Happy Monday Everyone! Today I’m excited to have Sarvenaz Tash here to share about her new MG mystery, The Treasure of Ocean Parkway. This is a sequel to The Queen of Ocean Parkway, but it sounds like it can be read as a standalone. I love mysteries, and I’m excited to read this one.
Here’s a blurb from Goodreads:
Two
podcasting sleuths help their neighbor solve a cold case—one that’s literally
etched into the walls of their Brooklyn apartment building—in this cozy,
twisty-turny middle grade whodunnit from the author of The Queen of
Ocean Parkway.
Twelve-year-old globetrotter Thea Lim-Lambert is
spending a rare summer at home in Brooklyn, when she discovers a secret room in
the back of her closet. There, among her grandfather Errol’s old diaries and
peculiar carvings, is a clue Errol left to a massive hidden treasure. But to
find it, she’ll need the help of two experienced sleuths—lucky for her, two of
the best live in her building!
Roya and Amin’s mystery podcast has earned them
a stellar reputation, but they never could have guessed that their latest case
would send them on a wild scavenger hunt in their own building. Clue by clue,
they search the building from roof to cellar (thanks to Roya’s mom’s master
key). But just when a solution seems near, they realize an essential piece is
missing—locked away where none of them can reach it. And unless Thea finds the
courage to stand up to her family, the treasure of Ocean Parkway may be lost
forever. . .
Hi
Sarvenaz! Thanks so much for joining us.
1. Tell us about yourself and how you became a writer.
I’ve actually wanted to be a children’s book author since I was seven years old! I was a big reader as a child, and nothing seemed as exciting to me as getting to have my own name on a book spine one day. I took a bit of a detour in college, majoring in film, where I quickly realized that I mostly wanted to write screenplays as opposed to being on set or directing movies. And I eventually found my way back to books via my middle grade debut, The Mapmaker and the Ghost, in 2012.
2. Where did you get the idea for The Treasure of Ocean Parkway?
The idea for the series as a whole definitely came from my Brooklyn neighborhood. It was also born a bit from the pandemic because back in 2020, I was really missing all the seemingly mundane neighborhood things I had often been doing with my kids like taking the subway, going to museums, or going to Coney Island. So a lot of those city-specific activities are very much at the heart of the series.
Your Writing Process
3. It’s cool that your story idea came from your neighborhood. How did you plot out The Treasure of Ocean Parkway? Do you have a plotting process you use for all your stories?
I am very much an outliner and I usually use a combination of Scrivener and Plottr to help me plot out my book, though it’s usually after I’ve written something like 20-50 pages to get a feel for the characters and story first. I find outlining makes the process a whole lot less intimidating for me because thinking I’m going to write a whole novel feels overwhelming, but thinking I’m going to write a scene today that I already have some direction for feels a lot more manageable.
4. Your
process is an interesting way to plot a story. This is a sequel to The Queen of
Ocean Parkway, but many reviewers said they read it as a standalone. Did you
purposely write it like this? If so, why?
That was definitely on purpose. I was thinking of it more like a classic mystery series, like Agatha Christie or Nancy Drew, where each book revolves around its own standalone mystery, though there are character arcs and plot points that do go throughout the series. I think it’s a slightly richer experience if you read both books, but either can certainly be read as a standalone without missing anything major.
5. I like the kind of mystery series you describe as a model for yours. Roya and Amin are the main characters in book 1 too. How did you develop them as characters in The Treasure of Ocean Parkway given that some readers already know them from book 1 of the series? What advice do you have for writers on how to continue their characters’ personal growth throughout a series?
This is a good question as this is my first series, and one of the reasons I tended to shy away from them and only work on standalones is I often felt that my characters had completed their arcs in one book. I overcame some of that fear by setting up certain parameters with this series: for example, the setting is a large building with the potential for many new tenants/characters and each mystery could be a standalone. In The Treasure of Ocean Parkway, I introduced another kid tenant, Thea, who really takes over as the main protagonist of this book with Roya and Amin serving as more secondary characters. This helped me develop a new arc, while also furthering Roya and Amin’s growth by having them interact with a new character who inherently introduces a new dynamic to the duo.
