Authorpreneur Dashboard – Joni Rodgers
The Hurricane Lover
Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
During the record-smashing hurricane season of 2005, a deadly game of cat and mouse unfolds and a stormy love affair is complicated by polarized politics, high-strung Southern families, a full-on media circus and the worst disaster management goat screw in US history. As Hurricane Katrina howls toward the ill-prepared city of New Orleans, Dr. Corbin Thibodeaux, a Gulf Coast climatologist and storm risk specialist, preaches the gospel of evacuation, weighed down by the fresh public memory of a spectacularly false alarm a year earlier. Meanwhile, Shay Hoovestahl, a puff piece reporter for the local news, stumbles on the story of a con artist who uses storm-related chaos as cover for identity theft and murder. Laying a trap to expose the killer, Shay discovers that Corbin, her former lover, is unwittingly involved, and her plan goes horribly awry as the city's infrastructure crumbles. The Hurricane Lover is a fast-paced, emotionally charged tale of two cities, two families, and two desperate people seeking shelter from the storm. Praise for books by Joni Rodgers: "Rodgers is a pure storyteller. She writes with a wit, lyricism, humanity and joy that make her books impossible to put down." Oscar-winning screenwriter Aaron Sorkin “At its best, her prose is dazzling, risky and intoxicating.” Bestselling author/O Magazine book reviewer Pam Houston "Alternately wrenching and humorous...Rodgers' strength is a knack for realistic characters who show their faults unselfconsciously and a womanly wise, laugh-through-tears appreciation of life." Publishers Weekly "Every character resonates with life." Southern Living Magazine
Book Bubbles from The Hurricane Lover
The Politics
The misguided media and deeply divided politics were very much a part of the Hurricane Katrina story, and it all comes to a head when Shay and Corbin are roped into Sunday dinner with her conservative Christian family a few weeks after the storm. Woven between the chapters, you'll see email (released through the Freedom of Information Act) sent and received by FEMA director Michael Brown before, during and after Hurricane Katrina. I also included bits of transcripts from media coverage and political speeches. But I wanted to place it all in a personal context: human faces, families, all the love and heartache and laughter that is part of life, even in the most extreme situations. Here on the Gulf Coast that summer, we witnessed enormous destruction and a lot of dirty deeds, yes, but we also witnessed the power of compassion and an overwhelming tide of lovingkindness. These hurricanes - Katrina and Rita - taught me something important, the essence of what I hope readers will take away from this novel: there are more good people in the world than bad. And whatever our differences, we are capable of loving each other.
The Journalist
The character of Shay Hoovestahl was inspired by three of the most fabulous women I know: my daughter Jerusha, Megan McCain and Kristin Chenoweth. She's over-privileged, hyper-motivated and too gorgeous for her own good. She's also whip-smart, gutsy and goodhearted. By the end of the book, she's been transformed from a pampered pageant princess to a hardworking, principled journalist.
The Weather Man
When I started researching Hurricane Katrina media coverage for The Hurricane Lover, hurricane specialist Dr. Jack Beven showed up a lot. A calm, knowledgeable voice in the storm of hurricane hype. He graciously agreed to spend time on the phone with me, reality checking my science, educating me on the lingo and logistics, and bolstering my portrayal of my protagonist, Dr. Corbin Thibodeaux, a meteorologist whose specialty is storm behavior. Of course, Corbin is what you’d expect a fictional character to be: brilliant, kind, good-humored, and slightly too sexy to be a geek — all of which Dr. Beven seems to be, but in real guy terms, which means he's educated, well-spoken and imperturbably focused on one thing: the science of the storm. I knew that to make the written man breathe, I’d have to make singular focus foundational to his character.
