High School Flashback - Author Kay Cassidy

It’s day two of the Young Adult Author High School Flashback Tour in which you can win really great bookstuff! Five winners will be chosen Friday and each winner will get five cool book related prizes - all for just poking fun at us!

Today we get a Kay Cassidy flashback. Kay is the author of the fantastic new novel The Cinderella Society, a true Girl Power book that hits my sweet spot: secret societies + makeovers! But before we dive in to the book details, shall we hop in the time machine and set it for the 80s? Check this out:

Hi Kay! Nice Chevette Scooter - it's almost as shiny as your megawatt smile!
The picture is of me on my 16th birthday by my first car. It was technically my brother's car but he was away at college so I got to drive it until he came back from school and I got my own car. The thing I remember most about it is actually from being a passenger in the car. It was starting to rust out in the floorboards beneath the passenger side foot area and when my brother would go over a puddle, I would sometimes get splashed if the puddle was big enough. You'd think I would've learned from his Chevette woes, but no. My first car of my own was also a Chevette (aka "The Crappy Copper Car").

What clique(s) were you part of in high school?
I was really tight with my cheerleading team. We were largely a bunch of honor roll, non-partying athletes so we totally broke the cheerleader mold of the '80s. But I was never a very clique-y person. I sort of floated between groups for the most part. I was comfortable around just about everyone, except for the people who were hard partiers. I always felt like a big lame-o around them.  :-)

Please describe one outfit you absolutely LOVED but now that you look back on you cringe. 
Oh my gosh, I had this black cotton dress… three tiers that all fell above the knee… and this big, thick, copper choker necklace like something you'd see on Cleopatra? I thought it was THE STUFF. And it's funny because my best friend my senior year moved to our school during junior year and she later told me she always looked forward to when I'd wear that because she thought it was super cool too. I have a feeling we would laugh our butts off if we saw a picture of it now. Sooo '80s.

If you could give your teen self one piece of advice, what would it be? Stop trying to plan ten years down the road and enjoy the now. Seriously, life is going to happen whether you plan every waking moment or not.  But these friends, these moments, will only be here once. Take more pictures and just have fun. Oh, and write stuff down so you can use it later! Someday you will be a YA author and all that crap you're going through now? Gold, baby.  :-)

That's so right! And here's Kay's gold:

What a girl to do when the glass slipper fits, but she doesn't want to wear it anymore?

Sixteen year old Jess Parker has always been an outsider. So when she receives an invitation to join The Cinderella Society, a secret society of the most popular girls in school, it's like something out of a fairy tale.  Swept up by the Cindys' magical world of makeovers, and catching the eye of her Prince Charming, Jess feels like she's finally found her chance to fit in.

Then the Wickeds--led by Jess's arch-enemy--begin targeting innocent girls in their war against the Cindys, and Jess discovers there's more to being a Cindy than reinventing yourself on the outside. She has unknowingly become part of a centuries-old battle of good vs. evil, and now the Cindys in charge need Jess for a mission that could change everything.

Overwhelmed, Jess wonders if The Cinderella Society made a mistake in choosing her. Is it a coincidence her new boyfriend doesn't want to be seen with her in public? And is this glamorous, secret life even what she wants, or will she risk her own happy ending to live up to the expectations of her new sisters?
Go to Amazon to read more about The Cinderella Society!

Kay Cassidy is the author of teen fiction she wishes was based on her real life. She is the founder of the national Great Scavenger Hunt ContestTM reading program for kids and teens and the host of the inspirational Living Your FiveTM web project.  In her free time, she enjoys yoga, movies, music, and reading.  Lots and lots of reading.  She hopes her debut YA novel, THE CINDERELLA SOCIETY (Egmont), will help girls embrace their inner Cindy.

Thanks Kay!

To be entered in the contest to win five great prizes, simply leave a comment. All five of us will have winners, so be sure to stop at everyone's blogs. As added bonus you can see me as a teen dressed as a wench over at Kimberly's blog. Sadly, that's not a typo.

Christina's Blog   Kay's Blog   Jen's Blog   Kimberly's Blog