As far back as fifth grade, Suzanne Mattaboni knew that she would be an established novelist. Years later, she is making good money as a corporate writer, but Suzanne never lost her dreams of being a storyteller. Through a whole lot of resilience and determination, Suzanne is now advancing her goal of being an esteemed novelist by incorporating an ’80s twist to her upcoming piece Once in a Lifetime, which hopes to withstand the test of time despite the decade being behind us.
Born in New York, Suzanne is the recipient of many accolades, including being a Pushcart Prize-nominated fiction writer, blogger, essayist, retro podcaster, and corporate consultant. Moreover, she’s been a community service reporter for Newsday, and her works have appeared in numerous publications such as The Huffington Post, Seventeen, Mysterious Ways, Guideposts, Dark Dossier, and more. But despite her various accomplishments, Suzanne excels most in creating thoughtful, fun fiction; producing women’s fiction, horror, young adult, and middle-grade works. In addition, she’s a significant contributor to well-known anthologies like the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, Pizza Parties and Poltergeist, The Little Demon Digest, and What’s a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Relationship Like This?
Suzanne has also dabbled in acting and theater, usually as a lead singer and comic relief in pastoral-themed regional musical productions like Fiddler on the Roof, Zorba, and Brigadoon. She started her writing career at Columbia Pictures in Manhattan, where she spent some time doing script research for notable films like Point Break and Spike Lee’s School Daze. After years of working in school district and regional PR, she moved onto work with larger corporate clientele, getting them featured in media like Bloomberg News, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Forbes.
After building a portfolio as a highly acclaimed writer for many of the market’s most prominent publications, Suzanne went back to her roots and decided to further her career as a fiction writer, even adding blogging and pop-culture podcasting to her resume, as well as a hosting gig with the Banzai Retro Club focusing on the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s.
Suzanne’s quirky and energetic debut novel Once in a Lifetime is a coming-of-age piece set in 1984 New Hope, Pennsylvania, and Long Island, New York. The paperback is set to launch on May 24, 2022 in time for summer, published by TouchPoint Press. It follows off-beat and ambitious art student Jess Addentro as she desperately attempts to jump-start her love life and career in an era when women were finally told they could have it all—love, sex, friendships, education, careers, meaning, and success. That said, Jess has no idea about all the madness set to unfold as soon as she decides to get her hands on everything, including a steamy new wave bass guitarist who lands her in a frustrating love triangle, among other compromising messes that threaten to derail her plans to pursue a dream study abroad program.
The novel’s plot plays out against a vibrant background of 1980s new wave music and art, with a tone that combines a much-needed pop-culture sensibility and snarky wit with an intelligent, literary edge. In portraying New Hope of the 1980s, it embodies the turmoil and flippant energy of David Byrne’s new wave anthem “Once in a Lifetime,” which the novel is named after.
The book will hold special appeal to women over thirty who remember all the fanfare and musical flair of this decade. Yet it boasts of a solid feminist bend, considering it’s being positioned as a romantic comedy that doesn’t focus all on the guy, but rather puts a weighted emphasis on core female friendships instead.
“I want to write fiction that pulls people away from the politics and divisive influences of the day. Too much of our current lives and the forces we’re exposed to thrive on discord,” Suzanne explains about the tone of her novel. “It’s edgy, but it still shows us a free-living, ambitious, feminist heroine in a trail-blazing era that produced icons ranging from RuPaul to Sandra Day O’Connor. It also shows the roadblocks women hit on the way to where they wanted to be.”
In years to come, Suzanne hopes to become “a fabulous best-selling author” and write more pieces starring the protagonist of her current work, Jessica. She also aspires to mentor emerging writers and be a keynote speaker at conferences and events, making people laugh and participating in thought leadership activities that promote living your best life, perseverance, and women succeeding in male-dominated professions like high-tech.
