The Awful Truth

A mesmerizing tale of a family coping with the revelation of a secret that will change their lives...Jackson's most absorbing book yet, a lush, rich read with three very different but equally compelling characters at its core."

***Booklist Starred review

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: You know people who just--make you laugh so much your stomach hurts? There's goofy funny, but that's not Joshilyn. There's dopey-funny, but that's not Joshilyn. There's hilariously, brilliantly, uniquely and brilliantly funny--yes, that about says it.

I met Joss (Yes, Joss, not Josh, please..) at the South Carolina Writer's Workshop (here we are with a whole crop of writers there) where she cut a swath through the place with her funny stories and incredible insight--and left an entire roomful of people half-crying and half-howling with laughter at the poignant and dramatically told (I mean, with accents) of her first book sale.

Now she's a total hot shot. She really is. I wish I knew how her mind worked, but then again, maybe not. Her books are --well, there's no one who writes like Joss. And that makes every one of her readers happy. Today, I'm brazenly, or as Joss would say: "BOO-KITTY brain-fryingingly flat-out PUSHING like a HUSSY"--or something like that.

Her new book A GROWN UP KIND OF PRETTY is getting the buzz of buzzes. And she's here to day to tell us--it almost didn't happen.

Plus--she's giving away an autographed copy to one lucky commenter!

Brain Tricks

by Joshilyn Jackson

For me, writing has two purposes. First, I write to entertain myself. I like to invent imaginary friends and get them into scrapes. I like to make myself cackle with black humor that I feel vaguely guilty about perpetrating. I never outline; I want the plot to unfold in ways that surprise me as I go. I write, in short, because it is the most fun you can have with your pants on, and it doesn’t hurt that working from home means the pants in question can be saggy knit twelve year old rags coated in dog hair.

But under all that, writing is also my way of exploring the questions that drive me as a human being: How far into the black can you go and still find a light that will take you home? Is redemption possible? What does grace look like in this broken world? Does Love win?

I relish the fun parts, but I am a coward at heart. I will play all kinds of brain tricks on myself to try to avoid the realest part of writing---the part where I go down into the black and salty reaches of my own mental illness to wrestle around with the stuff that matters most.

My new book, A GROWN-UP KIND OF PRETTY tells the story of three generations of Slocumb women. Ginny is 45, her daughter Liza is 30, and Liza’s girl, Mosey, is 15. If you do the math, you can guess that Ginny and Liza want nothing more out of life than to get Mosey to 16 Unpregnant.

Mosey is so NOT that girl. She is a virgin who has never even been kissed, but she has had such vigorous two-pronged relentless helicopter mothering on the issue of sex that when she gets nervous or stressed out, she sneaks dollar store pregnancy tests into the woods and pees on them, just to see that test window come up white and blank and pure---a physical testament that she is not going to make the same mistakes.

When the story begins, Liza, an ex junkie wild child, has had a debilitating stroke. The only thing working for her is water therapy, but she doesn’t have health insurance. Ginny decides to put in a backyard pool and do it herself, but Liza’s sacred willow is in the way. The tree was Liza’s haven before the stroke. She has pressed all her pins from Narcotics Anonymous into the trunk.

When they dig out the tree, they find a silver chest buried down near the edge of the root system---a silver chest full of bones. Human bones.

When I began writing, Ginny and Mosey were the narrators. I alternated between Mosey and her best friend Roger’s rambunctious adventures as they try to solve the backyard murder mystery, and Ginny’s tale of finally blooming at 45, as her attempts to keep Mosey safe send her careening into the arms of the long lost love of her life. It was funny and sexy and fast paced…and utterly heartless.

One of my writing partners called me on it—how desperately I was hiding from the real work. She said, “You are so determined to keep Liza from talking that you gave her a stroke to shut her up. She is the chewy black nougat at the center, and you have to give her a voice or your story is all fluff and buzzes.” That was so tough to hear, and my first reaction was, “SHUT UP! NUH-UH. YOU ARE DEAD WRONG AND ALSO SHUT UP.”

I was mad---even hurt!--- but now I am so grateful to her!

I gutted the book, and made room for Liza to go on a wild ride through her own black past, seeking the truth and her lost language, and excuse me for being disgusting, but I love this book now. I am proud of it. I think it’s more than just a fun ride, and I want every person ever born on the planet to read it.

I think that if my friend hadn’t called me on my cowardice, I would have written an empty book that would have made me eventually quite ashamed.

I can’t imagine I am the only coward in the room….

Do you have a Lydia in your life who calls you out when you play brain tricks on yourself? Whats the hardest truth you ever had to hear? I have a hard time telling people hard things --- I am SOUTHERN and incapable of bluntness. Luckily my friends know me well enough to extract the point when I walk around and around the issue nudging and hinting. What’s the worst truth you ever had to tell a friend, and how did you handle it?

HANK: Ah, Joss, that's a tough one. I am a huge coward, and have some idea that things will fix themselves. Which hardly ever works. I DO think--would I want someone to tell me? And most often, I would. I'd tuck in a bra strap, or mention spinach in teeth, and even stick my toe into manuscript criticism. I guess the fear is when the toe turns into a whole foot. In my mouth.

The worst truth? Hmmm. Let me think...How about you, Reds? Or--what do you wish someone had told YOU?

And don't forget, A free copy of A GROWN-UP KIND OF PRETTY to one lucky commenter!

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New York Times Bestselling novelist Joshilyn Jackson lives in Georgia with her husband, their two children, and way too many feckless animals. She is the author of five novels: gods in Alabama, Between, Georgia, The Girl Who Stopped Swimming, Backseat Saints, and, in January of 2012, A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty. Her books have been translated into a dozen languages, won SIBA’s novel of the year, twice been a #1 Book Sense Pick, and been shortlisted for the Townsend prize. A former actor, Jackson reads the audio versions of her novels; her work in this field has been nominated for the Audie Award, was selected by AudioFile Magazine for their best of the year list, and garnered a Listen Up Award from Publisher’s Weekly.

She is hard at work on a new novel titled SOMEONE ELSE’S LOVE STORY, expected in 2014.