjoyed by those looking for a novel that will speak to them. Not only is this young woman gifted with words, but she has the ability to bring forth those raw emotions and challenges we all face growing up into a new light with a fresh perspective on that classic coming-of-age story.
I had the opportunity to speak with Kimberly about her life, her favourite things, her fears and her passions, and I hope you are just as intrigued about Loved as I am!
Let’s start at the very beginning… What moment in your life made you really stop and think “I should write a novel about this”? Was there one particular event or a combination of events?
In general, I was fascinated by the way that people come and go in our lives, how not everyone we get close to remains in our present, but each person has an impact. Positive or negative, always an impact. Specifically, one person I lost was very special to me. He really defined who I am as a person. This story started out as his story, then I realized I was really saying so much more. (Disclaimer: Find out who this person is in my next interview with her in a couple of months!)
When you first decided to write Loved, what were your initial fears? What did your support system (friends, family, coworkers, peers, etc.) say about your goal? What challenges did you meet while writing Loved? What was surprisingly easy for you?
I didn’t have any fears at first because I was only writing for myself. If no one else is going to read something, there’s nothing to be afraid of. Little by little, I started to want other people to read it and feedback from friends and some friends-of-friends was positive, which encouraged me to keep going and put it out there. Now I have fears!
I read a quote somewhere about how writers hate to write but love to have written. That couldn’t be truer. I love the feeling of reading something back and being so excited about what you’ve accomplished. Sitting down to write can be challenging. The hardest part of the whole process is editing. Once you have written the story, the last thing you want to do is go through it with a fine toothed comb and rewrite and rewrite and move commas around. That was agony!
Why do you believe Loved is a story that needs to be told?
I wish someone had told me at seventeen, or twenty, or even twenty-five that I wasn’t alone in my struggles and heartache, or encouraged me about the woman who I would become, in words that I would understand. Those messages come from parents, teachers, pastors and they don’t really sink in. In our young adult lives we tend to feel really isolated from most of the world and from our future selves. Life isn’t that hard. These young women need a new way to look at things and I’m hoping this story speaks to them in a way they really hear.
Without giving the whole story away, in 50 words exact summarize Loved… And go!
Kimberly leaves her small town to chase big dreams of working in the entertainment industry, falling in love, all the beautiful things life has in store. She’s hit hard by loneliness, heartbreak, and the disappointment that things don’t always work out ideally. She has to learn to manage the letdowns.
Wow, spot on! Nicely done! Okay, now moving away a bit from Loved because I want to get to know the person behind the novel… Other than writing, what are some of your hobbies and interests?
I love to travel — Portland and Las Vegas are favourites. I’m taking my first trip to Mexico later this year and I’m really excited about that. I also try to stay really active. I love yoga and kickboxing, and I’m hoping to find an adult ballet class. Ballet is one of the things from my youth that I miss! Planning events is also something I love, whether for work or for fun. My two best friends and I founded a charity event planning group called Giving Back is the New Black, through which we host events for charities that we’re passionate about, like young adult cancer advocacy and various issues in Africa.
Describe your perfect day.
Let’s do this schedule style!
7:00am: Waking up in New York in an apartment that I love, checking in with my assistant and answering emails and phone calls in my pj’s, drinking coffee.
10:30 am: Working out and making lunch.
12:00pm: Getting dressed up for client meetings and generally being a marketing/PR rock star.
6:00pm: drinks or dinner with friends.
9:00pm: Reading or writing at home unless I have an event. Hopefully eventually someone I love will be there when I get home.
11:00pm: Bedtime.
As you can see, this lady is a delight to speak with and her debut novel will definitely be making an impact on young women everywhere. I actually can’t describe how excited I am to read her novel, and I hope this has peaked your interest as well. She has created a Kickstart campaign to get her novel printed, so please click on this link to find out more. I’ve already pledged money and I hope you do too! Let’s help Loved kick off from the ground running.
Q&A with BooksandBowelMovements.com:
Earlier this week I had the loveliest chat with new author Kimberly Novosel. I feel like her last name pretty much explains why she’s a novelist since it seems a distant twin to the word itself. She’s the author of upcoming book,Loved and has created aKickstarter campaign to get the book printed. Normally, I’m a snob about self-publishing and prefer publishing houses and agents, but the theme of her novel, Loved, is dear to my heart. You’ve all heard me rant about self-esteem, usually in the young adult genre, but Novosel has written a novel dedicated to struggling women in their twenties.
