Cats, squirrels, monkeys, Law & Order reruns, superheroes, my iPod, ghost stories, book geeks, clothes, shoes, lip gloss, pizza, New Jersey diners, wicked stepmothers, coffee, solo road trips, NPR, the ocean, cephalopods, talking to myself, stargazer lilies, regime change, dancing, reading, and writing (or, more accurately, having written)
Music
Ani DiFranco, Tori Amos, Dresden Dolls, Sleator-Kinney, Kate Bush, Stars, Franz Ferdinand, Tegan and Sara, Garbage, Annie Lennox, The Killers, Ben Folds, B-52s, PJ Harvey, The Cure, Frou Frou (Imogen Heap), Cake, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Pizzicato Five, Cibo Matto
I also like:
Aretha Franklin, India Arie, Jill Scott, Melissa Etheridge, Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, Carly Simon, Carole King, Johnny Cash, Dar Williams, Bonnie Raitt, Etta James, Ella Fitzgerald, Mahalia Jackson, Cole Porter tunes
...some cheesy disco (Abba, KC and the Sunshine Band, Bee Gees)
...a little bit of dance and a littler bit of house
...big band (Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman)
salsa
samba
tango
and a million other things.
Movies
Rear Window, Memento, Jaws, Pride & Prejudice (1995 version), Persuasion, Sense & Sensibility, The Incredibles, Run Lola Run, Thelma & Louise, Casablanca, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Adaptation, Pulp Fiction, High Fidelity, Say Anything, Sixteen Candles, L.A. Confidential, Fight Club, A Room with a View, The Others, Spiderman, The Ring, Chocolat, Amelie, Garden State, Wallace & Gromit, Indiana Jones, X-men, Princess Bride, This is Spinal Tap, Waiting for Guffman, The Maltese Falcon, Gaslight, Shakespeare in Love, Lost in Translation, Out of Sight, Grizzly Man, Fahrenheit 911, Strictly Ballroom, Lord of the Rings, Flirting with Disaster
Television
Veronica Mars, The Simpsons, detective shows, Sex and the City, Six Feet Under, Project Runway, TLC’s What Not to Wear, BBC’s Coupling, ballroom competitions on PBS
Books
YA/Kids
The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, Can You Sue Your Parents for Malpractice, The Blue Castle, James and the Giant Peach, everything by Judy Blume, everything by Robin McKinley, The Westing Game, The Shadow Thieves, The Bartimaeous Trilogy, The Thief and sequels (Megan Whalen Turner), The Abhorsen Trilogy, The Golden Compass, Harry Potter, Speak, The Eye, the Ear, and the Arm, The House of the Scorpion, Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Shattering Glass, The Boyfriend List, A Great and Terrible Beauty, Sahara Special, A Bad Boy Can Be Good For a Girl, Saving Francesca, Thou Shalt Not Dump the Skater-Dude, Looking for Alaska, I am the Cheese, Everything on a Waffle, Rats Saw God, Feed
Picture Book Favs
Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, The Stupids, Martha Speaks, Officer Buckle and Gloria, Many Moons by Thurber (long for a children’s book but absolutely hilarious and fun to read aloud).
Adult:
Pride & Prejudice, Persuasion, Sense & Sensibility, Jane Eyre, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, The Scarlet Letter, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, I Capture The Castle, The Handmaid’s Tale, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Waiting for Godot, The collected poems of E.E. Cummings, Fool on the Hill, Set This House in Order, Michael Connelly mysteries, Jeffrey Deaver mysteries, Elizabeth George mysteries, Dennis Lehane my-okay, you get the point, a lot of mysteries, Feast of Love, The History of Love, Amy & Isabelle, Winter’s Tale (Helprin, not Shakespeare), The Tempest (Shakespeare), High Fidelity, Generation Ex, The Virgin Suicides, Running with Scissors, The Glass Castle, Woman: An Intimate Geography, How We Die, Attenborough’s Life on Earth, A Natural History of the Senses, Broadsides from the Other Orders, Misery, The Bestseller, stories by Lorrie Moore and John Cheever, White Noise, The Corrections (audio version), The Intuitionist, The Midwife’s Tale, Spilling Clarence
I’m sure there are dozens and dozens that I can’t think of right now…
Heroes
Librarians, teachers, readers, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and Cat Woman.
About me: I write books for kids, teens and adults. My kids' books include Lily’s Ghosts, nominated for an Edgar Award for Best Juvenile Mystery, The Wall and the Wing (nominated for ALA's Best Books for Young Adults and a New York Public Library's Books for the Teenage), and the sequel to The Wall and the Wing, The Chaos King. I also have an essay in the forthcoming anthology Everything I Learned About Being a Girl I Learned From Judy Blume.
Good Girls was an ALA Quick Pick, a New York Public Library Book for the Teen Age, a fall 2006 Book Sense Pick, one of Reading Rants' Top Ten Books of 2006 and a Cynsational Book of 2006. It was called "Judy Blume's Forever for savvy and sophisticated 21st century readers..." by Michael Cart, uber-librarian, "Harrowing, honest, poignant, and wickedly funny..." by the amazing Libba Bray, and "...a page turner that tells a powerful truth about girls and about our culture," by Chris Crutcher.
I also wrote the adult book, I'm Not Julia Roberts. Before you ask, I'm Not Julia Roberts is NOT about Julia Roberts. It's a collection of interconnected short stories about blended families, I'm Not Julia Roberts
People magazine called I'm Not Julia Roberts "...mordant, well-observed. Ruby makes hilariously, heart-wrenchingly clear that breaking up is hard to do." Redbook said, "When it comes to emotional baggage, the extended clan in I'm Not Julia Roberts by Laura Ruby needs a full set to carry all their issues. This hilarious story of blended-family tumult will make you see your own brood in an entirely new light." The Miami Herald said, "...manages to be both hilarious and genuinely sad, a cracked but revealing mirror of torment..." —The Miami HeraldAnd the Boston Globe said, "Reading "I'm Not Julia Roberts" is like observing a square dance. The grown-ups do-si-do and change partners in the outer ring, while in the inner ring, moving at cross-purposes, stepchildren plot and scheme, devising torments. Chick lit it may be, but it's not for sissies." —The Boston Globe
Who I'd like to meet: Readers! Writers! Librarians! Teachers! Stepmoms! Oh, and Johnny Depp. Dressed as Jack Sparrow.
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Hi Laura! Wishing you an abundant and joyful holiday season. :) Liz PS I'm celebrating my deal with St. Martin's for Death Will Help You Leave Him, the follow-up to Death Will Get You Sober.
Hey! Your newest book, Play Me, sounds great. I have a copy of Good Girls here to read&review, so I'll let you know what I think. :) If you ever want to do a guest blog or author chat anytime, just let me know!
I kind of lost track of Kate Bush a few years ago and am glad I found her again. I can't hear Running Up That Hill enough (obviously). Love your name, by the way.
Laura--having the sequal come out must be doubly exciting--you have probably taken all the most popular aspects of the first and then tweaked just enough to bring it to another level.
May it surpass its predecessor by miles in every regard in 2008!
![Tania [[Ticking Time Bomb]]](http://c2.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images02/2/s_6b69d2a86daa4d8cb46187928a205d95.jpg)
