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 Audio Interview With the Author20-minute audio interview (File could take a minute to load) |
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CITY OF MIRRORS: |
In her days as an actress in movies and television, award-winning author Melodie Johnson Howe had front row access to observe all of Hollywood’s quirks and foibles. Appearing on-screen with such leading men as Clint Eastwood, Alan Alda, and James Caan as the ever-seductive blonde bombshell, she quickly learned just how cut-throat a world the movie business can be. And while she chose to walk away from Hollywood to pursue a career as a writer, the city of glitz and glam never left her. In this AUDIO interview, Melodie talks about her new Hollywood-inspired thriller and her first novel in nearly a decade: CITY OF MIRRORS (Pegasus Books; Hardcover; $24.95). The masterfully written tale focuses on corruption, greed, dysfunctional relationships, and good old fashioned revenge. Diana Poole is a forty-something actress desperate to rebuild her career after years out of the spotlight. Hollywood can be a brutal and unforgiving place for a middle-aged woman, but she is running out of money and acting is the only work she knows. As the daughter of Nora Poole, a recently deceased movie-star, Diana is quite familiar with the cruelty of Hollywood and the lengths people will go to for success. So when an old friend and movie producer offers her a role playing young starlet Jenny Parson’s mother in his next big film, she puts her ego aside and jumps at the opportunity. But an actress should never get her hopes up. Jenny Parson is trouble. Her late night partying and poor work ethic is running the film into the ground and threatening Diana’s big shot at a comeback. Diana’s problems only intensify when she discovers Jenny’s murdered body the day after a heated exchange on set. With more than just her career on the line, Diana decides to fight back and goes in search of Jenny’s killer. An unintentional sleuth, she proves to be quite good—perhaps too good—as her quest to bring the killer to justice also uncovers scandalous secrets about those she holds closest to her heart. It all leads to a shocking conclusion that could only happen in the cutthroat world of Hollywood. “Hollywood is filled with wonderful ghosts for me,” says Howe. “CITY OF MIRRORS is the novel that brings my writing life and my acting life together. Diana Poole is another side of me just as that young actress who now re-runs on television is. But of course neither really is me. They are only reflections in a city of mirrors.” In this interivew Melodie talks about actors and their struggle for identity, about the surprises that awaited her when she turned from acting to writing, and about her publishing experience with Peguasus. |
City of Mirrors by Melodie Howe Portrays Decay of Hollywood
