Former Cortlandt Manor Resident Debuts Novel at Barnes and Noble’s Local Author Event

Jacqueline Levine debuted her Young Adult novel, Spiral, on Saturday, May 17th, at a Local Author Event hosted by Barnes and Noble Poughkeepsie. Levine, accompanied by six other authors from the Hudson Valley, showcased her novel and held a 30 minute discussion forum with fans.

Spiral, a contemporary romance for teens, follows the glamorous but chaotic lifestyle of fictional teen celebrity Cherie Belle, who loses her parents in a tragic accident at the book’s start. Belle’s ensuing breakdown is told from two perspectives:  narrator Jack Hansen, a high school football player with a dark past, and the faux gossip website, Dirterazzi.com. 

“Spiral is about a boy falling for a girl who falls from grace,” Levine explained during her forum. “But it is more than a love story. It is a tale about family and empathy, and it takes a serious look at the harsh criticism that young celebrities face today.”

Writing has always been a passion for this Lakeland Central School District alumna, who graduated from Walter Panas High School in 2000 (maiden name Matragrano). She remembers writing short stories as early as five years old. “It was something I always knew I wanted to do, something I always came back to.” After graduating from the University of Miami with a degree in Theater Arts, Levine went on to receive a Master’s of Science in Education from Fordham Graduate School of Education. Through teaching, Levine was able to continue pursuing her passion for writing and for theater.

“I would write plays for an after school drama class, and one just stood out to me as needing to be more. At the time, it was just a play about a typical holiday dinner with an atypical family,” she says of Spiral. “One day, I sat down and asked myself, ‘What could happen to this family next?’”

Inspired by the celebrity drama that we read about every day, Levine penned the novel in under a year, and then she self-published it in August of 2013 through the self-publishing site, Createspace. The book has received positive reviews from readers on Amazon and Goodreads.

Levine says this is the first novel in a three-book series, and she is working on publishing the sequel, Twist, by the end of this summer. She currently teaches fifth grade in lower Westchester and lives in Fishkill with her husband and two dogs.

When asked how she makes time for writing, Levine remarked, “You have to make the time for the things that make your heart happy.”

Spiral is available for purchase on Amazon.