Jeffrey B. Burton

Jeffrey B. Burton was born in Long Beach, California, grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, and received his BA in Journalism at the University of Minnesota.

His many novels include The Finders, The Chessman, and The Eulogist.

He lives in St. Paul with his wife, an irate Pomeranian named Lucy, and a happy galoot of a Beagle named Milo.

Burton's new novel is The Keepers.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

The first book in my series about dog handler Mason "Mace" Reid and his extraordinary pack of human remains detection dogs was titled The Finders. That's what he calls his cadaver dogs. The second in the series is titled The Keepers, which plays off the old nursery rhyme (Finders, Keepers, Losers, Weepers) but, as the novel progresses, the keepers comes to represent the group of villains they're up against.

What's in a name?

Everything. You want a certain cadence (think James Bond, Mitch Rapp, Jason Bourne) and nothing that could distract.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

My teenage reader self would be delighted with middle-aged Jeff as teenage Jeff read a bunch of dog-related novels (Where the Red Fern Grows, Call of the Wild, Fluke, etc.).

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Currently, I've been rewriting a prologue for what seems an eternity (stripping it down to its basics). In terms of changes, that depends on what my editors find.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

Reid isn't a superhero like the characters listed above. He's more of a regular guy, like me, who gets some things right and some things dead wrong. Unlike me, Reid's lucky to have canine friends around to pull his chestnuts out of the fire when things go south.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Music - Reid names his dogs after country or country rock songs ("Elvira," "Sue," "Maggie May," "Delta Dawn," "Billie Joe"). Also, The Keepers finds Reid investigating the death of a one-hit wonder. I'm also a bit of a history buff, and The Keepers digs into Chicago's deliciously checkered history.

Visit Jeffrey B. Burton's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Gilles Legardinier

Gilles Legardinier writes genre-hopping best sellers in French with more than 2 million copies sold and translations in 20 languages. A novelist, screenwriter, producer, and director, his film industry experience in Los Angeles, London, and Paris ranges from scale model maker and pyrotechnician to marketing/distribution for Warner and Twentieth Century Fox.

Legardinier's new novel is The Paris Labyrinth.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

The title The Paris Labyrinth propels you right into the story; it evokes a city and an atmosphere of mystery. The setting and the context of this intrigue are fundamental: it’s the 1889 World’s Fair, the birth of the City of Light, the opening of the Eiffel Tower, in a time when there are a lot of new technologies. People back then feel at a loss, a bit like today, they’re scared by all these changes. Vincent, the protagonist of this story, especially feels it as he is a secret passage maker and is threatened by an invisible power. In this thousands-of-years-old and labyrinthine city, he must unveil the secrets of a mysterious hunt made of riddles, lost knowledge, and hidden places so he can survive. The title is the first step of the journey and already plunges the reader into a universe of adventure and mysteries.

What's in a name?

The name is the first glimpse you get of a character, it’s their calling card. In literature, you only have the words to picture the character in the reader’s mind, no image, and this is why the name becomes so important. A name must strike a chord; it must resonate with what you, personally, profoundly feel about it and what it evokes in the collective imagination. The choice of character names is essential and it’s a step of the work of being an author that I truly enjoy. For The Paris Labyrinth, Vincent, the main character, has a timeless first name indicating a strong and complex personality. Gabrielle, the woman who will change his brother Pierre’s life, has an internationally well-known first name associated with charm.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Well, each book is a journey. At the beginning, you present the protagonists and lay the foundations for the action. The ending reveals, explains, and brings everything to a close. These are two really different parts of the story to write, but I don’t really have any preference. It’s just like when you go for a long stroll. At the beginning, you just want to start, even though you know it’s going to end at some point. At the end, you’re sad to leave the adventure, but the memory of it is now a treasure to you. The hardest part, in my opinion, is the one just between those two—when you have to go the distance, not get lost, make sure the people you have invited into your story are comfortable and don’t need anything. I love to take care of the readers!

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

I’m the one who writes, imagines, and feels, but my aim is not to talk about me through the creation of my characters. Of course, since I create them, they’re bound to have my values and be the fruit of my life course, but the part of me in each of them is still very subtle. To me, the most important thing is to tell a sincere story, with coherent and deep characters. I am touched by what my characters live and go through, but they’re each an entity in themselves, they’re not my clones.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

The teenager I was isn’t dead; he still lives in me in perfect harmony with the adult I became. He helps me to write, he inspires me! He hates to be bored! I love to play, to laugh, and to discover new things. I’m still young in my mind even though my life experience is getting substantial now! I think I would have liked my stories, the sincerity they carry. I remember that, when I was a kid, I already hated people who would take themselves too seriously. I loved those who would talk to me for real, honestly. Whatever we do, we must act and do it with all our hearts but without pretension. Lots of teenagers and young adults read my books and have played a major role in building my success, and this truly makes me happy.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Life! Life inspires me, people, chance meetings, everything I see around me, every day. Art works inspire me as well when they’re sincere and created by authentic personalities: feelings and humor can hardly bear to be industrially manufactured. My stories are the continuation of who I am; I shape my personality a bit more every day with the world around me. I absorb so much from what’s around me, all the time!

Visit Gilles Legardinier's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Paris Labyrinth.

--Marshal Zeringue

Angela May

Angela May is the founder of May Media and PR and a former award-winning television news journalist who helps promote great books and share important community stories as a media specialist. She’s been working with Mary Alice Monroe for more than a decade. The Islanders is their first book together! May’s husband is a middle school assistant principal. They have two children and live in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

When we started writing this middle grade novel, the working title was The Island during the rough draft. It seemed fitting at the time, considering that the setting of the story--Dewees Island, SC--was a special nature sanctuary that my co-author, Mary Alice Monroe, and I absolutely love it. The title seemed to appropriately reflect the strong sense of place we were creating. However, as our characters developed and the scenes crystalized, their adventurous story led us to rename the book The Islanders because that is who they became, together, in their summertime journey together. And, through the characters’ experiences, we felt like the reader would grow to feel like one of the gang too, an Islander who yearns to return to Dewees again and again. You’ll have to let us know if you think we chose the better title after you read the book. We’re curious to know!

What's in a name?

Each character’s name in the book is special to us, and the names were relatively easy to come up with.

