The pair will be sharing the spotlight tonight at Flyleaf Books to promote Han’s new book, “To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before.”
Han, the author of The New York Times best-selling series “The Summer I Turned Pretty,” will start the event by reading from her book, then will have a conversation with Dessen about their respective writing processes, the transformations in the young adult publishing industry in the past 10 years, as well as their experiences at UNC.
“I’m really not in promotional mode right now because my last book came out in June, but I’ll do anything for Jenny and I love Flyleaf,” said Dessen, a lifelong Chapel Hill resident who is currently working on an upcoming novel.
Linnie Greene, marketing manager at Flyleaf, said if past events with Dessen are any indication, this event will likely be standing room only.
“You’re hearing from people who have already done this for quite a while and who are very experienced in the whole process of starting with a manuscript and ending up with a novel that sells hundreds of thousands of copies to people all over the world,” she said.
Dessen met Han, who lives in Brooklyn, face-to-face for the first time in 2008 after years of telecommunication. In 2006, when Han was enrolled in a class at UNC called “Writing Children’s Literature,” professor Ruth Moose recommended her manuscript to Dessen, who had recently retired from her position in the creative writing program.
Once Dessen read it, she called Han to congratulate her on what would be her first novel, “Shug,” published in 2007.
Since then, Han and Dessen have kept in touch by seeing each other at library conferences, panels and other literary events. However, their one true uniting force has been Twitter, which keeps them connected as they decompress during UNC basketball season and make plans to one day become co-owners of season tickets.