6. You write for middle grade, young adult, and adult stories. Why have you chosen to write for so many different age groups?
I
really like to stretch my writing muscles and I find writing for those
different audiences each comes with its own sets of boons and challenges. I
also like writing characters of different age groups and exploring the problems
they may face in different phases of their life, and the age of my main
character tends to determine the audience. And, finally, I get a little bored
if I’m always writing the same thing and I like to learn something new with
everything I write. Which is why, aside from being for different age groups, my
books run the gamut from historical fiction to contemporary to magical realism
to sci-fi.
Your
Journey to Publication
7. Your agent is Molly Ker Hawn. How did she become your agent and how did you get your first publishing contract?
Molly is my third agent and I got her the old-fashioned way: by querying! She signed me on The Queen of Ocean Parkway. My first agent I got through a more unorthodox way: she was my teacher at the Gotham writing workshop classes I was taking, and when she branched out into agenting she offered to represent the book I was working on in the class. My first editor thought that the book was too short and sketched-out for her to sign (it was) but I had a humor blog at the time that she really liked (all about the wackiness of working in Times Square) and she gave me an R&R which eventually led to an offer.
8. Share how you’ve been able to steadily publish books over the years and how your career as an author has grown.
The main reason is that I’ve just kept on writing. I usually take a couple of weeks off in between projects, and then I’m working on something new, which is the best way I’ve found of keeping the anxiety of constantly waiting (which, let’s face it, is most of what publishing is) at bay. I think it has also helped that I’ve been able to pivot between age groups and genres like I have. And, finally, I just really love writing. Not publishing as a business, I don’t often love that so much. And I don’t always have an easy time getting the words out either. But as a whole, the process of hitting upon an idea and characters that I love and figuring out their story is just really fun for me. And whether or not I continue to publish, I can’t imagine myself stopping the writing part of it anytime soon.
Promoting
Your Book
9. Your
advice is great to keep on writing. How are you marketing The Treasure of Ocean
Parkway? How has your strategies for promoting your books changed as you
published more books?
With middle grade, I’ve found that school visits and book festivals really do seem to be the best route to getting the book into the hands of its intended audience. I’ve also been incredibly lucky and very grateful for librarians who’ve embraced this series. It’s a bit different with young adult and adult books and I’ve found shifting my marketing strategy to suit each book’s genre and themes has been somewhat helpful. Though, at the end of the day, I can only do so much and I very firmly believe that the success of a book’s marketing is 99% in the hands of the publisher and what they decide to do with their reach.
10. What are you working on now?
I’m waiting to see if my publisher is going to buy the third book in The Queen of Ocean Parkway series, so that’s on deck if they do. But I’m also currently working on an adult romantic comedy and have a YA romantic comedy on sub.
Thanks
for sharing all your advice, Sarvenaz. You can find Sarvenaz at www.sarvenaztash.com or @SarvenazTash.
Giveaway Details
Sarvenaz is generously offering a hardback of The Treasure of Ocean Parkway for a giveaway. To enter, all you need to do is be a follower of my blog (via the follower gadget, email, or bloglovin’ on the right sidebar) and leave a comment by December 20th. If I do not have your email (I can no longer get it from your Google Profile), you must leave it in the comments to enter the contest. Please be sure I have your email address.
If you mention this contest on Twitter, Facebook, or other social media sites and/or follow me on Twitter or Bluesky or follow Sarvenaz on her social media sites, mention this in the comments, and I'll give you an extra entry for each. You must be 13 years old or older to enter. This book giveaway is U.S.
Marvelous Middle Grade Monday is hosted by Greg Pattridge. You can find the participating blogs on his blog.
Upcoming Interviews, Guest Posts, and Blog Hops
Wednesday, December 10th, I have an agent spotlight interview with Andie Smith and a query critique giveaway
Monday, December 15th, I’m participating in the Dashing December Giveaway Hop
Wednesday, December 17th, I have an agent spotlight interview with Marissa Cleveland and a query critique giveaway
I hope to see you on Wednesday!
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