First, our main protagonist is Jake Potter. Mary Alice originally wanted to name him Jack, in honor of her first grandchild. But, then she thought that might not go over so well with her other five grandchildren in the near future. So, I suggested Jake. It’s a nod to my dear husband, whose mother and father have always called him that nickname, even though his name is Jaeson! I don’t know why, but I’ve always thought that nickname to be endearing.

Next, is Jake’s grandmother who he calls Honey. It is a wonderful moniker for one of my family members, which I’ve always thought was a sweet name in place of the traditional grandmother names. And, several years ago, when Mary Alice and I took an informal survey among readers asking what their grandkids call them, Honey was mentioned several times. I’m not sure if it’s a southern thing, but whatever it is, it’s sweet and perfect for our character.

Jake befriends two kids on the island who are coincidentally his age. Macon Simmons is from a successful and wealthy African American family in Atlanta. Mary Alice chose his first name in honor of Macon Bolling Allen, an Indiana black man born in the 1800’s and believed to be the first African-American lawyer in the U.S. and eventually was appointed to the bench to serve as a probate judge in Charleston, SC.

And Lovie, she’s the low country girl I sure would have loved to be when I was her age. Curious, knowledgeable, and fearless in the wild. Her name is specific to Mary Alice’s beloved Beach House series, which is her long-running and bestselling book series that include a matriarch named Olivia Rutledge, AKA Lovie. And later a child born is named in her honor and is nicknamed ‘Little Lovie’. Our editor didn’t like us using ‘Little’ in Lovie’s name, so we dropped the first-half and simply kept Lovie. Her interests and family dynamics mirror the child character of the same name in Mary Alice’s contemporary adult fiction series.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

My teenage reader self wouldn’t even believe this would be possible! Published writer wasn’t on the list of possible career choices at that age.

It wasn’t until my early twenties, and several years into my journalism career writing other people’s stories, that I wished in my heart that I could write books for children. I had no idea that my journey would unfold the way it has so far, and in middle grade fiction. I would have never picked that, but I’m totally in love with writing in this important category in literature.

Also, my teenage self would feel immensely grateful for this unsuspecting opportunity and proud of her efforts.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

For me personally, the endings are hardest. When creating The Islanders with Mary Alice, the beginning drastically changed from its original outline. The shift in one single event in Chapter 1 from Jake’s father dying while serving his country overseas in the Army, to surviving his injuries but not without sacrifice, changed so much of the book. But, that change made the story stronger, and it pushed me out of my comfort zone because we had to reimagine everything. Mary Alice seemed to handle that change much better than me. I credit that to the depth of her experience as a writer. I mean, she’s published 27 books so far. Surely, she’s much more adapted.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

These characters are not exactly me or Mary Alice in any way, but each character embodies qualities or skills that I’d love to have in my own life. Whether it’s their knowledge of the flora and fauna of the low country, or their ability to maneuver a boat through the rich, winding creeks, at least I can live vicariously through my characters; story lives.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

For The Islanders book series, the diverse landscape of my home state of South Carolina inspires me--from the barrier islands to the network of rivers, and the blackwater swamps and national forests. As a former journalist, my job gave me a rich opportunity to visit places I would not have otherwise seen and talk with interesting people with deep connections and understanding to the land and its wildlife.

Learn more about The Islanders and visit Angela May's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Chris Offutt

Chris Offutt is the author of the short-story collections Kentucky Straight and Out of the Woods, the novel The Good Brother, and three memoirs: The Same River Twice, No Heroes, and My Father, the Pornographer. His work has appeared in Best American Short Stories and Best American Essays, among many other places. He has written screenplays for Weeds, True Blood, and Treme, and has received fellowships from the Lannan and Guggenheim foundations.

Offutt's new novel is The Killing Hills.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

It’s hard to speculate on the effect a short phrase will have on a stranger. People often ignore “No Trespassing” or “Emergency Parking Only” signs. Many poems are composed of short phrases but they have a cumulative impact. Titles are difficult in general—after the work to make a book, a writer is then expected to distill its essence down to a few words. Frankly, I’m terrible at titles. In this case, my wife suggested the title because it refers to a conversation in the book and it has a slight rhyme.

What's in a name?

For a protagonist, I tend to go with a one syllable first name because it’s quick and easy to type. The last name “Hardin” was my favorite teacher in elementary school. I also like it because, in the speech pattern of eastern Kentucky, it sounds like someone saying “hard one.” That in turn is an oblique—at least to me—reference to the term “hard man,” British slang for a tough guy. The name “Fuckin’ Barney” is an homage to a friend of mine who took his own life during the time I wrote the book.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

Probably surprised that I was still alive, but disappointed that I wasn’t a famous movie actor, race car driver, or comic book artist—my teenage ambitions. Mainly my younger self would be shocked that I could carry out an interview on a hand-held gizmo that I carried in my pocket along with an encyclopedia, a dictionary, a calculator, and a method to talk to people.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Neither is harder than the other. The beginning is usually done with great joy and freedom—anything can happen! As a result, I change the beginning the most. I often cut the openings completely or move the pertinent information elsewhere. Any narrative goes its own direction. Then I go back and give it a better start. The key to an ending is not to rush it.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

As Flaubert said: “Madame Bovary, c’est moi.” All my characters are roughly one-third me, one-third modeled after someone I know, and one-third their own person as a result of writing. The inner emotional life of protagonists typically mirrors my own at the time of writing. I never try to imagine what my character would feel, but include my own feelings of the moment. As far as their speech and actions, I try to get out of their way and transcribe how they respond to the world.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Photography, visual art, travel, and spending time alone with nature. A few movies and TV shows, but not many. Music would be The Clash and ‘50s jazz. The earliest influence is probably MAD Magazine, the first periodical I subscribed to. Then Marvel comics. Also talking to strangers and observing human behavior. I listen carefully and am big on clandestine eavesdropping, which is much easier since people talk so loudly into their cell phones.

Visit Chris Offutt's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

D.W. Buffa

D.W. Buffa was born in San Francisco and raised in the Bay Area. After graduation from Michigan State University, he studied under Leo Strauss, Joseph Cropsey and Hans J. Morgenthau at the University of Chicago where he earned both an M.A. and a Ph.D. in political science. He received his J.D. degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. Buffa was a criminal defense attorney for 10 years and his Joseph Antonelli novels reflect that experience.

