Women's Fiction
Date Published: 05-16-2023
Publisher: Creative James Media
When a career-ending injury and a messy breakup send prima ballerina Daniela Verdi back to Queens, New York, she fills her days with countless distractions: meaningless sex, pinot grigio, and video games.
It takes a chance meeting with her brother's best friend, Vincent LaBate, for her to remember who she was before the stage lights and distractions of the Upper West Side. She's convinced that Vincent could never love a girl like her: broken, insecure, and stumbling her way through life. What Daniela didn’t count on is that Vincent is as scarred as she is after divorcing his cheating wife and going through an equally messy child custody fight. Soon enough, old vulnerabilities rear their ugly heads, opening a crack in Daniela’s perfectly imperfect romance.
As Daniela and Vincent's relationship develops, will Daniela learn to accept that a dream life isn't all it's cracked up to be?
Interview with Rachel Corsini
How many books have you written and which is your favorite?
Fun fact! Sushi and Sea Lions is the only book I’ve finished in its entirety. While I was figuring out my writing style, genre, and voice, I started many different novels, mainly historical fiction, which always died at the halfway mark. I could never figure out why. I think I needed to have more life experience and figure out who I was as a person. Sushi and Sea Lions came about after I experienced a few things in my own life. I realized what I wanted and needed to say as a writer and put it all on the page. It really is the book of my heart.
If you’re planning a sequel, can you share a tiny bit about your plans for it?
The book I’m currently working on isn’t necessarily a sequel, but it’s a standalone read with characters from Sushi and Sea Lions. It’s about Daniela’s best friend Tricia. Tricia has demons of her own that she needs to sort out. She’s very successful in her work life, especially financially, but when it comes to her romantic relationships. It’s a mess. It deals with forgiveness and healing.
Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?
So far my books have connections between each other. They deal with the characters that appear in each of the novels, but they can stand on their own. Each of the friends that appear in Sushi and Sea Lions has their own story to tell. Tricia’s story is next and then Mellie’s will come after.
How did you come up with the title for your book?
I know the title sometimes stumps people, but it’s really about Daniela’s heart and her coming to terms with loving herself. Sushi and Sea Lions are two physical things that she loves, but really it’s a metaphor for embracing what makes her the unique and wonderful person that she is. She suppressed that for a really long time and that’s her journey in the book.
How long did it take you to write this book?
It took me about six months to write the draft, a year of revision, and two years of editing. It was my first book though so I think I’ve learned a lot of things about writing in that time.
What does the title mean?
The title is a representation of falling in love with yourself and embracing the unique things that you love.
What did you learn when writing the book?
I learned that I was a first person POV writer from the female perspective. That has been a huge lightbulb moment. I also learned that I was a contemporary fiction author and women’s fiction writer. I tell stories from the perspective of the millennial female experience. Those experiences are unique and different for each character. Also, I’m a character driven writer. My plots are subtle since it’s mostly about the internal development of my characters.
What surprised you the most?
What surprised me the most was how cathartic writing something like this book could be. I was going through a difficult time in my life when I wrote this book and allowing myself to process all of those emotions through Daniela was a huge help. Writing can really be therapy.
Have you ever killed off a character your readers loved?
I haven’t. There hasn’t been a need for that kind of trauma yet.
What do you do to get inside your character’s heads?
I always ask myself what would this character do, not what I would do. Daniela isn’t necessarily a self-insert but she has a lot of characteristics of my personality, whereas Tricia from my WIP, is the polar opposite of Daniela. I try to engage with how they process emotions, events, the way they think about things, how they move through the world. It has to come from an authentic place.
About the Author
After declaring herself a pretty pink princess during her first ballet class, Rachel dreamt of sugarplums and began pirouetting her way through life. While studying to become a ballerina, she compulsively read books under her covers by flashlight and scribbled in spiral-bound notebooks. The urge to tell stories culminated in her graduation from Columbia College Chicago with a B.F.A. in fiction writing.
Never one to keep her feet on the ground, she traveled the world from Prague to Cape Town. Once settled back in Queens, she dabbled in journalism before working as an Editorial Assistant for a medical publisher. Seeking a more fulfilling career, she earned her MAT from Queens College and currently works as an English teacher in an alternative program in NYC.
Rachel spends her time sipping coffee, trying to cook, and practicing her pirouettes. She currently resides in Freeport, Long Island.
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