Hi, it’s me, Princess Mia Thermopolis! I stopped by Meg’s blog to post for her because she’s so busy promoting Abandon, which just came out today for the first time in paperback!
You would think that as a royal, I’d be the busy one, what with going to college and helping my dad to rule a country (for the last time: he only died in the movie version of my life. He is alive and well in real life).
But I’m getting pretty good at multi-tasking. I’m actually writing this during my Interactive Media class (blogging counts as interactive media, right?).
Anyway, a lot of you have been writing to ask where I’ve been lately, and why I haven’t updated my own blog in so long.
Unfortunately, blogging isn’t as emotionally therapeutic as I’d hoped. I hadn’t counted on the fact that everyone can read it (hi, Mom).
I thought Tweeting might be more fun so I’ve been doing that a bit (you can follow me here), but again, those pesky privacy issues.
I really think I’m better off journaling. Who knows, maybe I’ll have something else for my royal biographer to publish someday. We’ll see how it goes.
In the meantime, since so many of you seem to have questions for me, I thought I’d try to answer a few of them. So here goes:
Dear Princess Mia,
Do you still go to the Plaza in New York City for tea with your grandmother? Because I went there over winter break hoping to get your autograph, and you never showed up.
Wondering If You’re Even Real
Dear Wondering,
As a matter of fact, I am real. I don’t get to the Plaza for tea as much as I used to because I’m in college now and don’t have to take princess lessons anymore (thank God).
I did, however, spend winter break in Genovia, where the median temperature is always seventy-five degrees. (Please plan your next vacation in Genovia!)
Due to my busy study and travel schedule I won’t be making many public appearances in the near future. However, if you’d like to meet my biographer, Meg Cabot, she’s got TWO public events planned for the month of February in advance of the release of Overbite in paperback! If you’ll be in either Texas or California, you can have tea (or lunch) with her, and even sit at her table (if you buy a ticket in time).
The details of those events are:
Saturday, February 18
2:00 PM to 5:00 PM
Tea at Fresh Fiction
The Adolphus
1321 Commerce St
Dallas, TX
Friends, books, chat, and high tea! Who could ask for anything more? Not me. An exclusive luncheon with Meg Cabot in the famous French Room at The Adolphus!
This will be Meg’s only appearance in Texas and a perfect way to spend a Saturday afternoon! Click here to sign up!
You’ll also get one of the first copies of Overbite, which will be out that month in paperback, which Meg will sign! (She says she’ll sign all your other books, too. Well, the ones you bring/buy at the event that were written by her.)
Maybe she’ll even give you some spoilers about the next book in the Heather Wells series, Size 12 and Ready to Rock, coming out this July, and the sequel to Abandon, Underworld, coming out in May, too!
Click here to read more about DFW’s fabulous author teas!
and
Saturday, February 25
Passion and Prose Conference
12:00 PM to 2:00 PM
333 E Ocean Blvd
Westin Long Beach
Long Beach, CA
What is Passion & Prose, you ask? Well, it is a daylong conference especially designed for readers , aspiring writers, and published writers, particularly of books containing romance (right up my alley, since, as you may or may not know, I have a published romance novel of my own. All the author proceeds go to Greenpeace).
This 2012 inaugural event features bestselling authors Meg Cabot, Christina Dodd, and Gail Carriger, among the fabulous 50 romance authors in attendance. From the Passion and Prose conference brochure:
We can’t think of a better place to spend a winter day than in sunny southern California at the luxurious Westin Long Beach. The event commences with registration and a fun breakfast buffet meet and greet with 50 authors. You will love this unique opportunity to mingle with authors, readers, fans, and aspiring writers.
After breakfast, you are guaranteed to be seated with an author for the day of festivities. Once seated, a passionate round of speed dating will ensue, where authors will circulate table to table to woo you with their tales of romance and love.
Since we know that you would love nothing better than to chat with the authors, multiple book buying and autographing sessions will be available as well. Here is your chance to collect autographs from your favorite authors, as well as some of the new authors with whom you will be introduced.
The Passion & Prose continues with special luncheon keynote presentations by bestselling authors Meg Cabot, Christina Dodd, and Gail Carriger.
Our passion for reading and writing would not be complete without passing along community support. Join us in an exciting opportunity drawing to benefit for WriteGirl, a non-profit organization devoted to supporting disadvantaged and at-risk girls with the means to achieve success thru the creativity and self-expression of writing.
And of course we know you love giveaways, so every attendee will leave with a goodie bag filled with fun giveaways!
Share the love, share the passion, and share the prose!
Click here to register!