The New York Times called The Defense "an accomplished first novel" which "leaves you wanting to go back to the beginning and read it over again." The Judgment was nominated for the Edgar Award for best novel of the year. The latest Joseph Antonelli novel is The Privilege.

D.W. Buffa lives in Northern California.

My Q&A with the author:

Does the title take the readers into the story?

A title can tell the reader what kind of book it is, whether it is, for example, a murder mystery, a love story, or a courtroom drama. At other times, it can tell something about the story itself, something that, after you have read it, makes it easy to remember. The title The Great Gatsby does not tell you anything about what kind of novel it is, but, once you have read F. Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece, that title stays with you forever. The Privilege tries to do both these things.

The Privilege refers to the attorney- client privilege, the privilege that requires a lawyer to keep secret anything his client may tell him. Defending a client for a murder he did not commit, Joseph Antonelli is losing at trial when a new client confesses, or seems to confess, to the crime. How can Antonelli save an innocent man without violating the privilege with the guilty man? That question is difficult enough, but Antonelli will also have to find a way to save himself when he finds himself a pawn in a game he does not understand, a game in which other murders will be committed, other innocent defendants will be put on trial, and, unless Antonelli agrees to represent them, the evidence that can prove their innocence will never be revealed. The mystery is not who committed murder; the mystery is why it is so important that the innocent be put on trial and why Antonelli defend them.

The Privilege does not refer to the attorney-client privilege alone; it also refers to the privileged lives of men and women who have too much money and too little conscience. It also refers to the privilege of being gifted with the kind of remarkable intelligence that allows the driving force behind the action of the story to control things in a way, and for a reason, that, for a time at least, no one is able to grasp.

What is in a name?

The Privilege is the ninth novel in which Joseph Antonelli is both the narrator and the main character. He was given the name because I wanted to have an Italian, or, more specifically, a Sicilian, who, instead of a low-life mobster, was as good a courtroom lawyer as there was, someone serious about what he does, and serious about the world around him. I named the woman he is with Tangerine, for no other reason than that I have always like the song by that title, and because the words of that song come closer than anything else to describing the heart-throbbing, breath taking, effect she has on everyone who sees her.

How surprised would your teenager reader self be by your novel?

When I was a teenager, people were reading Faulkner and Hemingway and Fitzgerald, and everyone was talking about what they read, serious novels that dealt with some of the tragedies of life. So, in that sense, I would not have been surprised. There has been an element of tragedy in most of what I have written. The innocent may be acquitted in a courtroom drama, but someone lost their life, and no one has been held responsible, and the defendant, the innocent defendant, has been put through hell. At least most of them. Not, as it turns out, Alan Boe, as the reader of The Privilege will discover. The Privilege is a tragedy, but for a somewhat different reason than is usually the case. It has less to do with what happened to the victim, or I should say, victims, than what happens to everyone else, including, perhaps, even the reader.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

I usually know when I start the way I want the story to end, but I did not know even that when I wrote The Privilege. I knew that I wanted to write about the dilemma posed when Antonelli learns from one client what had really happened in a case he was on the verge of losing, but it only started to come together as I wrote it. The story, as often, or even as always, happens, began to tell itself. That is not as strange as it may seem. How often do we hear someone say that a thought suddenly came to them. We never ask, where did it come from? It happens when we began to concentrate on something; it happens when we start to write.

The beginning, as someone used to say, is more than half. Everything follows from that. It establishes time and place, and it sets the mood. Edith Wharton, the great novelist, insisted that the essence of the story, the whole story, should be found on the first page.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

The Privilege, like the other Antonelli novels, is told in the first person. Writing in the first person as Joseph Antonelli, I am Antonelli. But Antonelli is not me, if you collect my meaning. Writing about other characters is like observing someone - you see them, you hear them, you make judgments about them, but you do not, as such, identify with them. The main thing is to make them as lifelike as you can. That does not mean they have to resemble, in whole or in part, anyone you know, or even anyone you have any reason to think could ever exist. One of the main characters in The Privilege, Alan Boe, is a complete impossibility - and one of the most lifelike characters I have ever known, if you will permit me to say this of a purely fictional character of my own invention. But even Alan Boe is drawn from experience, a reading of ancient history. He is what Socrates might have been like had he been born here, in America, sometime in the middle of the twentieth century.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Years of trying cases in the criminal courts gave me a knowledge of the way in which a trial is organized and conducted, and a sense of the intangibles that affect what a jury will do. The years I had the great good fortune to work for Phil Hart, the most respected member of the United States Senate, gave me whatever insight I might have about the shifting boundaries between politics and the law, and, more importantly, the effect someone’s character has on their ability to persuade.

Visit D.W. Buffa's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Martine Bailey

The Prophet, Martine Bailey’s fourth novel, is a historical crime novel in which Tabitha Hart investigates a cold-blooded murder and a utopian sect in an ancient forest.

The novel follows on from events in The Almanack and also reads as a standalone mystery.

Cheshire. May Day, 1753. Tabitha De Vallory's perfect life is shaken when a girl is slaughtered beneath the Mondrem Oak on her family's forest estate. Nearby, enigmatic Baptist Gunn is convinced that a second messiah will be born, amid blood and strife, close to the oak on Midsummer's Day. Could the murder be linked to Gunn's cryptic prophecy?

As Midsummer's Day draws closer, Tabitha soon learns the destiny that threatens her and those she holds most dear...

Bailey lives in a village near Chester, England and her first novel, An Appetite for Violets, was a Booklist Top Ten Crime Debut.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

I didn’t find choosing a title easy. My sleuth character, Tabitha, is drawn into the orbit of a dangerous preacher, Baptist Gunn. As his prophecies are central to the book I played with poetic phrases about divination and omens but nothing suited. I also wanted a title that neatly followed The Almanack with a similar feel such as The Quickening – but that was recently taken.

The story asks, is it possible to see into the future? Tabitha becomes increasingly fearful that Gunn’s prophecies concern her unborn child. Her husband, Nat, investigates Baptist Gunn’s claims, acknowledging that over centuries prophets have guided mankind. So finally I chose the plainest statement of all – The Prophet.

