Welcome Gail! Let's start with our favorite question. How did you develop a love of story?
Through a childhood of reading. It was
the fifties, and we lived on a farm. None of this nonsense of driving to town to be on a sports team, etc. (That was
my dad’s view, no questions asked.) It was all about work. But in between, in
the evenings and every other chance I got, I read. I think Mom was my model,
although she was so busy, she had little chance to devote time to reading.
But she made sure we went to Sunday school, where
stories abounded. Amazing miracle stories of an oil jar being magically filled,
a little girl being raised from the dead, a man walking on water ... oh, the
stories! I brought my Sunday school papers home proudly and shared with whomever
would listen.
Visits
to the local library became necessities, and characters were in some ways more
real to me than the people around me. School offered more stories—I was one of
those kids that cried on the last day in spring and couldn’t wait for the first
day in fall. From Emily Dickinson to Mark Twain, I loved books.
I
still remember a bookmark from back then. The verse ended with, “From books we
learn most everything.”
LOL. I can't imagine an author who doesn't love to read but I know there are some out there. :) How
long have you been writing?
Since junior high, which tells you I grew up before
“middle school” came about. But sporadically. Some of my poems and articles
were published years ago, and I started a sympathy card company with verses
penned in the middle of the night when our family went through some devastating
events.
My memoir, Catching
Up With Daylight, came out in 2013, and I started it about nine years
earlier. While in that process, these characters started showing up in my mind,
and gradually, my courage grew. I began to write their stories.
Chuckle. I can relate. I went to junior high too. :)Tell us about your new novel.
The heroine, Dottie
Kyle, is the kind who’d never want to stand out in a crowd. But in her little
Iowa town in the aftermath of World War II, the loss of her son Bill to the war
puts her in a special class of women, Gold Star mothers. Of course, nobody
wanted to be one, but here Dottie is, making the best of each day after her
husband dies at the end of the war.
At
Helene’s boarding house, Dottie takes pride in offering home-cooked meals to
the male boarders now, although her husband would never approve of her working.
Cleaning and cooking for these quiet, isolated men gives her a reason to wake
up each morning. Grateful for her job, she tackles her workload without
complaining ... and then Helene brings in a new employee, younger and
worldly-wise.
Two
other things happen as late summer turns into a chilly autumn. Cora, Dottie’s
daughter in California, develops complications with her third pregnancy,
increasing Dottie’s desire to see those grandbabies she’s never met. And Al,
the widower next door, shows a sudden, unexpected interest in Dottie—what’s
this all about?
Ooh, that sounds like a fun read. What
spiritual truths do you desire to convey to your readers?
I’d like my readers
to recognize the tenacity of the human spirit. That’s not a “spiritual truth”
we often discuss, but consider the Romans chapter eleven list of VIPS of our
faith. Tenacity strides through their lives—without it (and there’s a fine line
between faith and tenacity, imho), they’d have caved.
Women of every era “make do” as they face
challenges. We see this quality in Esther, who rises from a common girl to
queen, “for such a time as this.” But she doesn’t rise without hesitating, nor
triumph without agonizing. I have a special appreciation for World War II
women, because that struggle forced them to show their colors.
Quiet, unassuming women like Dottie Kyle held the
world together while their husbands and sons fought. They may not have had time
to lead Bible studies, but they were there when a fallen soldier came home,
scrubbing the basement church kitchen and spit-shining the sanctuary for the
funeral. They put their faith into action.
The home front provides endless fodder for novels in
nearly every locale. For example, a lady in the town next to ours pulled some
certificates for growing hemp, used to make ropes for the Navy, from her
memorabilia. I recall slashing sturdy hemp plants out of our soybean fields
when we walked the fields to cut out unwanted corn. I had no idea it probably
represented remnants from some farmer’s contribution to the war.
But back to spiritual truths—we can fall into
thinking things are worse now than they ever were. I think stories from the
past remind us that’s not true, and women persevered through it all. It’s the
same today—giving up is not an option.
Well said, Gail. What
advice can you give to writers trying to break into the publishing world?
Keep
reading. Study all the technique books you can, take all the online classes
possible, work hard at understanding how fiction works, and as your genre comes
to you, give it all you’ve got. Read Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way, do the exercises she suggests (they’re fun!!),
and don’t look back. Read The Moral
Premise and discuss it with someone farther along the road. Then read it
again.
Keep
writing. Keep writing. And keep editing, once you’ve completed the story. I
can’t even count how many times I’ve re-edited my manuscripts. Now, I edit for
other authors, too, and it’s SO much easier to see their errors than my own. So
the rule is, you MUST find a crit partner or editor to shadow you. MUST!!!
With
writing, there’s always something to make better. It’s as if striving for
perfection won’t work in this arena—keep aiming for clarity and strengthening
the moral premise upholding your story. If you’re looking for a job that has an
END to it, writing is not for you.
Great words of wisdom. What’s
something quirky about you that most people don’t know?
I’m not sure this is quirky, but I’ve often felt
like an outsider. We’ve moved a lot during our marriage, and even though I’ve
enjoyed every place we’ve lived ...well, maybe not Senegal, West Africa ...
Anyway, for me, it’s always about the people, but sometimes I’ve sensed a
distance from what was going on around me. Hard to define—maybe some readers
will know instantly what I mean.
Kathleen Norris clarified this “outsider” sensation
for me in The Cloister Walk as she
described being a writer. I don’t have the exact quote, but it was about our
vocation being to report what’s going on, and to do that, we have to look in on
scenes. Ah ... I finally understood that woebegone feeling. The feeling wasn’t
about me, per se, it was about my vocation. Isn’t it fun when comfort comes
unexpectedly?
LOL. I think I can relate. :) If
you have a day all to yourself how would you choose to spend it?
I’d have an
early, quiet morning, with my usual reading. Al-anon literature continually
builds me up, as do the Scriptures. Then I’d free-write for a while, just for
the pure joy of it. And do some garage sale-ing—a great way to meet people. I’d
take a long walk and maybe a bike ride on my trusty old Schwinn, followed by an
undisturbed nap. Then I’d read an old favorite, and meet my favorite cousin for
dinner. (I probably wrote that because I get to see her this week, and am so
looking forward to the kind of talk you can have only with those who know your
roots.)
Sounds like a full day. Thanks again for stopping by to see us, Gail. Be sure to leave a comment today to be entered into the November drawing for The Mistletoe Kiss by Janet Lee Barton.
Be sure to tune in next week to learn more about Nike Chillemi. Have a great week.
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