So, everyone who lives in Texas or California, please come to one of these events!
Dear Mia,
Where can I get a nice boyfriend like yours?
Shevonne
Dear Shevonne,
The minute you stop looking, you’ll find him, the same way Little Bo Peep found her sheep.
Usually the perfect guy shows up when you’re least interested (like when your dad’s been arrested and you’re about to leave to go study in England, as in the case of Diane Court in the fantastic teen movie Say Anything).
Or maybe he’s the guy who’s always mowed your lawn and you never even considered dating him until that time you spilled that drink on your mom’s suede jacket and he said he’d pay you to go out with him and you did because it was the only way you could pay for the dry cleaning and then you discovered that he was actually kind of special and even cute, just like Cindy Mancini did about a young Patrick Dempsey in the amazing teen movie Can’t Buy Me Love.
Or maybe you thought he’d never give you a chance because you have low self-esteem and he’s your best friend’s brother and you’ve decided it’s safer to think you’re in love with some shallow hot popular boy than risk your feelings on the guy you truly like, like a certain princess who shall remain nameless (hint: it’s me).
Whatever the case, just stop looking. He’ll show up at the exact worst possible moment, guaranteed.
Hopefully like all of the above, your story will have a happy ending (but not without some heartache and probably a lot of fights and maybe even some kick-boxing and journaling).
Dear Princess Mia,
I got into one of the best Ivy League schools in the country early decision (I know, yay me!).
Unfortunately I received no financial aid or scholarships. My parents already told me that I will have to take out student loans to pay for tuition myself since they can’t afford it, as I have two other siblings in college as well. I did the math and this means I will owe $200,000 upon college graduation.
Or I can go to the local state college, which I am pretty much guaranteed to get into, and which my parents said they will pay for.
The problem with the state school is that it has a reputation for being a party school, all my friends will make fun of me for going there, and I won’t get nearly the education I would at the Ivy League school, severely limiting my job prospects after I graduate.
What should I do?
Signed, Freaking Out
Dear Freaking,
It’s a little awkward for me to answer this question since I’m a princess and so rich that my cat has his own tiara (although I refuse to make him wear it).
But I did some research for you, and I found out there are a ton of famous people who have attended so-called “party” schools, either because that’s the only school they could afford (hi, Mom!) or the only school to which they were accepted (hi, Dad!). And they did just fine.
In fact, a huge amount of the CEOs in the Fortune 500 went to large public universities. 200 out of the 500 had no graduate degrees, many were college drop outs, and 19 had no college degrees at all!
“This information should help allay the anxieties of many parents and their college-bound children who believe admission to a top-ranked school with a powerful alumni network is a prerequisite to success in the upper echelons of business management,” says an article in a Wall Street Journal.
“Today’s crop of chief executives are, of course, at least a generation older than current college students, but they are in the position to hire and say they don’t favor job candidates with certain degrees.”
“I don’t care where someone went to school, and that never caused me to hire anyone or buy a business,” says Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, who graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
What counts most, CEOs say, is a person’s capacity to seize opportunities. As students, they recall immersing themselves in their interests, becoming campus leaders and forging strong relationships with teachers. And at state and lesser-known schools, where many were the first in their families to attend college, they sought challenges and mixed with students from diverse backgrounds — an experience that helped them later in their corporate climbs.
Apparently even my royal biographer Meg Cabot went to a state school. She says the advantage of graduating “owing nothing to anyone” was that she did not have to feel guilty about failing to pursue a career in her major (art), or when she took the first job she got that paid benefits.
“That was as a receptionist at NYU. Later, I got a promotion to assistant manager of a dorm at NYU, like Heather Wells from Size 12 is not Fat. I did that for ten years while also writing novels on the side, until eventually I made enough money from my writing to support myself. Not having to pay back a lot of loans made that all possible.”
Meg says to tell you that, like anything else, your education is what YOU put into it, whether you go to community college or Columbia.
I am certainly putting a lot into mine, sitting here in class writing for someone else’s blog. Which is why I’m going to stop soon. But not before I say that I think I will pawn Fat Louis’s tiara and donate the proceeds to a scholarship fund….
But before I do here is a brief photo essay Meg is making me include of her cat Henrietta discovering the paperbacks of Abandon, which she says just arrived in the mail:
Henrietta: “What is it?”
“Smells delicious.”
“I think I will rub my face on it.”
“Nevermind.”
“No, wait, maybe I’ll come back and rub my head on it some more.”
“Or maybe just against this wall.”
Thanks for reading! Come back soon!
More later.
Much love,
Mia
