- Meep was kind of a placeholder name for Nat’s cat. Once I thought about it, I would have used Pixel (the name of the cat who walks through walls in Robert A. Heinlein’s books) but I’d been calling her Meep for so long that it stuck.
- Oscar is based on a few friends of mine from high school and college. If you think Oscar is kinda crazy and outrageous, you should have met my friends. That’s why I love him so much! He’s probably my favorite character.
- Chapter 9 is my favorite chapter and also the first chapter I wrote.
- There were some quotes that didn’t make it into the book because we couldn’t get permissions for them, including one by Garrison Keillor. The first quote I got permission to use was from Jim Davis (there are two in the book from Jim Davis, creator of Garfield).
- I am most excited about the chapter header quotes from Paula Poundstone and Robert A. Heinlein. Always thought Paula was cool & funny and Heinlein was probably my favorite writer EVER growing up.
- Melly is named after the friend of a fan who wrote me and asked that I name a character after her friend who had died.
- I took the ballpark tour at Wrigley field while I was researching the book. I took The Max with me. He loved sitting in the dugout. The tour guide was very nice and even let me take a peek into the locker room, which was closed that day, after I explained to him why I was there (and that I wasn’t a crazy stalker or terrorist…I was asking some bizarre questions).
- I used the names of a BUNCH of my nieces and nephews for this book…Natalie, Victoria, Claire, Candace, Ryan, Rachael, and Emily (Emmy). I only have a couple nieces and nephews names that I haven’t used in a book yet (Cameron’s name I used in Still Sucks to Be Me), so sooner or later I need to work in a Kylie and a Christian.
- One character’s name changed about a billion times. In fact, it changed so many times that I actually never remember what it finally wound up being (the one that sticks in my head is “Beryl” but that didn’t get used). I won’t tell you which character though…
- Even though I’ve actually had a professional photo taken before, all the author photos that have been used in my books (including this one) were taken by me. Like, literally I held the camera out and snapped the picture myself. For Cat Girl, it’s a photo of me in my old Derby hat that I bought at an art show in Louisville.
- There were originally 10 things in this list, but 11 is my favorite number so I thought I’d add one more. The original ending of the book was WAY different as I’d planned it out, but as I was writing I got to that point in the book and realized there JUST WEREN’T ENOUGH WORDS so I broke my cardinal writing rule, jumped the outline, and just kept going. I thought it was going to kill me, but ultimately it worked out better (and more action-y) than what I had originally planned.
Diana A's cat inspecting the book. He looks just like my old cat Harley, so this makes me very happy.
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