I never read age-appropriate books as a kid, much to my parents' exasperation (at eight, I would sneak into their book stash and pilfer Sidney Sheldon, Ken Follett, Colleen McCullough, and Robin Cook). I read a lot more YA and teen books as an adult than I did as a YA and teen. So it wasn't until I was older that I realized I loved the YA/teen genre. I should've started earlier: My favorite book of all time is a YA book (Long Live the Queen, by Ellen Emerson White).

2) What was the first scene of any of your books that made you stop and wonder if you should write it since your mom/best friend/husband/high school nemesis might read it?

In my first book, Black Tuesday, I had a break-up scene where the guy just wasn't going quietly into the night. He'd been showering the girl with expensive gifts, and even though she felt uncomfortable taking them, he'd reassured her that it was just money and he didn't expect anything in return. It's during the break-up that he asks for, uh, a favor. It was hard writing that question. But I felt that this worm had this thought in his mind the entire time they were seeing each other, and it was time for the reader to know that. Plus, I didn't want the reader being too sad that she was breaking up with this guy.

3) What is a day in the writing life of Susan Colebank like?

7 a.m. -- Baby wakes me up, and we play together while I try to slap myself awake.

10:30 a.m. -- Baby takes nap. I hurriedly work on notes for story, catch up on e-mails, make calls.

Noon -- Baby wakes up. I try to write in between feedings, playing, and cuddle time.

7 p.m. -- Baby's asleep. Exercise, shower, throw in laundry. Maybe mop up a dust bunny or two.

9 p.m. -- Write. Write. Write.

1 a.m. -- Watch 30 minutes of something my DVR's recorded (The Office or Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares or The Biggest Loser or Ghost Hunters).

1:30 a.m. -- Read for ten minutes and then fall into sound, weird-dream-plagued sleep.

4) As a teenager, did you do anything that you later really regretted?

Oh boy, yeah. In ninth grade, we had a contest in English class to see who could read Mark Twain's Puddin'head Wilson in the best dialect. Well, me being the drama queen, I tied an apron high under my breasts, put a kerchief on my head, and -- big embarrassing moment coming -- smeared black zinc oxide on my face. I still cringe at my huge ignorant blunder.

5) Which teen movie heroine do you wish you could be for a day?

I think Kat in 10 Things I Hate About You would be pretty fun. Heath Ledger chasing me around all day AND being a kick-butt feminist with a big brain? Sign me up!

Susan's first novel, Black Tuesday, is now out in hardcover. Her next book, about a girl whose family wins the lottery, comes out in 2009.

~S.C.

P.S. I will never interview myself again. But this is what happens when you're starting a new site...you go with who's available. And I just couldn't tell myself no. Wuss.

I cried. More than once. Granted I had a crappy work week and I was tired which might have been part of it. But it's also raw. If you haven't read the other books in the series, and I've only read Long Live the Queen, I'm not sure it would have the same impact. And it has very obvious spoilers for Long Live the Queen. Some of which I'm going to talk about here.

SPOILERS for Long Live the Queen below. (But not for Long May She Reign...)

In Long Live the Queen Meg, whose mother is the first female president of the United States, is kidnapped by terrorists - Americans funded by Islamic extremists. LLtQ was published in 1989 so it pre-dates the post-9/11 terrorist attacks so don't roll your eyes about it. She was beaten (you may even say tortured) and then left to die after her mother refused to negotiate. She escaped death but only through her own brutal courage. LLtQ is a violence and raw book. Long May She Reign picks up where it left off.

Meg is, obviously, still dealing with everything that happened. And as you might guess, not particularly well. On top of all the emotional and mental scars that she's dealing with she has serious physical scars too. Her knee is totally messed up. She may never walk normally again. Her hand is completely shattered. And so is her spirit.

She locks herself in her room, going out as little as possible. But eventually she tries to force herself to go forward. And so off she goes to college. How will she deal with being a freshman in a dorm? How will she deal with being able to trust the Secret Service again (it was one of the agent in her detail that sold info that allowed her to get kidnapped). Will she heal at all? What about her family? It's been torn apart by this too. Will Meg, and everyone else, be able to forgive her mother for refusing to negotiate?

Like I said, it's emotionally raw. And long. It clocked in at 720 pages. That's a lot of emotions.

I do recommend it but if you can get your hands on the other books in the series first I'd suggest you read them in order. Or at a minimum read LLtQ first. Trisha at The YAYAYAs didn't though and she did fine.

Also, note that this book contains potential triggers - predominantly for violent acts and eating disorders. Technically YA but very mature YA.

It's also a book that lingered with me for a few days and I had a hard time moving on to something else.

And although I finished it a week ago I'm still trying to figure out if Ellen Emerson White left the door open for a fifth book. I think she may have.... If so I hope that it's not another 18 years away.

For those of you who don't know, Long May She Reign is the 4th book in the President's Daughter series, written by Ellen Emerson White. Never heard of it? Well...it's not exactly new.