We did a quick Q&A from questions I pondered while reading her bio and learning about Lovedthrough the Kickstarter campaign. I feel like everyone at readings always asked, “What inspired you to write?” or “What do you recommend to young writers?” Instead of asking these questions, I asked questions about Novosel’s own upbringing and how it influenced her writing as well as how other authors have influenced her. Read our Q&A below:
How has being a small town girl gone big city shaped your writing? What did the small town give to you as gifts for writing, and what did the city give? And with this what are your favorite writers from both places and landscapes?
Audrey Niffenegger, who wrote The Time Travelers Wife and Her Fearful Symmetry, is from South Haven, Michigan and has lived near Chicago most of her life. A small town to a big city, like me. I think in these cases the small town develops a unique kind of imagination, learning to fill the quiet with your own thoughts. Living in a bigger city as an adult helps to surround you with more stimulation, more fodder for stories, new ideas and personalities and backdrops. Nicole Krauss, who wrote The History of Love, was born in Manhattan and lives in Brooklyn, where I live now. If you readThe History of Love, her deeply rooted knowledge of the city and the people who come to live there is apparent. I think both can develop strengths in a writer in their own way. What matters most is that the best writers write what they know.
What were some of your favorite mystery books as a girl in Pittsburgh and did this shape Loved?
I read a lot of Nancy Drew books and ghost stories, though the names escape me now. I loved that stuff! The little girl who is haunted by the girl who lived in the old house before her. One favorite from those days is Ouida Sebestyen’s The Girl in the Box, about a girl who is kidnapped and held underground in a dirt hole with nothing but a little bit of food, water, and a typewriter. I’ve obviously never been afraid of darker material, even as a pre-teen. I also liked some fantasy stuff like A Wrinkle in Time, The Phantom Tollbooth and The Giver, which I recommend even to adults.
Why did you decide to self-publish Loved rather than shop around for agents and publishing houses?
My goal is just to put the book out there into the hands of readers. I’d love to be published on a large scale, but that wasn’t my immediate goal. First I want to see how it does, what kind of impact it has. Maybe big publishing will happen with this book or maybe the next one, as I continue to grow as a writer.
How did you come to novel writing? Have you tried poetry, short fiction and other genres before ultimately writing Loved?
My earliest memory of writing is changing the words from the willow tree poem in the movie “My Girl”, and then writing new lyrics to Mariah Carey melodies. I was probably ten or twelve. Then I started to write my own poetry. That turned into writing lyrics with musician friends at Belmont University, and then I jumped right into the process of starting this book. I’d love to do short stories eventually, for literary magazines or my own full collection.
How did you come to the title, “Loved?”
Coming up with a title was one of the most stressful parts of writing this book. There was one title in the beginning, and as a different theme began to emerge I came to a second title and stuck with that one a good while. In the end I felt there was a better fit, and in the absence of coming up with the perfect clever title, I landed on Loved. I just kept coming back to that word. It just felt right to me, summing up the theme and evoking the right emotion, so I had to go with succinct over poetic.
What is your favorite quote from Loved and from literature?
From literature…oh how to choose! I love so much of the mother’s dialog in White Oleander. She’s such a fascinating character to me. She has this one rant in which she says, “If you expect to find people who will understand you, you will grow murderous with disappointment. The best you’ll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want, and not let the cattle stand in your way.” She’s practically evil but sometimes what she says rings true. Fascinating! I don’t know the exact quote for this, but in The Private Lives of Pippa Lee by Rebecca Miller, a young Pippa follows a man she’s attracted to down the street and into a café. In such a short time, she imagines their future together, and when he leaves with out speaking to her, she’s heartbroken. That is amazing writing.
This is one of my favorite quotes from Loved:
“The thing about secrets is that they can hurt you more than the person you’re keeping them from. It’s like eating the last piece of caramel candy, a delicacy for you alone to experience. You hold it on your tongue, savoring the layers of salty sweetness. It makes you so happy while it rots your teeth.”
If you could tell women struggling with self-esteem or self-discovery, what would you say? With this can you give book recommendations for girls or women dealing with these struggles.
Forget what’s normal or what’s expected of you and decide for yourself. Are you talking to yourself respectfully? Are you listening to yourself and what it is that you need? For example, I need more alone time than most people do, and when I thought that was weird or that I was acting out of fear and not health by isolating myself, it actually caused me to be unhealthy. Now I know it’s ok for me to take that time that I need, and it makes me better around people when I am social. Write your own rules.
I suggest coming of age stories or stories of survival rather than the typical self-help books. Study others’ stories of growing and overcoming and you’ll start to recognize your own. Alice Sebold’s Lucky, Terri Jentz’s Strange Piece of Paradise, Jeanette Walls’ The Glass Castle, (all adult) Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep(adult or young adult).
What is your six word memoir?
“Present or absent, love moves me.”
The Ooh La La Life 