Today I'd like to welcome Emily Wing Smith, author of Back When You Were Easier to Love. Emily stopped by to share her thoughts on items we would've found in her teenage garage sale. Take it away Emily!
Original and insightful, quirky and crushing, Joy's story is told in surprising and artfully shifting flashbacks between her life then and now. Exquisite craft and wry, relatable humor signal the arrival of Emily Wing Smith as a breakout talent.
Even as a child, Emily Wing Smith had overly thick eyebrows, a passion for writing, and a tendency toward attending odd schools. So it wasn’t much of a surprise when she graduated first with a BA in English from Brigham Young University, and later with an MFA in Writing for Children from Vermont College. It’s also no real shocker that she spends too much money on eyebrow waxing.
Emily lives with her husband in Salt Lake City, where she writes, bakes chocolate chip cookies, and occasionally substitutes at her old high school (which hasn’t gotten any less odd). Official Website
Teenage Garage Sale – Here’s what you’d find if I had a garage sale during my
teen years:
1.Alanis Morisette Ironic single on cassette
2.Plaid button-down shirt
3.Hawaiian shirt, floral head-wreath, gray sweatpants and black silk gloves—all leftovers from unfortunately-themed school dances
4.Plastic fishbowl (sad reminder of fish gone by)
5.Gigantic poster of the Eiffel Tower
6.Tie-dyed T-shirt I made at Hollins pre-college summer program
7.Size 8 sandals (I wear a 6 ½ but for some reason didn’t acknowledge it)
8. Tapestry vest
9. Baby-Sitters Club board game
10. Silver-studded denim wallet my Grandma gave me in third grade (okay, so there’s no way I would have actually sold this—but I was told I should many times. Okay, so I was told I should just throw it away. I ended up using it until I was 21).
Back When You Were Easier to Love by
Emily Wing Smith (April 28th 2011)
What's worse than getting dumped? Not even knowing if you've been dumped. Joy got no goodbye, and certainly no explanation when Zan - the love of her life and the only good thing about stifling, backward Haven, Utah - unceremoniously and unexpectedly left for college a year early. Joy needs closure almost as much as she needs Zan, so she heads for California, and Zan, riding shotgun beside Zan's former-best-friend Noah.