What's in a name?

Baptist Gunn is a rare but true-life phenomenon, a sleeping prophet who appears to make predictions in a sleep-like trance. In choosing his name I was attracted to the combination of the evangelical with something explosively violent. I discovered his name almost ready made when researching the night-time battles between poachers and landowners and found a true life gamekeeper called Baptist Nunn. Tabitha is also a mix of contradictions. Tabitha is a name I associate with witchcraft (Bewitched on TV as a child) and is also listed in a wonderful book of curious Puritan names. As a former prostitute, I gave her the surname Hart for her warmth as she’s a true ‘tart with a heart’.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your novel?

I think she would be amazed, delighted and relieved. As a youngster I did have a secret desire to be a writer but the task ahead seemed completely out of reach. However I have two pieces of evidence about my former self hoping to be a writer. Recently, my former school teacher sent me a story I wrote when I was ten years old. It’s about a Tudor serving woman that has uncanny echoes of most of my novels.

Secondly, I remember writing a long story one teenage summer about a woman on a journey rich in symbolism about a jewel. Again, ‘memorial items’ such as rings and hair jewellery are a theme I love. In The Prophet the murdered woman clutches half of a ring in her cold hand. It is part of a ‘gimmel’ or twin ring – where two hoops fit together to form one revealing an engraving. By the end of the book its two bands are destined to be finally reunited.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

I find it easier to write beginnings. So in The Prophet I had a distinct idea of a folkloric setting in which Tabitha and Nat would discover a victim covered in May flowers in a dark forest. Both recognise the young woman from incidents in their former single lives and this shakes their new found happiness.

When I sent my proposal to my publisher the end was typically fuzzy. That gave me equal parts of creative fun and agony to pull out a good ending right up against my deadline. I love to use misdirection, so I always want the final pages to make the reader reassess everything they’ve read so far.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

The folklore of England is my theme, at a time when science and superstition were battling head to head. To get into the atmosphere I walked in (and videoed) my local Delamere Forest in Cheshire, which was long ago known as Mondrem Forest, as featured in the novel. I found ancient forts, standing stones, and wells to explore. Like my characters I picked and pressed wild flowers, foraged for foods, and learned to make soap from the soapwort herb at writer Alan Garner’s Medicine House.

English folk music was never far from my mind as I love a good murder ballad. Singing was also a central activity in 18thC life, especially around the celebrations of the seasons. My playlist includes singer and fiddle player Seth Lakeman, singer Kate Rusby and new folk duo, Hannah Sanders and Ben Savage.

I tweet a riddle and more from @almanacktweets every Thursday using #FolkloreThursday which keeps me up to date with the world’s amazing community of folklorists.

Visit Martine Bailey's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: An Appetite for Violets.

The Page 69 Test: An Appetite for Violets.

My Book, The Movie: A Taste for Nightshade.

My Book, The Movie: The Almanack.

My Book, The Movie: The Prophet.

--Marshal Zeringue

Laurie Frankel

Laurie Frankel is the New York Times bestselling, award-winning author of four novels. Her writing has also appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly, People Magazine, Lit Hub, The Sydney Morning Herald, and other publications. She is the recipient of the Washington State Book Award and the Endeavor Award. Her novels have been translated into more than twenty-five languages and been optioned for film and TV. A former college professor, she now writes full-time in Seattle, Washington where she lives with her family and makes good soup.

Frankel's new novel is One Two Three.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

Lots! I can’t take credit for the title One Two Three — my editor came up with it — but it’s doing a lot of heavy lifting here. For one thing, it’s a book about triplets. For another, the title reflects the book’s structure, which is told in turns by three narrators. I think of it like a waltz. And third (I had to have three points, right?), it previews the characters, said aforementioned narrator-triplets, who go by the nicknames One, Two, and Three.

What's in a name?

When the narrators’ mother found out she was having triplets, she gave them all M-names with escalating syllables so she’d be able to keep them straight (or, if you prefer, I did that so you would be able to keep them straight). Mab — named for Shakespeare’s fairy queen from Romeo and Juliet — was born first and is nicknamed One. Monday came second and needed two syllables so her mother named her for the day they were born. Monday also goes by Two. And then Three — Mirabel — came last and needed three syllables, so got, according to Mab, the only normal name.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

For my teenage self, this novel would be like looking in a mirror, a lot more than it is for me, in fact. It’s a good thing I used to be a teenage girl because I had to summon her to write these teenage girls since it’s been a really long time for me. This world of high school girldom seems ages ago to me, but my teenage self would be BFFs with these girls for sure.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Beginnings are hard to write. Endings don’t feel like they get written at all — just found. It feels like the whole process of writing a novel boils down to finding the ending, and it’s not something I write at all. I hope you get to the end of this book and feel empowered and lit up. Meantime, when I say beginnings are hard, I’m leaning hard on that plural. For one thing, each narrator gets her own first chapter — so there are three of them — but for another, I rewrote the first page of this book from scratch a dozen times.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

The three narrators of this book are very different from one another, but they all have lots in common with me. I share Mab’s self-doubt and worry that she’s tricked everyone into thinking she’s actually smart. I share Monday’s desire for control and devotions to books and specificity of language. I share Mirabel’s role as the writer, the connector, the observer and aspirer. What does it say about me that I am very like three people who are very different from one another? It’s a good question.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

I love this question! International travel (back when such a thing was possible), live theater (ditto), visual art, baseball, nature, especially the owls in the park near my house.

Visit Laurie Frankel's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Laurie Frankel and Calli.

The Page 69 Test: One Two Three.

--Marshal Zeringue

Patrick Chiles

Patrick Chiles has been fascinated by aircraft, rockets, and spaceflight ever since he was a child transfixed by the Apollo missions. How he ended up as an English major in college is still a mystery, though he managed to overcome this self-inflicted handicap to pursue a career in aviation operations and safety management.

He is a graduate of The Citadel, a Marine Corps veteran and a private pilot. In addition to his novels, he has written for magazines such as Smithsonian’s Air & Space. He currently resides in Tennessee with his wife and two lethargic dachshunds.

