Early Acclaim for the Novel: Part 1

Blurbs! Who doesn’t love them? I love ’em. I have four of them for the First Annual Grand Prairie Rabbit Festival. I will reveal them — one a week starting today. Three of the blurbs are from folks who’ve written books and who were kind enough to take some time out of writing more books to read mine and say a kind word or two about it.

But I think the best way to start this off is with a quote from Helen Stephenson Pursell, the real Queen of the real Fifth Annual Grand Prairie Rabbit Festival (or, as it was called, Festival Du Lapin).

“Ken Wheaton’s fictitious story of a real small community in Grand Prairie, Louisiana, will keep you entertained and laughing out loud! Wheaton thoroughly describes the tradition and passion for the Cajun French way of life. Strap on your waders and get ready to trudge through some of the most colorful characters in the South.”
–Helen Pursell, Fifth Annual Festival Du Lapin Queen

How’s that for keeping it real?

Now, I can’t emphasize enough that The First Annual Grand Prairie Rabbit Festival is a novel — one for which I did pretty much zero research. I made it all up. And Helen’s blurb isn’t a result of me interviewing folks. Nope. Her blurb came about the old-fashioned way: Facebook.

Helen graduated Opelousas Catholic two years after I did. She was in my brother’s class. I couldn’t tell you the last time we’d talked to each other. (It was probably high school.) But, as happens on Facebook, we became friends at some point. And, as luck would have it, she was paying attention when I posted the title of the novel on the site. Which prompted her to reply, and I’m paraphrasing, “Holy crap. I was the queen of that festival.”

Which is funny. And sort of typical of where we grew up. When I told the story to my editor and agent, they replied, and again I’m paraphrasing, “Holy crap. That’s funny. And it would be cool if we got her to blurb it.”

So, there you have it. That’s how one blurb was born.