Happy Tuesday and welcome to my stop on the blog tour for FAKING REALITY! I’m so excited because today I have an interview with Sara Fujimura to share with you! This book is truly amazing and I’m so excited to for you to find out more about it, PLUS enter for a chance to win a print copy!
Faking Reality by Sara Fujimura Published on July 13, 2021 by Tor Teen
Genres: Contemporary, Romance, YA
Pages: 320
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Author Links: Website, Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, Instagram
Dakota McDonald swore after "The Great Homecoming Disaster" that she'd never allow her romantic life to be a plot line in her parents' HGTV show again. But when the restaurant run by the family of her best friend (and secret crush), Leo, is on the line, Dakota might end up eating her own words.
Leo Matsuda dreams of escaping his small town Arizona life and the suffocating demands of working in his family's restaurant, but the closer he gets to his goal--thanks to the help of his best friend (and secret crush) Dakota--the more reasons there are for him to stay.
What would you do if you spent the day with Dakota and Leo? Where would you go to eat, hang out, relax, etc.?
Phoenix Fan Fusion (which is our version of San Diego Comic-Con). We could totally nerd out together. I would put Dakota and Leo to work in my booth for a little bit, just like my kids do. Afterward, I would take them to eat Korean BBQ and sing karaoke with my family.
If Dakota and Leo were to hang out with characters from other books, who would they be and why?
Because all three of my contemporary YA books have a Phoenix tie-in, I would love to build a crossover world sort of like Becky Albertalli’s Simonverse. Hint: I already do that in smaller ways. Sky Doucet from TANABATA WISH shows up as a minor character in EVERY REASON WE SHOULDN’T. No spoilers, but you will see a wink to EVERY REASON WE SHOULDN’T near the end of FAKING REALITY. Maybe I will do a Tanabata-themed novella one day, bringing all of these characters together in one book? Dakota would realistically intersect with Jonah and Olivia because they are all minor stars in Phoenix.
If you could meet any fictional character, who would it be and what would you talk about?
Anne from L. M. Montgomery’s ANNE OF GREEN GABLES. Not the little girl version, but when Anne goes off to college in Kingsport, Nova Scotia. I am fascinated by that time period and hope that ANNE WITH AN E gets picked up for another season. Also, watch for the wink to Anne in FAKING REALITY.
If you buried a time capsule with three items inside, what three items would you choose and why?
1–A copy of BREATHE (which is set during the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic)
2–A newspaper from March 2020 talking about the US going into lockdown
3–My bullet journal from 2020, which talks about the toilet paper shortage, the hot mess of TIGER KING, how I took up hiking again, and all the tiny everyday things I did to keep the pandemic from pulling me under.
Why? Because it took a lot of time and energy to find first-person accounts of the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic. Americans were so traumatized by the double whammy of World War I and the Spanish Flu pandemic that they stopped talking about it all together and moved onto the Roaring 20s. What helped me bring that world to life was the stories I found in diaries, postcards, and letters. I also tracked down some videos (made later) of survivors of that era. So, keep an account of YOUR life during this pandemic. It can be a blog post or a rap or a TikTok dance, or whatever. Make a future researcher’s job easier.
What is your favorite quote, scene, or moment from Faking Reality?
Throughout the entire book, I play with the theme “things aren’t always what they seem.” No spoilers, but the Homecoming Carnival scene is my favorite scene, because it gives the perfect taste of how this theme is going to snowball bigger and bigger until it culminates in Dakota’s ridiculous Sweet Sixteen Extravaganza.
About Sara Fujimura
SARA FUJIMURA is an award-winning young adult author and creative writing teacher. She is the American half of her Japanese-American family, and has written about Japanese culture and raising bicultural children for such magazines as Appleseeds, Learning Through History, East West, and Mothering, as well as travel-related articles for To Japan With Love. Her self-published young adult novels include Tanabata Wish and Breathe. She lives in Phoenix with her husband and children.
Enter here to win a print copy of Faking Reality by Sara Fujimura!
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What do you think about Faking Reality? Have you added it to your tbr yet? Let me know in the comments and have a splendiferous day!
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