Chiles's new novel is Frontier.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

Hopefully a lot. People might immediately think of Star Trek and the “final frontier,” but when I was putting the story together I realized it actually was something of a frontier narrative. It’s about pushing outward, beyond humanity’s current reach, which makes certain other humans greedy. They want to reap the benefits from the risks others have taken. So what are the rules when people are beyond Earthbound jurisdictions? What right or claim does any one group have over anything? Does it all become a free-for-all, like the Wild West or high seas piracy?

What's in a name?

I put a fair amount of thought into character names, but not for any symbolism. It just has to feel right for the character. My main protagonist, Marshall Hunter, is the adult son of Ryan Hunter from my first two novels (Perigee and Farside). Marshall just sounded good to me when I first wrote him as a four-year-old, I wish there was something more profound for the grown-up Marshall but it’s about that simple! Plus it’s not a super common name so it makes the character stand out a bit more than “Bob” or something. Also I play guitar and like Marshall amps, so there’s that.

My Earthbound protagonist, Roberta McCall, came to me right away. To me, her name sounds like who she is: a whip-smart, gum-popping tough girl who loves what she does and isn’t afraid to take chances. She was fun to write.

One of the bad guys, Nick Lesko, took some thought. Does he sound like a sociopathic wannabe mobster to you? Because that’s what he is. He’s a mafia “fixer” who ended up rigging game machines for some Asian casino owners, and they call on him for the biggest “fix” of his life in Earth orbit. I blame this one on watching Goodfellas too many times on AMC. Sounds like he’d fit right in.

The Chinese characters were more difficult. Those took some research because I don’t speak the language and I was determined to not insult the reader with stereotypes. “Max” Jiang is an Americanized nickname for Maleko, which roughly translates as “Pledged to Mars.” That was perfect, as he’s off on a privately-financed mission to a flyby of the Red Planet.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your novel?

He’d only be surprised that it took me this long to get going. Anyone who knew me in childhood is probably not at all surprised that this is what I’m doing now. I used to try my hand at drawing comics and made up stories like this all the time. I’ve always been a space nerd and this is my way of experiencing things that I badly want to see in real life. I suppose it’s kind of a Walter Mitty existence.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

That’s a good one. It really depends on the story. My previous book, Frozen Orbit, came to me with clear visions of the opening and closing chapters. The connective tissue in between was the hard part. With Frontier, I knew where I wanted the story to go and what the major turning points would be, but the climax turned out to be nothing like what I’d planned. And I loved it that way, it was just so much better. It was a thrill to write.

I’d put Marshall and his crew into an impossible situation, worse than I’d planned, and it took some time to work through how he’d get them out of it. But once I did…boom. Those scenes just flew out of me in this exhilarating all-night rush and I couldn’t wait to get to the end. When you’re surprising yourself, that’s when you know you’re on to something.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

Oh, absolutely. I like to say I write to make the voices in my head shut up.

I think it’s necessary to have some of me in the major characters just because it’s easier to make them into more fully-formed people that way. But you have to work hard to keep those aspects separate, otherwise everyone’s speaking with the same voice. I’ve seen otherwise great stories become unreadable because every character sounds like the same person. I also draw from my close family members, namely my wife and sons. But they know that and they’re cool with it.

Antagonists are often drawn from people I’ve met throughout life who I just didn’t like very much. As the joke goes, “Don’t piss me off or I’ll put you in my next book.”

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

In this case, a project called Inspiration Mars that unfortunately never went anywhere. The original space tourist, Dennis Tito, had been pushing this idea to send two people on a manned flyby of Mars using a free-return orbit. Windows of opportunity come up about every 18 years or so for this. It would’ve been a 15-18 month trip with a close flyby around Mars, then back to Earth. This year’s window would’ve allowed a Venus flyby as well. He thought it could be done with a SpaceX Dragon type spacecraft paired with a couple of logistics modules for the living area and resources two people would need for that amount of time. There were some interesting studies done to support it, but in the end nobody was willing to pony up the money. It would’ve been a great proof of concept mission, but undeniably risky. I was fascinated with the idea and really wanted to write a story around it.

Another big influence is some of the current issues in the South China Sea. I extrapolate the kind of Chinese military expansion we see today, creating artificial islands for military bases, etc., out beyond Earth orbit. What kind of effect would that have on a nascent cislunar economy? What kind of steps should we be prepared to take to counter it? And what are the risks?

Otherwise, I pay close attention to how certain movies set up scenes and tell stories. When I’m really in the groove, writing is like I’m just transcribing the movie that’s playing out in my head.

Visit Patrick Chiles's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Patrick Chiles & Frankie and Beanie.

My Book, The Movie: Frontier.

The Page 69 Test: Frontier.

--Marshal Zeringue

Mary Bly

Mary Bly is a New York Times bestselling author under the name Eloisa James, and chair of the English department at Fordham University. She lives with her family in New York City, but can sometimes be found in Paris or Italy. She is the mother of two and, in a particularly delicious irony for a romance writer, is married to a genuine Italian knight.

Bly's new novel is Lizzie and Dante.

From my Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

My working title was “Elba novel,” because the novel takes place on the island. It became Lizzie and Dante when I realized the characters mattered more than the island. I hope readers grow to love all three.

What's in a name?

Lizzie is an American name, and Dante is clearly Italian. Dante’s twelve-year-old daughter is called Etta: an unusual name for an unusual girl.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

Not much. I began my first novel at the age of 8, describing my heroine is “incorrigible,” a quality I wanted to emulate. By my teen years, I was used to shaping heroines who were bolder and more incorrigible than I.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

I jumped into my characters’ lives to describe a transformative summer vacation, so I began with Lizzie on the ferry approaching Elba. The ending was far more difficult to write. Given Lizzie’s cancer diagnosis, I wanted readers to focus on her decision to fight the disease, not the moment when she passes away, so the book ends with the vacation and then skips to an epilogue years later.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

I have written historical romances for years (as Eloisa James) though I’ve never danced in a ballroom or met a duke. But like Lizzie, I am a Shakespeare professor who has weathered cancer and married an Italian man. I have drunk Elba’s fizzy wine, watched children fishing for jellyfish, and read Terry Pratchett on the beach. I can’t keep a tune, but if I could, I would sing hymns and Dylan with Lizzie.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Lyrics from Monty Python’s Holy Grail were inspirational, along with lyrics by Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen. One pivotal meal is modeled on an scene in the film Parent Trap. And Ruby quotes a key phrase, "I think it’s really dangerous to seek personal fulfillment through romantic relationships” from The Incredible Jessica James.

