SMART Love received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author Vincent Fudge II.
What is the name of the book and when was it published?
SMART Love was published on June 26th, 2020
What’s the book’s first line?
As a surveyor, I encourage you to consider how to learn from these shared experiences and not place judgment on who was right or wrong in any scenario that tells the story of our journey.
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
SMART Love an educational narrative that focuses on relational improvement by establishing healthy behaviors in a relationship emphasizing effective communication techniques, measuring progress, relational accountability, and alignment on relationship goals. “Edward” (the narrator and main character,) describes the 1-year journey through which he worked with his wife to improve their relationship. With chapters existing as month-long reviews, each month/chapter is transitioned into with a flashback memory of a significant event that provides context as to how they wound up where they were at the beginning of the 1-year journey. Key instances of communications successes, capitalized by positive outcomes from the SMART Love exercises, inspire Edward to continue working on making his marriage work. Conceptually, SMART Love is designed to do two things: 1. Tell a story about a man’s commitment to work on fixing his relationship and describe very vividly what that experience looked like, and 2. Share realistic relationship improvement concepts and describing how to approach implementing them.
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
Mainly, I wanted my son(s) to understand the level of effort I put into making my marriage work with my wife; teaching them my lessons learned as I grew into being a better man. I wanted to provide an artifact if they ever sought to understand what my relationship with their mother had been like throughout their upbringing. I also acknowledge that there are a lot of younger people emotionally lost, not taught how to love properly, and don’t know how to acknowledge and/or fix their own brokenness… I hope SMART Love reaches many people seeking how to improve themselves in these ways, and find the narrative an effective learning tool.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
The SMART Love methodology provides an ability to map the direction you want your relationship to go, a means to measure progress towards relational goals, and an accountability measure for contributions to the health of the relationship. It’s a great approach to establishing healthy norms in a relationship. It does not help find the right person, but if you embrace the concept, it can help identify whether you are with the right person.
If they made your book into a movie, who would you like to see play the main character(s)?
There’s a lot of amazing undiscovered talent out there, but for the main roles of Edward and Ebony I’d love to see how John Boyega, Corey Hawkins, Lakeith Stanfield, Naturi Naughton, Yvonne Orji, and Amanda Seales would approach the characters respectively.
Is this the first book you’ve written?
I dabbled in many types of short story writing as a hobby over the years, but this is the first project I saw all the way through the self-publishing process.
What do you do for work when you’re not writing?
I manage a team of software developers who deliver enhancements to a suite of desktop tools used in financial services call centers.
How much time do you generally spend on your writing?
I use quick notes or voice recorder apps on my phone to capture thoughts and story points while I navigate through life, and then I dedicate a full weekend once a month to revisit all my random notes and plug them into my projects.
Would you go traditional if a publisher came calling? If so, why?
I’m honestly not sure. Being new to the environment, I don’t understand the landscape well enough to know the pros and cons. I’d consider any offers shared, but I appreciate the creative freedom and the legwork of building my projects from the ground up and figuring things out as I go.
Is there something in particular that motivates you (fame? fortune?)
Nah, neither fame or fortune drives the passion for my writing projects. I have a fulfilling and promising career already, it’s the appetite to inspire and teach others from my lessons learned and the desire to tell a story that motivates me to continue writing.