And the story changed again.... by Brenda Janowitz

One summer, when I was single, Grandma Dorothy informed me that she would be renting a house in the Hamptons. No more of these silly share houses I was doing with my friends each summer. They were getting me nowhere (read: still single and over thirty). Instead, I was to stay with her and she would help me meet someone. The only problem with this scenario was that I was sure she’d meet a man before I did. She had sparkling crystal blue eyes and a killer figure. My own hazel eyes and good birthing hips were no match for her easy glamour and style.

When she found out that a Hamptons summer rental costs more than the gross national product of some countries, the idea sort of fell apart. But it gave me an idea—what if a young woman spent the summer out in the glamorous Hamptons with her even more glamorous grandmother?

The idea for my third novel was born.  It would be called RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, and it would feature an impossibly glamorous grandmother and her not-as-glamorous granddaughter.

Both of my own grandmothers really inspired me to come up with the character of Vivienne, the glamorous widow six times over. Neither was a widow six times over, but both of my grandmothers were very glamorous ladies. When I think of my childhood memories, I’m not likely to picture them in aprons baking cookies. I picture them in evening gowns.

I began to write.  My first two novels would be classified as “chick lit,” which is to say they’re smart, funny novels with heart about a single girl living in the city. And that’s exactly what I was at the time. But just as I’ve grown up, my writing has grown up, too.

RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE is different from my first two novels in so many ways. In my first two books, I was really focused on writing a funny story. The sort of book that would make you embarrass yourself in the subway from laughing (I’ve gotten that email from numerous readers and it makes me smile each time someone tells me that!). The sort of book that could make you forget your problems for an afternoon (two different people read my second novel while getting chemo and told me that it helped them to keep a smile on their faces through an awful situation). The sort of book that’s just meant to be read on a plane, or a bus, or a beach (you could also read them on a subway, on a train, or by a lake. I don’t discriminate.).

With RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, I was looking to do something different. Something more grown up. Something deeper. The idea for the book—a granddaughter and her grandmother out in the Hamptons for the summer—was originally played for laughs. Much was made of the fact that the grandmother meets a man before her granddaughter does.  But the book changed.

I did the first major overhaul of the novel while I was pregnant with my first son. Everything was different for me—I was changing as a person, my voice was changing, and so, too, did this novel. I began thinking more deeply about the ties that bind mothers and children, grandmothers and grandchildren. How we hurt each other. How we can forgive. What that means.

When I was six months pregnant and almost finished writing the book, my mother was rushed to the hospital for emergency open-heart surgery. It was the most harrowing 24 hour period of my life (until I had kids, but that’s another story entirely), and even though my mother made a full recovery, it took me a long time to recover myself. It was the same time that I was writing a death scene for RECIPE and it was impossible to write. I was still so scared from almost losing my mother. I wrote it quickly, tried to get through it quickly, and one of my first readers, author Lynda Curnyn, called me out on it. She told me that this wasn’t the time to write a death scene. I needed time away from it. I needed to heal. I needed to process.

She was right. It took me another year until I was able to get the scene right. And the book changed again.

RECIPE became another book entirely, and I’m happy about that.  I’m always happy to follow the story, see where characters lead me, get lost in the craft of writing.




I’m the author of SCOT ON THE ROCKS, JACK WITH A TWIST, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, and THE LONELY HEARTS CLUB.  My short story, HOLLYWOOD PUNCH, will be released on September 2nd.


My work’s also appeared in the New York Post and Publisher’s Weekly. You can find me at brendajanowitz.com or on Twitter at @BrendaJanowitz.

RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE by Brenda Janowitz

My third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, came out yesterday.  And I'm feeling a million different emotions all at once: excitement, fear, happiness, joy, terror.... you name it.

It's not the first time that I've had a book come out.  In fact, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE is my third novel.  But there's something about putting your work out there into the universe for all to see.  

And judge.

I was recently chatting with a memoir writer about how we put ourselves out there as writers.  I was telling her that I found it brave, the way she was able to tell the truth.  But then I thought about it: isn't that what we do as fiction writers as well?  Sure, I won't have family members coming to me to complain about the way they were portrayed in my novel, but aren't we truth tellers, too?  Aren't we trying to tell the world what we think, how we think, and how we process it all?

RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE is about three generations of women with a culture all their own.  When Hannah finds herself spending the summer with her glamorous grandmother, a widow six times over, at her sprawling beach-front Hamptons estate, she learns that there’s more than one recipe for happiness. 

A story of mothers and daughters, grandmothers and grandchildren, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE is a quirky story about correcting the mistakes from your past and trying to create a future for yourself. 