Visit Mary Bly/Eloisa James's website.

The Page 69 Test: Lizzie & Dante.

--Marshal Zeringue

Connie Berry

Connie Berry is the author of the Kate Hamilton Mysteries, set in the UK and featuring an American antiques dealer with a gift for solving crimes. Like her protagonist, Berry was raised by antiques dealers who instilled in her a passion for history, fine art, and travel. During college she studied at the University of Freiburg in Germany and St. Clare's College, Oxford, where she fell under the spell of the British Isles. In 2019 Berry won the IPPY Gold Medal for Mystery and was a finalist for the Agatha Award’s Best Debut. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America and is on the board of Guppies and her local Sisters in Crime chapter. Besides reading and writing mysteries, Berry loves history, foreign travel, cute animals, and all things British. She lives in Ohio with her husband and adorable Shih Tzu, Emmie.

Berry's latest title in the Kate Hamilton Mystery series is The Art of Betrayal.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

The first thing to say is I’ve never yet had my publisher use the title I gave my manuscript. In this case, the manuscript I entitled A Pattern of Betrayal became The Art of Betrayal, which is better because the plot centers around a reclusive widow who’s planning to dispose of her late husband’s famous art collection. The title also references the bad guy, who’s perfected the art of deception and treachery.

All my titles have four words, which (I’ve been told) tells the reader to expect a traditional mystery rather than a thriller or novel of suspense, which often have one- to three-word titles, or a true cozy, with a title built on a pun like Sugar and Vice, A Cookie House Mystery.

There’s an art (and a science) to titling books. I’m glad my publisher knows what they’re doing.

What's in a name?

Kate Hamilton got her name so long ago I can’t remember why I chose it, other than the fact that her late husband’s Scottish roots play a role in the plot of the first book, A Dream of Death. For my main characters, Kate and Tom, I chose simple names I liked and thought I could live with for a long time.

The real fun has been choosing names for the secondary characters.

Lady Barbara Finchley-fforde, for example—the last survivor of the Finchleys of Finchley Hall, a family with eleventh-century roots. When Lady Barbara saved the Hall from creditors by marrying the wealthy son of a Welsh family, Cedru fforde (yes, lower-case double ff’s), her father insisted their surnames be hyphenated, an affectation often associated with the British upper class.

The name I gave Kate’s friend and mentor in the antiquities trade, Ivor Tweedy, combines two elements. Ivor is a Norse name, a hold-over from the Viking incursion into East Anglia, where the book is set. The surname Tweedy has a Dickensian quality, implying eccentricity. Ivor is a loveable eccentric.

Since my books incorporate history, I often choose names from lists of very old or rare English names like Ingham and Nuthall. My best sources for character names are often census records, lists of fallen soldiers in East Anglian churches, and names on tombstones. For wealthy or professional characters, I’ve been known to troll lists of National Trust and BBC executives, although I always mix up the first and last names to protect the innocent.

For each book, to minimize reader confusion, I create an Excel spreadsheet of both first and last character names so I don’t begin names with the same initials, except for families.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your novel?

What an interesting question. Since my parents raised me to believe I could do just about anything I set my mind to, I don’t think my teenage self would have been surprised to learn she would become a novelist. Reading was a pleasure instilled in me very early by my mother, an ex-schoolteacher and book addict. Of course neither would my teenage self have been surprised to learn she would become a world-famous archaeologist who would one day unearth the lost tomb of the Pharaoh Akhenaten.

Actually it was during my early teenage years that I discovered, in the stacks of my local library, not only the writers of the Golden Age of Mystery (Agatha Christie, Cyril Hare, Dorothy L. Sayers, G. K. Chesterton, to name a few) but also those masters of British wit, P. G. Wodehouse and Jerome K. Jerome. I was hooked then and still am now.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Both are hard. Writing is hard. The first chapter of my debut novel went through more iterations than Lady Gaga. That was mostly because I didn’t yet know what the book was really about. Lots of wasted effort. What I’ve learned since is not to revise or change the first chapter until I’ve completed the first draft of the book. I’ve also learned that the first chapter has to do a lot of work, so I’d better get it right.

In The Art of Betrayal, the first chapter begins with Kate in Ivor Tweedy’s antiquities shop. She meets the central character, a reclusive widow who wants to sell a Chinese pottery jar from the Han-dynasty tombs of Imperial China. Kate is thrilled to have the consignment, but the woman herself sends up red flags. Something isn’t right.

I introduced the reader to the possibility of doom in the first sentence: “The fourth of May was one of those glorious spring days in England that almost convince you nothing evil could ever happen again.” Almost.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

There’s something of me in every character I write—good, bad, or somewhere in between. The hard part is bringing it to the surface and then putting it on the page. Once I was writing about a character who was enraged at a supposed injustice. I wasn’t going deep enough, so I pulled up a memory of what I’d felt like when a neighbor’s dog was hit by a car and run over. I loved that dog. At that moment (I was probably ten), I wanted to throw myself at the driver and beat him to the ground. I didn’t, of course, and I’m sure the poor guy felt terrible, but it was the memory of the emotion I drew upon.

Every person, over the course of his or her life, experiences the full range of human emotions. Hopefully we don’t act on them all, but this is the well writers draw from. Another well is observation. Readers often ask me if Kate’s wise, logical mother is patterned after my own mother. I tell them “partly.” My characters are mash-ups of lots of people, but I’m definitely in there somewhere.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

My most significant non-literary influence would be my parents who were antiques collectors and later dealers. My father shopped for clothes at K-Mart, but he thought nothing of paying thousands of dollars for a Georgian silver teapot or an exceptionally fine cloisonné vase. Many of the objects I mention in my books are ones I remember or still own. Our house doubled as a warehouse where objects would come and go. At various times our living room might be occupied by a life-size bust of Marie Antoinette or The Three Graces on a marble pedestal or a sixteenth-century ivory tankard in a terrarium to keep it from drying out. Or possibly all three. I thought my upbringing was totally normal. Only later did I realize that my friends were a bit frightened by it all. Once, as a child, I asked my mother why we couldn’t have new furniture like everyone else. She said, “Our things have a history. So much more interesting.” Now I agree with her.

