Madeline Stevens's new novel is Devotion.From her Q&A with Deborah Kalb:
Q: You spent seven years as a nanny--how did your experiences affect the creation of your character Ella?--Marshal Zeringue
A: It’s difficult to work in a wealthy family's home—to live the way they live during the day and then go back to being poor every night. For years, working as a nanny, I imagined how I would have decorated my employers’ houses, the choices I would have made differently raising their children. It’s difficult to not live that sort of double life in your head when you’re surrounded by wealth.
When I started to write Devotion, I decided to let Ella fully feel everything I was trying to repress, and often act on it. I didn’t know what else to do with my envy. I had to shape it into something useful; otherwise it would have eaten me alive.
Q: How was the novel's title chosen, and what does it signify for you?
A: The novel went through a number of working titles before we landed on Devotion. I sold it under Small Night, which was taken from a Pablo Neruda poem: “and let your head of hair be a small night for me,/ a darkness of wet perfume enveloping me.” I loved the image from that poem because it was both sexual and...[read on]