arts&life
books
With Love, Alexa
JOYCE WISWELL SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
A
Local writer
Alexa Randolph
publishes her
fi rst novel.
details
Alexa Randolph will be signing
copies of With Love, Ella 2-4 p.m.
Saturday, April 28, at Orchard
Mall in West Bloomfield. Books
will be available for purchase, or
can be ordered at amazon.com
or alexarandolph.com.
lexa Randolph loves binge-watching
reality shows like The Bachelor and
The Real Housewives, as well as the
“cheesy love stories” on the Lifetime and
Hallmark channels. She took inspiration
from both genres for her first novel, With
Love, Ella.
“I have always loved romance and the
happily-ever-after,” the 23-year-old West
Bloomfield resident says. “And I love creating
my own fictional world.”
With Love, Ella tells the story of successful
party planner Ella Chambers, who is plan-
ning her own dream wedding to longtime
boyfriend Daniel Collins, a professional foot-
ball player. But a shocking medical diagnosis
turns Ella’s world upside-down and jeopardiz-
es her future happiness. As the promos tease,
“Will she and her fiancé finally make it down
the aisle, or will tragedy get in the way?”
Randolph has self-published the romance
novel on Amazon, where it can be purchased
as either an e-book or a hard copy through
the CreateSpace service.
She’s sold about 150 copies since its
December debut, and Randolph is enjoying
promoting the novel, which had a launch
party at the West Bloomfield JCC in January.
On April 28, she’ll sign copies at Orchard Mall
in West Bloomfield.
Randolph has always enjoyed writing but
had expected to spend her career as an event
planner (like Ella). “It was something I had
wanted to do for about five years, but after I
actually did it for about six months, I realized
it wasn’t what I wanted,” she says. “I’m good
at the organizing part but not as good at the
design part.”
She left that job to devote herself to writing
full time. She’s already penned a second novel,
Healing Hearts, and is working on a sequel to
With Love, Ella called Daniel Ever After.
Randolph strives to create a chapter a day,
writing on her computer for about three
hours each morning and another two hours
later in the day. “Some days it works out and
some days it doesn’t,” she says, “but this is
my job right now — full-time blogger and
author.”
She wrote her first short story for an
assignment in the eighth grade about four
friends who grow apart but then come
back together. “Reading back, it is so funny
because it wasn’t very good,” she confessed.
After graduating from West Bloomfield
High School in 2012, Randolph attended
Michigan State University, where she majored
in communications, enjoyed sorority life for
a few years and chaired MSU Hillel’s Jewish
Women’s Forum in her senior year.
“I am very proud of my Judaism and my
religion,” says Randolph, who had her bat
mitzvah at Congregation Shaarey Zedek in
Southfield. “Almost all of my characters are
Jewish because that’s what I’m used to, but
you don’t really know unless there is a wed-
ding and someone breaks a glass.”
With Love, Ella has charming cover art by
Ryan Achtman of Novi, who is the brother of
Randolph’s boyfriend, Maxx. He nailed her
vision on the first try.
“It was the first cover he came up with and
it was exactly what I wanted,” Randolph says.
The novel itself — which Randolph dedi-
cated to her parents, Lori and Chuck — took
a lot longer, with many rounds of edits and
rewrites over a three-year period. The strug-
gle, she said, was worth it. “This last version
was definitely what I wanted,” she says.
Randolph blogs extensively on what she
describes as a “lifestyle empowerment” blog
called Love, Alexa, which is available at
alexarandolph.com.
“It’s written for women in their 20s and
includes advice from things I have learned,
like the pros and cons of social media, and
that sometimes, as hard as it can be, it’s
important to cut people out of your life,” she
says.
That later lesson came the hard way when
Randolph realized that not all of her “friends”
were happy to witness her success. “There
are people who will be jealous and one-up
you, people who want to cut you down,” she
says. “But you have to live your life how you
want to live and not worry about others. Do
what makes you happy.”
She said she’s “developing a thick skin” and
has “also learned it’s OK to feel a little lost in
your 20s and that you learn as you go.” As she
muses on her blog, “Now that I am writing
full-time and finally starting my brand, it is
scary … What if I think I am good at what
I do, but in reality, I’m really not? … If it is
something we really want and we work for
it, there should be nothing stopping us but
ourselves.” •
jn
April 26 • 2018
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