Visit Connie Berry's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Art of Betrayal.

My Book, The Movie: The Art of Betrayal.

--Marshal Zeringue

Caroline Lea

Photo by Hannah Stevens

Caroline Lea was born and raised in Jersey in the United Kingdom. She lives in Warwick, England.

Lea's new novel is The Metal Heart.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

Initially, I struggled to find a title which would encapsulate a wartime love story and also draw in the beautiful work of art that the Italian prisoners of war create. My draft title was simply Italian Chapel but that felt a little dry and cold. As soon as I decided to use the actual metal heart that still sits in the real-life Italian chapel today, left by one of the prisoners of war who fell in love with an Orcadian woman, it was clear that The Metal Heart was the perfect title. I like the fact that metal implies the harsh brutality of war, while the heart suggests something warmer and more hopeful.

What's in a name?

My twin protagonists, Dorothy and Constance, are outsiders within their community but are very close to each other and united, so I was keen to use names that could be shortened to something more endearing – Dot and Con. The main Italian prisoner, Cesare, has a beautifully musical-sounding name, which perhaps reflects the fact that he’s an artist, and although I wasn’t aware of choosing his name for this reason, I definitely aimed for a name that sounded lilting. Perhaps more significant is my naming of the island where the main action takes place: Selkie Holm is a wilder and more remote fictionalisation of the small Orcadian island, Lamb Holm, where the real Italian Chapel sits. I wanted to draw on the Scottish myths about selkies – women who swim in the sea, like seals, but sometimes come onto land to dance by night. The legend tells us that, if a man takes the selkie’s skin, he can hold her prisoner on land and she can only return to the sea once she lays claim to her skin once more. I loved weaving this, and similar myths into the book, to reflect the rich folkloric history of the Orkney islands.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

I’ve always loved history and enjoyed reading love stories that offer something of an escapist element. I’m a big fan of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin and although it didn’t influence my writing of this story, my teenage self would be sublimely happy to hear readers comparing my book to Louis de Bernieres’. The sea and wild, remote landscapes have always found their way into my writing, so I think The Metal Heart provided me with a wonderful opportunity to write lyrically about what I love. I think my main surprise and joy would be the positive and enthusiastic response I’ve had, both from readers and within the industry, from other writers and publishers – it feels overwhelmingly lovely.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Endings are so hard! I rarely change the beginning of my novels. In most cases, my opening sentences remain the same throughout multiple drafts. I always knew I wanted to start with a dramatic scene, in a storm, with a body being pulled from the wind-whipped water and I was certain that I wanted to move on to the torpedoing of the ship, The Royal Elm (based on the real-life destruction of The Royal Oak) and my protagonists being swept up in the ensuing chaos. My ending changed multiple times, however, and this is nearly always true. It’s difficult to write final scenes that are satisfying but not too cloying; hopeful but not unbelievably so. I think this is particularly true when writing a wartime love story but I’m really happy with the final ending to The Metal Heart.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

I always aim to create characters who feel unique and fully developed but I think it’s very hard to write certain feelings or impulses without having experienced them yourself. In The Metal Heart, when Cesare and Dot first meet, there’s an instant connection, which turns, fairly quickly, into something much more profound. I don’t think I could have written that without my relationship with my partner, which felt (and still feels) slightly uncanny in the ways that we understand each other. I often know what he’s thinking, or what he will say, even before he’s reacted. We finish each other’s sentences and can share jokes without voicing our thoughts. It’s a bit sickening, actually. In a more general way, I’ve wanted to write about prisoners of war for a long time: my great aunt was interned in a Japanese prisoner of war camp in China, during the Second World War; she spoke little of it, but I know it affected her for the rest of her life. Her brother, my great uncle, fought and died in El Alamein, and I drew some of the descriptions of Cesare’s time in North Africa from what I know and have imagined of my great uncle’s experiences there.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Growing up near the sea on the island of Jersey has definitely influenced my work. It feels natural to write about the ocean and about windswept landscapes, but also about small communities: the way they can be both supportive and oppressive; the way they create their own rules – and their own punishments for breaking them. I’ve always enjoyed exploring the power dynamic within relationships – both romantic and familial – and I feel like this is almost certainly a product of an unhappy childhood and unstable family life, which, for many years, made all of my friendships and relationships hard. I spent a great deal of time trying to fathom out how other people worked and the ways in which we misunderstand each other. Trauma and outcasts are recurrent themes in my work, but I also enjoy writing about characters who overcome suffering – and I think this is something I’m getting better at all the time. As a younger writer, I found it hard to write optimistically. Happy endings felt unrealistic. Perhaps it’s a reflection of where I am personally, that writing about hope feels more and more natural. I’m very lucky.

Follow Caroline Lea on Twitter.

The Page 69 Test: The Glass Woman.

My Book, The Movie: The Glass Woman.

My Book, The Movie: The Metal Heart.

--Marshal Zeringue

Soraya M. Lane

Soraya M. Lane graduated with a law degree before realizing that law wasn't the career for her and that her future was in writing. She is the author of historical and contemporary women's fiction, and her novel Wives of War was an Amazon Charts bestseller.

Lane lives on a small farm in her native New Zealand with her husband, their two young sons and a collection of four legged friends. When she's not writing, she loves to be outside playing make-believe with her children or snuggled up inside reading.

Lane's new novel is The Secrets We Left Behind.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

I think it does a lot! The story is all about being left behind - in this case during the evacuation of Dunkirk during WWII. and what these women face during that time… trust me, there are some terrifying secrets they left behind!!

Originally when I pitched the book I just called it The Girls of Dunkirk, but my editor told me she felt that title was too light for the content of the book. It became a very emotional, big story, and we went back and forth with ideas until I sent her this one - and she immediately said: “Yes, this is the one!”

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

I think my teenage self would just be so impressed that I managed to make my dream a reality - I wanted to be a published author from my early teens! I loved reading historical fiction then, my mom let me read all her books so I was reading very grown up fiction at a young age. I love that she never censored what I could read, because it allowed me to read widely. I think the young me would be really proud that I’m writing about brave, incredible women, and giving them a voice.

