I thought I knew everything about Gwen Matson. We've been best friends since sophomore year at Analy High. I know her to be smart and confident with a retro style that would give Jackie O a run for her money--albeit a graceful, sweat-free run in kitten heels.
Not once did she ever display a rabid need to record every detail of her existence. But never before had she gone on a weekend road trip with her amazing boyfriend, Coop...and his evil, yoga-toned best friend, Devil Blonde Dannika. Now she's writing to me like mad.
Not that I'm complaining. I'm in gay Paris (good), meeting my future in-laws (bad), so her tireless scribbling is keeping us both sane.
Usually, a well-thought-out What Would Jackie Do? helps Gwen pull it together. But this crisis is beyond help. I know Gwen and Coop are meant to be, but can their love withstand Gwen's psycho jealousy and Dannika's twisted sabotage?
Jody Gehrman grew up in northern California, a place that has gotten so thoroughly into her blood she's been forced to return. She attended the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she studied playwriting and Japanese. College confirmed her commitment to writing, and after graduation she freelanced as a journalist in San Francisco before becoming a contributing editor at the San Francisco Review of Books. In 1996, Gehrman won a New Women Playwrights Award for Tribal Life in America; she has had nine of her plays produced across the country.
Writing is Gehrman's primary obsession, but she still indulges in other forms of exhibitionism now and then. She's been an aspiring singer-songwriter since she was eight, and she performs frequently as an actress. In 1998 she founded the Women's Theater Ensemble in Bellingham, Washington, where she wrote and performed her one-woman show, Stone Sisters. She considers her addiction to the arts to be a direct biproduct of her bohemian upbringing; as a kid she spent weekends at her father's commune in Berkeley, hanging out with his anarchist friends.
Like many writers, Gehrman has had way too many jobs and addresses; she has been a massage therapist, an editor, a cocktail waitress, a publicist and a travel writer. She has lived in California, Spain, Texas, Japan, Washington and Canada. She has an M.A. in English and a master's in professional writing from the University of Southern California. She currently teaches writing at Mendocino College in northern California. Feel free to visit her at www.jodygehrman.com.
