WNY Author Melissa O’Connor to Share Debut Novel The One and Only Vivian Stone at Ellicottville Library
WNY Author Melissa O’Connor to Share Debut Novel The One and Only Vivian Stone at Ellicottville Library
Melissa O’Connor brings her Hollywood-inspired historical fiction debut to Ellicottville Memorial Library for a September 30 reading and discussion.
If curling up with a new page-turner is on your fall must-do list, check out western New York native Melissa O’Connor’s debut novel, The One and Only Vivian Stone. Published just two months ago, the novel shares the story of Margot DuBois and her long-lost ex, with whom she reconnects over a set of unlabeled cassette tapes found in her grandmother's attic. The pair are shocked to hear the voice of Vivian Stone, an old Hollywood film star. What is her connection to Margot’s family? Where did the tapes come from? There’s even more to discover on Tuesday, September 30th at 6:00pm, when O’Connor, herself, will be visiting the Ellicottville Memorial Library to discuss her new book!
The One and Only Vivian Stone is O’Connor’s first published book, though she is hardly new to writing. “This is my fourth written novel, but just the first to take through the process and get published,” she explained. A lifelong voracious reader, O’Connor always wanted to be an author but was initially intimidated by the process. “I was in my twenties when I really started trying, but I could never get more than a few paragraphs down because I didn’t know how,” she explained. “I innately understood it, just because I had read so many books, but I didn’t know how to craft the whole plot. I think it took until I was in my thirties to really have enough life experience to be able to craft a whole plot.”
A self-taught writer, O’Connor wrote her first book and then immediately followed it up with a second to prove to herself that she could do it again. Through her third book, she really developed her craft, and then in her fourth book, she asked herself how to write a book that’s marketable. Speaking of her fourth book, O’Connor recalled, “I had to now consider, if I wanted to share the story with other people, it needed to be something that could potentially get an agent and sell. I had to kind of merge what I loved in reading and writing with what is marketable, and that’s how we got to this story.”
The plot, which is a dual timeline, features Margot in the present day, who discovers the mysterious set of cassette tapes in her grandmother’s home, where Margot grew up. Unable to get the cassette player working, Margot brings it to the music shop where her ex works. He agrees to fix the tape player if she allows him to listen to the tapes, too. “As they listen, they hear a story about Hollywood in the 1950s and Vivian’s pivot from film to TV, the misogyny of Hollywood and the studio system, what the actors could do with their bodies, and all these different ways that they tried to control who they could date and their image, and things like that,” O’Connor explained. “We hear about Vivian’s friendship and her two great loves, and so in the end, we find out what the connection is between the past and present when she gets to the end of the tapes.”
O’Connor, who enjoys the historical fiction genre, said Vivian’s character is inspired in part by Lucille Ball, and there are also connections to Judy Garland and Marilyn Monroe in the book. O’Connor noted that the 1950s was a fascinating time in entertainment, as television was perceived as inferior to film, yet it was beloved by the public. While O’Connor already had background knowledge prior to writing her book, she did quite a bit of research, including travel to Los Angeles to learn more about the places that would have been familiar to her characters.
O’Connor also learned a great deal about the publishing process through The One and Only Vivian Stone. While she’d queried her earlier books, her fourth book was by far the most personal book she’d ever written, which O’Connor believes was key to its success. “I had sent out about 40 letters and I ended up getting about half of them who wanted to read the book,” she recalled. “Then, about six ended up offering, and I had never had an offer before!”
In January of 2024, O’Connor sold her book to Gallery Books, which is an imprint of Simon & Schuster, the third largest publisher in the U.S. Copies of her book will be available at the Ellicottville Memorial Library event on September 30th. To learn more about O’Connor and her new book, visit www.melissaoconnor.com.