My favorite subjects as a teen were English and History, with a special interest in WWII… I think the surprise would be that my teenage self learnt so much about history, but was never taught about the amazing things women did during the war.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

This is a really interesting question for me - I often picture both the beginning and ending when I first come up with a new idea. I don’t start writing until I can see the opening scene playing through my mind like a scene from a movie. Because that’s so clear in my mind, I don’t often change it, so it stays very much the same. With the end, my editors always seem to make me change it! I usually find this a very hard thing to do, but once I’ve re-written it, I always prefer the new version. It’s usually about going deeper with my characters and really giving the reader the most satisfying epilogue we can. I’m a huge fan of the epilogue!

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

The film Dunkirk. I just loved the movie, but at the end I found myself wondering where all the women were! I started my research that night and became absolutely obsessed with this moment in history… and when I found out that there were women involved, I knew I had to write the story. It was such a brilliant film in terms of sharing such an important moment in history, and I then felt it was my duty to tell the story from the female perspective.

Visit Soraya Lane's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Secrets We Left Behind.

--Marshal Zeringue

Stacey Swann

Stacey Swann holds an M.F.A. from Texas State University and was a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. Her fiction has appeared in Epoch, Memorious, Versal, and other journals, and she is a contributing editor of American Short Fiction. She is a native Texan.

Swann's new novel is Olympus, Texas.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

Before I even had any specific characters or plot, I had the idea to write a novel that somehow merged classic mythology with modern Texas and all of its state mythology. The title Olympus, Texas allowed me to evoke both at the same time. I’m also a writer that is drawn to setting, so I wind up with a lot of place names as titles. I hope that readers can connect with the landscape of this part of Texas as clearly as they do the characters in the book.

What's in a name?

Coming up with the names of my characters was so much fun for me. I wanted names that riffed off the gods they were based on but still felt at home in modern rural Texas. Like most Americans, I’m more familiar with the names of the Greek gods than their Roman counterparts, but the Roman names were much easier to adapt so mine also lean towards the Roman gods: Peter for Jupiter, June for Juno, March for Mars, Vera for Venus. In general, I do love unusual names in fiction. But I also think they have to be used sparingly. For every Hap and Lavinia, you need a Peter and a Ryan.

How surprised would your teenage reader self be by your new novel?

Not very surprised at all, actually. I had a love of Greek mythology as a child, and the setting of Olympus, Texas borrows heavily from the area of Texas I lived in until I was eighteen. My teenage self would only be surprised that I had gotten a novel published, as I unfortunately didn’t have a high regard for my own creativity at that age. I thought I was doomed to love novels but never produce one of my one.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

I find endings much harder! There’s something about the wide-open potential of openings that makes it easy for me to write. Here we have a married couple (Peter and June), with grown children, in a strained relationship that is further strained by the actions of one of their kids. When I first start, I’m feeling open to every possibility and the characters have loads to tell me. But the ending needs to factor in everything that passed in the previous hundreds of pages, and it needs to both satisfy the reader and also not feel totally expected. No easy feat! The last seventy-five pages of Olympus, Texas needed a lot of revision passes to get them right.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

I have always loved movies. One of my toughest decisions was deciding whether to major in English and Film in undergrad. I often write in the present tense in fiction, even though past tense is the more common convention, and I think it’s because when I am drafting, I see the scenes in my head like a movie. Movies exist in the present tense to me. My novel also has a lot of arguments in it. I’ve had a passion for fictional arguments ever since I saw the film version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.

Visit Stacey Swann's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Kathryn Erskine

Kathryn Erskine is the author of several acclaimed books for young adults and children, including the National Book Award–winning middle grade novel Mockingbird.

Her new novel is Lily's Promise.

My Q&A with the author:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

Lily’s Promise gives you an idea but, of course, it’s how she fulfills that promise that makes for an interesting story. Lily is a shy girl who was homeschooled by her father until he passed away. Now, she has to attend public school and, as she promised her dad, learn to speak out and stand up for herself. As she discovers, it’s a lot easier if you reach out and make a few friends. She also discovers that it’s imperative to speak out when you’re dealing with bullies and want to help your friends. I also like to think of Lily’s “promise” as her “potential.” Like young readers, she has a lot!

What's in a name?

I love this question because names convey so much. I try to give characters names that are appropriate to the time, place, and culture. I research popular baby names by year at the Social Security website, for example. However, sometimes I pick a specific or quirky name for a reason. That’s why I picked “Hobart” for Lily’s best friend. It’s an uncommon name and Hobart is a quirky character. He’s young and naïve for middle school, he wears a bowtie, and he’s obsessed with curling, a sport few know or care about. He provides laughter and, really, is the most loyal friend anyone could have.

Do you find it harder to write beginnings or endings? Which do you change more?

Good question. I think it depends on the book. Beginnings are critical and do so much—introduce the character, the voice, the plot—but I probably tweak the ending more because that’s my last chance to talk to the reader, the last impression they’ll leave with, and I want them to put down the book with a satisfied sigh, even wish there were more and, ultimately, I want the characters to stay with them.

Do you see much of yourself in your characters? Do they have any connection to your personality, or are they a world apart?

I was shy, like Lily, when I was young, which made moving from school to school hard because I was always having to break into existing groups. Once I found my niche, though, I became more like Hobart because I was comfortable, and because I’m generally a positive person who likes to have fun. And I’m like Lily’s mother, being a lawyer like her, and more of a realistic, down-to-earth (as opposed to gushy) kind of a mom. And yes, I made my kids do their own laundry, too, starting in kindergarten.

What non-literary inspirations have influenced your writing?

Lily’s Promise was partially fueled by the last administration and the apparent acceptance of behavior such as lying, bullying, and denigrating others. In fact, the bully in the book embodies those qualities. It was disturbing to hear of incidents of bigotry in elementary school on the rise during that period, and I didn’t want kids growing up thinking it was normal or OK, because it’s not. I want kids to know that they have agency and power, and they can use it to change themselves and their world. Libro, the metafiction character who comments on the characters and story, even addresses the bullies, and suggests how they can change.

Learn more about the book and author at Kathryn Erskine's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Kathryn Erskine & Fletcher.

My Book, the Movie: Lily's Promise.

The Page 69 Test: Lily's Promise.

--Marshal Zeringue