Sit a slap-happy set of adult twins down over drinks on the terrace of the Vero Beach Hotel and see how many sequels they come up with to their first book, “The Mentor That Matters.”
The Moment That Matters. The Muppet That Matters. The Moustache That Matters?
Exhaustion has clearly set in for Suzanne Fox, longtime Vero author, editor, book critic and writing coach, and her brother Andy Fox, a former investment adviser to pension and retirement funds. Finally, Tuesday evening at the Vero Beach Book Center, after more than of year of meticulous planning, the pair launch their new anthology publishing project, Stories of You Books. Along with the first “M” that matters, they will be presenting two other collections, first-person narratives on the process of writing.
All three books include not only national and internationally known figures, but also a number of local residents. Within the writing anthologies – one on mystery writing and one on historical fiction – three contributors are among the dozens, if not hundreds, that Suzanne Fox has coached or edited locally.
Helping others get published has been a mainstay of Fox’s career. So has getting herself published; the latest novel she has been laboring over even as this project took shape is nearly finished. And it will be her fourth. Fox had her two first books published within six weeks of each other: a memoir with Simon and Schuster, and a Harlequin romance novel.
For the Stories of You Books, she has found not only beginning writers eager to contribute for free, but world-famous voices including Pulitzer Prize-winning biologist and author E.O. Wilson; Emmy Award-winning TV writer Ken Levine; and poet and Time magazine “Hero for the Planet” designate Peter H. Raven.
Among the local contributors are John Mackie, an ex-police officer turned mystery writer, currently living on Vero’s barrier island; Bob Zielsdorf, another island resident who wrote a book based on 400 love letters to and from his wife, Fran; and Rosemary Dronchi, the now-retired owner of Park Place Salon who has written two works of historical fiction based on her Italian ancestry. Sebastian-based business author Laura Steward appears in “The Mentor that Matters,” as does Susan Mazza, a leadership counselor with a huge Twitter following.
Another Vero resident, C.J. Madigan, designed all three books.
In late 2017, the team will also begin generating custom anthologies for organizations and families.
“Organizations are trying to do that in new ways, for example with social media asking for people’s stories,” Fox says. “They may know how to create brochures, videos and TV ads. But they may not have somebody who understands the very intricate process of book design. That’s not a skill set most organizations have.”
One such book, an anthology of narratives from hospice workers and volunteers, is set for publication next year.
They will also consider anthologies pitched by other editors, so long as they fit the Stories of You model.
Meanwhile, the Fox team will continue to generate anthologies following their own interests. A book on historic hotels is planned for release next summer.
Book-sellers say anthologies, once a bedside staple, are enjoying a resurgence in popularity.
“An anthology is a dialogue in some sense, rather than a monologue. It allows us to bring together very diverse viewpoints. That is really important to us,” says Fox. “The old idea that one person has a bully pulpit in their book, that was our culture. One half-hour of news on three channels – they controlled the narrative. But through social media it has become a world where many people have a voice in the narrative and that’s what we want to reflect.”
From a business perspective, anthologies make sense because each contributor becomes a marketer of the product.
“You’re effectively collaborating with a large number of writers and their existing social media,” Fox says. “It gives me a partnership – even an international partnership – of people spreading the word. And to the readers, they can say, ‘Wow, look at that list of contributors.’”
“I’ve seen every side of this business,” she says. “I’ve always wanted to be a publisher, but several things had to happen. One was to find a business model that doesn’t involve investing huge amounts of time and resources into single books, because if they’re not profitable, my capital is used up three books later.”
As for the two-person organization that has launched Stories of You, they could easily put together a book on working with your twin.
“We as twins have a lifelong bond,” she says. “I have been the quintessentially creative artsy one where he has been the more analytic financial one. But we share in an interest in books and personal legacy and the impact every person has in the world.”
Raised in a small New Jersey town, Andy Fox went on to study at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and now lives in Pinehurst, N.C. Suzanne Fox double-majored in art history and English at Douglass College. She worked in Manhattan in investment marketing before enrolling at Columbia. Earning her MFA in 1990, Fox returned to Columbia to run the admissions office for the writing department.
Her first book, “Home Life: A Journey of Rooms and Recollections,” a memoir of the houses she’d lived in, was published in 1998; it was excerpted in Glamour magazine, earned a mention in Elle and was an editor’s choice in the Chicago Tribune. It was a draining project, she says, and she wanted to follow it with something lighter. With a friend at Harlequin sending her boxes of romance novels, she got the notion to write one herself. “They’re short, they can be very comic, and you can actually have a voice.” She wrote one, including the steamy sex scene her editor asked for, and sent it “over the transom” – without an agent – to Harlequin. They bought it.
“I love that book,” she says with a laugh. “I read it, it cracks me up and I cry in the end. It was translated into seven languages.”
She went on to write a women’s fiction novel, “Harper’s Moon,” published by Berkley Penguin Putnam under another pen name, Suzanne Judson. She has also published essays and poems in a number of journals.
After 25 years in Manhattan, in 2002 Fox moved to Vero Beach where her parents had relocated. She found a place on the faculty of the museum’s education department and taught an estimated 50 writing workshops. Producing a steady stream of book reviews for Publishers Weekly (and at one point for Vero Beach 32963), she also became involved in the local chapter of American Association of University Women, or AAUW, and ran occasional workshops as fundraisers.
With the first three books ready for retail, Fox and Fox are looking to do more anthologies involving restorative research, like the one on historic hotels. For that series, she’s come up with a new brand: Stories of Whew.
The project’s launch is Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. at the Vero Beach Book Center.