You see, once upon a time I owned Long Live the Queen, the 3rd book in the series. Which I ordered from a Scholastic book order at school when I was in oh, I'd guess about 5th grade. Man how I loved Scholastic book orders. Book order day was practically the highlight of my life at that age. I loved looking through the order form almost as much as I loved getting the books. I can't tell you how happy I was that my parents actually bought books for me. We didn't have a lot of money (that's to put it rather mildly) but I don't think I ever when through a order form without getting at least one book. Thank you Mom!

Anyway, Long Live the Queen. LOVED it. I really, really did. Quick synposis - Meg Powers is the teenage daughter of the first female president of the United States. She's kidnapped from school (v. dramatic) by terrorists. Her mother does not negotiate with terrorists. The terrorists are rather...violent. And Meg? Meg is totally a kick-ass character if my memory serves me correctly. Seriously. Granted I haven't read the book oh um 15 years at LEAST but I remember it quite well. And as it was rated the 1989 ALA Best Book for Young Adults I'm probably not wrong (see, even as a tween I had excellent taste in YA).

Meg, quite simply, kicks ass. Seriously good strong heroine. Who kicked ass.

Now, this was back before I had ever heard of the internet. And um, I didn't own my first computer until 1998. And then I was a student who really only used her computer for school (confession: I sometimes miss researching term papers) and email. Also, I grew up in a small rural town...not exactly up and happening in terms of YA knowledge at either the school or public libraries if you know what I'm saying. Also, big library wasn't sure what to make of me, a lowly 10yo, checking out books from the YA section which which shelved beside the adult books and didn't have their own librarian (actually, the probably still don't come to think of it).

So I had no idea that it was part of a series. I remember wishing it was.

A year or so ago I looked it up online and it was out of print. So imagine my surprise when I happened upon that post about the 4th book in the series coming out. I didn't even know it WAS as series. And that it turns out the book I read was actually not the first. Let me do the math for you. Long Live the Queen was the third book in the series and was written in 1989. The 4th book is being released this month, in 2007. Yes, that is an 18 year gap between books.

And I'm as giddy as a school girl that it's being released.

Only one itty-bitty problem. I no longer own Long Live the Queen. And I've never read the two books that come before it (President's Daughter and White House Autumn). And it seems that the first three books in the series are not exactly quite what one would call "in print" according to Amazon, Chapters and BN and certainly not in stock.

And that is rather mean don't you think? I mean, they are releasing the fourth book in a series 18 years after the third one was released and I can't get my little hands on any of the previous books in the series.

That's just plain cruel. Damn you publishers! DAMN YOU!

EDIT: A wee bit more research has revealed they will be re-printed in Fall 2008. 2008! That's like a whole year away! I don't think I really need to explain what's wrong with that to you guys.

The plot of Long May She Reign is deceptively simple, about the challenges a young woman faces over the course of her first year of college. But Meg Powers is no ordinary college freshman. If she were any other freshman, a book of this length would be interminably boring. Meg, however, is the daughter of the country's first female president, still recovering from the physical and emotional damage inflicted while she was kidnapped and tortured by people her mother refused to negotiate with.

Long May She Reign is a character study you can really sink into, a smart book that respects readers' intelligence and that of its characters. Meg is strong, smart, and somehow managed to retain her sense of humor. The length allows Ellen Emerson White to explore Meg's psyche in depth, and she is such a complex, nuanced character that adults will also find much to appreciate here. (In fact, White says it "is very much an adult book").

This is the fourth book in Ellen Emerson White's President's Daughter series. While there were references to past events—besides the kidnapped and tortured part, I mean—and what I assume were in-jokes, it does stand on its own. I haven't read the other books in the series but still found it easy to follow what was going on in this one. (If, like me, you haven't read the first three books, read Liz B.'s Under the Radar post while you wait for them to be republished next summer.*) That said, I do think the reading experience would have been richer had I read the books in order, and that's saying something, because this was a brilliant read on its own. We're told enough about past events to understand the circumstances in Long May She Reign, but actually reading about them in depth, as they happened in the first three books, would likely make the impact of what Meg must now deal with that much stronger.

Long May She Reign will be published on October 30.

* Though I must admit to wanting to read Susan's story, Friends for Life, even more.

But despite what I felt was an icky cover, it sounded interesting. Meg, the President's daughter is recovering from a kidnapping and brutal escape. And people I respected liked it so I read it.

It has been a long time since I took my time with a book, but I really did with this one. Partially because it was long - 720 pages, and partially because it was intense - Meg and her family really haven't recovered, and partially because it moved slow in places which I ended up not minding at all. There are prequels to this that were published a while ago (1989) which I hadn't read but they are being re-released and I am looking forward to at least the one in which she gets kidnapped. I liked Meg, she had a sense of humor but she is still pretty damaged, and not just physically and in the obvious ways, but in other not so obvious ways as well. In fact I am pretty sure she isn't aware of all the ways she is messed up. She also isn't really aware of how much of a survivor she is, navigating college as the President's daughter, a paparazzi stalked celebrity, potential target of terrorists, and still in pain isn't all that easy.

I really flew through the last 100 pages, we were on a trip and I read while my husband drove. Good thing there wasn't anything interesting to look at, I wouldn't have noticed.

Overall I enjoyed this, a little depressing but still good, and am looking forward to some earlier books.