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Mothers Who Dream |
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About the Author
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Loraine Despres: Take
Responsibility for Your Dreams Screenwriter and novelist Loraine Despres compares herself to her first novel's heroine. "Like Sissy," she says, "I'm a woman who made her dreams come true. Ever since I can remember, my goal has been that when I'm on my deathbed I want to look back and know I've really lived and experienced the whole panoply of life." Loraine says she's on her way to fulfilling that goal, but that it took the responsibility of motherhood to get her going out of a bad marriage. "What makes you a woman is working up the courage to take your life into your own hands," she says, quoting Rule Number One of the Southern Belle's Handbook, a fictional guidebook her novel's heroine lives by. Loraine remembers hearing her son crying in the hospital and knowing she needed to start taking charge of her life. Unhappy in her marriage to a man she calls a "good guy" but who wanted different things, Loraine knew she could make it on her own. She'd been the breadwinner, working in advertising while her husband tried his own business. When her son was three, she accepted an ad agency job in Paris, France, and left. But living abroad wasn't easy. "I often didn't get home until my son was asleep," says Loraine. "It was also hard for a very busy American, working for a French company to meet new friends." When the agency's worldwide creative director came to Paris, Loraine realized that although she liked the woman very much, she didn't want to be her. "Once I realized that, I began to wonder why I was working so hard," she says. "This was during the hippy revolution, and work didn't seem as important as living a good life. So I went home to New Orleans." Loraine only intended to stay six weeks before moving to New York for another advertising job, but the lure of the city held her captive. "People often go to New Orleans for a vacation and stay for the rest of their lives," she says. She made new friends and started seriously pursuing writing. "I was part of the New Orleans Poetry Forum," she says. She and her son got by on her pay from freelance jobs, and she enjoyed her vibrant friendships and "balmy evenings on the levee listening to friends play the guitar." But after a few years, Loraine's ambitions rose. "I wanted to go out to the West Coast and break into show business," she says. "Needless to say, everyone told me I was crazy." Loraine went anyway, although the move to Los Angeles, California with a 10-year-old son was difficult. "I was voyaging into the unknown," she explains. Once there though, she was determined to learn what she needed in order to succeed. She joined the organization, Women in Film, and others that helped helped her meet her goal. "I volunteered for every committee. And I made contacts in the business. I went to seminars on screenwriting and show business." After writing two screenplays that went nowhere, Loraine met the producers of the TV series Love Boat and Family. She wrote a spec script for Love Boat but was turned down. She pitched again and sold her first script. Producers of Family turned down all her stories, but they offered feedback. Loraine listened, and they eventually gave her an assignment. She landed an agent, and the rest is history. Soon, Loraine was writing for many series, including the final "Who Shot JR?" episode of Dallas. Loraine credits her success to hard work, determination, and a willingness to learn. "I didn't do one thing," she says. "I did everything." She advises women to join business organizations and make as many contacts as they can. "I was still getting assignments when I quit to fulfill another dream," she says, and we can almost hear her novel heroine quoting from the Southern Belle's Handbook that a smart women knows she can change her mind. Loraine says, "I wanted to write a novel imbued with my own cynical humor." That novel, The Scandalous Summer of Sissy LeBlanc, is now a Literary Guild Selection and a Barnes and Noble Discovery Great New Writers Pick.
Loraine admits to
some regrets. "Everyone has them," she says. "There's no magic formula.
Even today, I review mistakes I made years ago in advertising. But the
past is the past." For now, Loraine can be happy that her son, who is a
successful journalist living in London, has grown up to be "an
intelligent and caring man." And she's lucky in love, too, married to a
man she calls "wonderful" whom she met after moving to Los Angeles.
Loraine's advice to mothers who dream is Sissy's rule No. 101, "You
can't change the past, but a smart girl won't let that stop her."
The Scandalous Summer of Sissy Leblanc:...
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