Julie Buxbaum called it "a great summer read" and Ellen Meister said it was a "wise, tender and poignant story." Melissa Senate said "this gem of a novel sneaks up on you with just how powerful it truly is."

It's the most personal book I've written to date.  It is, at its core, about how I see the world, what I think about relationships.  It reflects who I am now, the person I've become, and it's terrifying to think that I've put that out there, for all the world to see.

I just hope you will all enjoy it.

I’m the author of SCOT ON THE ROCKS and JACK WITH A TWIST. My third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, was published by St. Martin's on July 2, 2013. My work’s also appeared in the New York Post and Publisher’s Weekly. You can find me at brendajanowitz.com or on Twitter at @BrendaJanowitz.

T Minus 29 days

The last time I had a novel out, it was 2008.  Since that time, I've gotten married, moved out to the suburbs, and had two kids.  So, you could say I've been busy.  But since that time, the publishing landscape has changed-- bookstores are disappearing before our eyes, book reviews are practically a thing of the past, and anyone can publish a book by simply clicking a few times over on Amazon.

Through all of this, I continued to write.  And my agent sold my third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, to St. Martin's in a two book deal, while I was in the hospital with my second son.  To say I was excited is an understatement.

RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE is about three generations of women with a culture all their own.  When Hannah finds herself spending the summer with her glamorous grandmother, a widow six times over, at her sprawling beach-front Hamptons estate, she learns that there’s more than one recipe for happiness.  

A story of mothers and daughters, grandmothers and grandchildren, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE is a quirky story about correcting the mistakes from your past and trying to create a future for yourself. 

It's a book that was inspired by my own grandmothers, and very much informed by my own journey into motherhood.  It's deeply personal, and I think it says quite a lot about where I am in my life right now.

When you sell a book to a large publishing house, it takes about 18 months for the book to be on shelves.  Since my book screams "summer"-- the setting, the gorgeous cover-- the pub date was important, so it will actually be a full two years from the time I got my deal until the book hits shelves.

And we are now at T Minus 29 days.  29 days until my baby (my third baby in every sense of that expression) sees the light of day.  29 days until I put myself out there, completely bare, for all the world to judge.  29 days until I find out if anyone likes the book-- if it means as much to anyone out there as it does to me.

It's my third time having a book published, but every time it's the same: you're scared, you're excited, you're thanking your lucky stars that you even got a book deal and you can feel all of these conflicting emotions all at once.

So, for the next 29 days it's just that: I'll feel scared, I'll feel excited, but most of all, I'll just feel lucky.

I’m the author of SCOT ON THE ROCKS and JACK WITH A TWIST. My third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, will be published by St. Martin's on July 2, 2013. My work’s also appeared in the New York Post and Publisher’s Weekly. You can find me at brendajanowitz.com or on Twitter at @BrendaJanowitz.

When EB White talks, I listen by Brenda Janowitz

One of the things I'm most often asked about the writer's life is my writing schedule.

I've heard all about this mystical "writing schedule."  In fact, I hear all the time about writers who have one-- they wake up every day at 5 am and write until 7.  Or they sit down and don't get up until they've written 1,000 words.  Or they go to writers colonies and hammer out entire books in the span of a month.

I envy those writers.  I really do.  I wish I could have such discipline.  But I don't.  Because the thing is, the thing that no one ever wants to hear, is that I don't have a writing schedule.  What I do is write whenever I can and as much as I can.  Simple as that.

My life is filled with little kids running underfoot, and carpools, and figuring out what to put on the table for dinner.  (Wow, I sound really glamorous, don't I!?)  I try to make the most of those times in between.  The few hours I have between dropping my son off and nursery school and pick up.  Whatever precious time I get if and when the kids nap.  A quiet evening here or there when the kids are in bed and my husband's stuck at work.

I wrote my entire first novel in the space in between.  When I got home from work early, when I had time on weekends, on lunch breaks.  I'd edit while riding the subway downtown, on the bus crosstown, on the Long Island Rail Road on trips to see my family.  And it worked.  Sure, it took longer than if I'd been writing every day until I hit the 1,000 word mark, but that wasn't my life.  So I fit the writing into the life I had then.  And I still do the same-- I fit the writing into the life I've got now.

EB White said "A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper."

Words to live by.



I’m the author of SCOT ON THE ROCKS and JACK WITH A TWIST. My third novel, RECIPE FOR A HAPPY LIFE, will be published by St. Martin's on July 2, 2013. My work’s also appeared in the New York Post and Publisher’s Weekly. You can find me at brendajanowitz.com or on Twitter at @BrendaJanowitz.