A Dream to Die For received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author Susan Ritz.
What is the name of your book and when was it published?
My book is A Dream to Die For, published by She Writes Press in July 2019.
What’s the book’s first line?
Celeste reached for the remnants of last night’s dream.
What’s the book about?
When small-town therapist Larry Blatsky is murdered, his computer containing the intimate dreams and terrifying nightmares of half the town is stolen. Suspicion immediately falls on globe-trotting bartender Celeste Fortune, known to be a rebellious member of his cult. With the help of her friend Gloria, Celeste sets out to find the real culprit. But when the two women discover the power of the stolen dreams, they become the killer’s next targets. Magical realism, virtual reality, and a cast that includes mystics and bartenders, artists and cops make this an unusual mystery that surprises at every turn.
What inspired you to write the book?
For over seven years, I saw a dream therapist who became in some minor ways the model for Larry Blatsky. This man was both brilliant and charismatic. And though I was never officially a member of a cult, almost everyone I knew was going to this same therapist. Our dreams ruled our waking lives and relationships. In fact, the dreams in this book are mostly from my own dream journals. In this book, I wanted to explore how someone like me, a strong, independent woman could fall under the spell of a powerful guru. I also wanted to have some fun playing with virtual reality and explore the ways imagination and new technologies collide.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
A Dream to Die For is not your usual mystery. It is lots of fun if you like a twisty-turny plot with elements of magical realism and speculative fiction, a unique mix for this genre. If you enjoy quirky female characters, are sometimes amazed by your own dreams, or just want an escape from your everyday world, this book will surely satisfy.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who—real or fictional—does the character remind you of?
Like me, Celeste is an adventurous woman who lived and worked in many countries around the world. I based much of her back story on my own years living and working in Kenya, Japan, Singapore, Indonesia and Germany. And like a much younger me, Celeste tries to hide her insecurity and low-self-esteem by never getting attached to people or places. That same insecurity allows her to fall under the spell of Larry Blatsky once she settles down in Riverton Falls. But even an unethical therapist can’t keep a good woman down! When Celeste finally allows herself to fall in love, her innate strength and rebellious nature come roaring to the fore, and she begins to find her own power.
Celeste is actually based on a bartender in my town. Though she has quite a wide fan base among the happy hour crowd, very few have any idea what’s hiding behind her smile.
If they made your book into a movie, who would play the main characters?
My main character, Celeste would be Laura Dern who is so good at playing essentially strong but endearingly flawed women. Gloria, her sidekick, would be played by Awkwafina, reprising her role as the mouthy, irreverent sidekick Peik Lin in Crazy Rich Asians. Danny DeVito would be the perfect Larry, short and brusque, while Jeffery Dean Morgan, Alicia Florrick’s hunky PI Jason on the Good Wife would be my perfect pick for Jake. Mark Ruffalo would be a great Adam. Can’t you just see him in dreads? And then John Lithgow and Glen Close as Charlie and Elinor, together again for the first time since The World According to Garp.
When did you first decide to become an author?
I have been a writer as long as I can remember. I was that little girl who spent hours sitting under a tree or hiding under the covers writing stories and journaling in spiral notebooks, some of which I still have over 50 years later. So, I don’t think there was a certain point when I “decided” to write. However, I was well over forty before I decided to take my writing seriously and begin the long journey toward publication and becoming an actual author. I got my MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Goucher College in hopes of finishing a memoir I had been fiddling with for years. I am still fiddling with it. In the meantime, as a distraction from a serious subject, I began a small side project which eventually became A Dream to Die For.
What’s a great piece of advice you would share with fellow indie writers?
Follow your dream and don’t let anyone, including your own monkey mind, tell you you’re not good enough. Though it may take you years to figure out what you want to write about and another long while to get up your courage to show your work to the world, believe in yourself.
I hope indie authors will also truly believe that self-publishing is not just for those who can’t find a way into the traditional publishing industry. It is for those who want to maintain creative control over their books. But you have to be ready to work hard. You will take on several roles. You will learn how to be an editor, a designer, a publicist, and a marketer. That might sound daunting at first, but there are many other authors, websites, and classes and workshops that will help you produce and sell the book you always dreamed of holding in your hands and sharing with the world.
I was lucky enough to find the hybrid publisher She Writes Press to help me though the tough parts, because I needed a lot of handholding as well as the support of a community of sister writers. Take a close look at yourself. Figure out how much you are ready and willing to do on your own and then build a team to help you through the tasks you need help with. Indie doesn’t have to mean you are all alone in this. Build a support system of friends and experts and you’re on your way!
Which book do you wish you could have written?
That’s a tough one. Though my book is mystery/thriller, I am drawn to literary fiction that incorporates magical realism, like One Hundred Years of Solitude and other novels by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I have a whole shelf of novels by Louise Erdrich. I have always admired the way she blends the mysterious and magical to show how the spirit world is all around us, especially in The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse. For the same reason, The Thin Place, by another favorite author, Kathryn Davis, is another book that astounds me. I wish I had half the talent of any of these writers!