Wednesday, July 16, 2025

Q&A with Susan Wiggs

 


 

 

Susan Wiggs is the author of the new novel Wayward Girls. Her many other books include The Lost and Found Bookshop. She lives on an island in Washington State's Puget Sound. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write Wayward Girls, and how did you create your character Mairin?

 

A: I grew up in a small town in western New York, not far from Buffalo, but we moved overseas when I was a child. I never went back until 2021, when my big brother and I embarked on a journey to revisit our childhood haunts. Jon was facing a terminal diagnosis, and this nostalgic trip was an item on his bucket list.

 

When we visited the church of our youth, vivid memories of Jon as an altar boy flooded back—especially the time his sleeve caught fire from the incense thurible. You might notice a dramatized version of this incident early in the novel!

 

This moment sparked a deeper exploration into the impact of the Catholic Church in the ‘60s and ‘70s. My research led me to a forbidding stone complex at 485 Best Street in Buffalo that had once been a place called The Good Shepherd, a Magdalene Laundry—a place where “wayward girls” were sent to be “reformed” by strict nuns.

 

Teenage girls were forced into slave labor and some delivered babies without proper medical care–babies that were stolen from them and put up for adoption. Though vaguely aware of the “laundries” in Ireland, I was shocked to learn they existed throughout the U.S. as well.

 

The main character, Mairin O’Hara, is a composite of women I read about and interviewed for the book. She’s of Irish descent, and one of the reasons she ended up at the Good Shepherd is that her strict Irish mother was too steeped in trauma and tradition to see the damage done by the institution.

 

But like all my favorite characters, Mairin is plucky, defiant, clever, and big-hearted—and she’s a survivor. I hope the story does honor to the girls who truly suffered at the hands of the church and its institutions.


Q: How did you research the novel, and what did you learn that especially surprised you?

 

A: I started at the public library, which is where nearly every book I’ve ever written starts. Without the library, I’d be lost! And remember, librarians don’t all work at the library. One of the most helpful people I interviewed was the librarian at the Buffalo Historical Society. She helped me reconstruct the city’s neighborhoods of 1968.

 

I also accessed a survivor group on Facebook and interviewed or listened to interviews with survivors of the laundries, the lawyer who is advocating for the survivors today (they’re in their 70s and 80s), and I read an amazing memoir, Girl in the Tunnel, by Maureen Sullivan. Her experience occurred in Ireland, but there are a lot of parallels to the situation in the U.S.

 

For me, the biggest surprise (and outrage) was the general acceptance and complacency the authorities (courts, social agencies) had when it came to church institutions. Hiding behind the cloak of organized Catholicism, the laundries engaged in many forms of abuse, some so severe I could not even include them in the book.

 

Q: You tell much of the story from Mairin’s perspective, but you also bring in a variety of other characters’ voices. Why did you choose to structure the book that way?

 

A: I wanted my cast of characters to reflect the diversity of girls who were sent to the Good Shepherd.

 

Each character is fairly typical of the type of girl who might have wound up there—Mairin, whose mother believed it was the best way to shield her from her stepfather.

 

Angela, whose Irish grandmother believed the nuns would “reform” her attraction to girls.

 

Odessa, caught up in a historically factual race riot in 1967 in Buffalo.

 

Helen, whose Chinese American parents were detained in China due to the Cultural Revolution under the Chinese Communist Party.

 

Denise, who was lost in the foster care system.

 

Janice, Kay, and Sister Bernadette are also important characters, but I don’t want to spoil the story too much.

 

The story is one of female friendship and empowerment, so the girls in the story were my “team” that discovers their true strength and power comes from learning their own value and cooperating in a stunningly bold move to survive.

 

Q: What do you hope readers take away from the novel, and how do you see its themes resonating today?

 

A: As a child in 1968, I remember more than one babysitter who “went away,” a euphemism for girls sent into hiding when they became pregnant. The more I learned, the more deeply I felt the helpless pain and rage of these young women.

 

Wayward Girls is one of my most personal and involving novels to date. I hope my passion for this topic touches readers’ hearts and inspires important conversations about our past treatment of young women, and–as Jodi Picoult points out–is a cautionary tale for today.

 

Because, sadly, we have found ourselves in a new era of toxic patriarchy, with women’s rights being taken away by an authoritarian regime that justifies its actions by citing Christian rhetoric.

 

That said, Wayward Girls is at its heart a Susan Wiggs book, the kind that keeps the reader entertained and makes its way to an ending that is filled with hope. Along with the anger and frustration, you’ll find laughter and tears, and ultimately, the deep satisfaction of reading about a life well lived.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I always have stories circling around in my head like air traffic over a busy airport! I’m researching a novel that takes place in Washington, D.C., during WWII, revising another that takes place in contemporary D.C., and I’m working with one of my best writer friends on our first screenplay.


Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: When I published my first novel in 1987 (!!!), I came to understand that, although the writer labors alone while creating the work, her success depends entirely on a vital partner in the creative process—the reader. Because a story only comes to life once it makes its way into the reader’s hands. She brings her own experience, taste, and experience to the story, completing the circle.

 

I can’t begin to describe the sense of validation that comes from knowing my book has been selected by a reader browsing in the bookstore or library. It’s humbling to know someone has chosen my novel from the overwhelming flood of titles, and given her precious time to reading my story.

 

When a reviewer, blogger, podcaster, or reader recommends a book, it stands out. A personal word-of-mouth endorsement carries more weight than a hundred algorithm-driven recommendations. I want readers to know how grateful I am for the word-of-mouth recommendations that have sustained me for book after book. It’s a gift beyond measure.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Susan Wiggs. 

Q&A with Marian Thurm

 


 

 

Marian Thurm is the author of the new novel I Don't Know How to Tell You This. Her other books include Today Is Not Your Day. She has taught creative writing at various universities, including Yale and Columbia.

 

Q: What inspired you to write I Don’t Know How to Tell You This, and how did you create your character Judge Rachel Sugarman?

 

A: I actually have a friend (now retired) who was a family court judge, and it occurred to me how fascinating it might be to create a fictional judge whose own life and family relationships were as complicated—though in different ways—as those of the plaintiffs and respondents who appeared in her courtroom day after day.

 

Q: How would you describe the dynamic between Rachel and her husband, Jonathan?

 

A: Watching Jonathan lose himself to dementia is no doubt the most painfully difficult experience of Rachel’s life; the loneliness she feels even when in his presence is evident to her as time passes.

 

And yet despite the loss of the smart, capable man she’s adored since they were both college students, she will continue to love him; to help him into his pajamas and brush his teeth for him every morning and every night; to respond calmly to those questions of his that make increasingly less sense, and to try, as best she can, to navigate the changes to her marriage, to her life.

 

Q: How was the novel's title chosen, and what does it signify for you?                                                                

 

A: I struggled to find the right title, and then I realized that “I don’t know how to tell you this” is often the way someone quietly warns the person she’s speaking to that she’s about to pass along some particularly bad news, the sort no one wants to hear. And those words suddenly felt like just the right message for the novel to send.

 

Q: Did you need to do much research to write the novel, and if so, did you learn anything that especially surprised you?                                                                                                                                                

A: My friend, the family court judge, generously allowed me to sit with him in his courtroom many times, and I came away with pages and pages of notes about the cases that appeared before him. Many of them were heartbreaking, but occasionally there were moments that were surprisingly funny.

 

Q: What are you working on now?                                                                                                                            

 

A: I’ve never written a book of linked short stories before, and that’s the new challenge I’ve given myself.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?                                                                                                                     

 

A: I’m the proud mother of a daughter—who works full-time helping elderly and critically ill prison inmates—and who has published a novel and a short story collection. It was one of the most meaningful moments of my life—as both a mother and a writer—when she was offered her first book contract!

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Marian Thurm. 

Q&A with Jaclyn Westlake

 


 

Jaclyn Westlake is the author of the new novel Lucky Break. Her other books include the novel Dear Dotty. She lives in California. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write Lucky Break, and how did you create your character Eliza?

 

A: The initial spark behind Lucky Break came from an article I wrote for The Muse about relocation incentive programs around the country. I got the chance to interview real people who'd packed up their lives and moved to an entirely new city, which I found absolutely fascinating.

 

That got me thinking: what would motivate me to move to an entirely new town where I didn't know a soul in hopes of a fresh start? In real life, practical reasons like community, cost savings, home ownership, or lifestyle changes drive these decisions.

 

But since I write fiction, I wanted to come up with something more dramatic – and explore what would push someone who would never typically do something so drastic to take the plunge.

 

The first thing I knew about Eliza was that she was going to be a planner. She's a Virgo (if you're into astrology) who almost never steps outside the box and maps out every detail of her life.

 

So when her carefully laid plans for her future completely crumble, she's not just disappointed – she's utterly lost. That's what drives her to apply for a relocation incentive program and move to a little lake town in hopes of rebuilding her life.

 

Of course, starting over in a tight-knit community with its own secrets proves more complicated than even Eliza could have planned for!

 

Q: The Library Journal review of the book calls it a “comforting story of belonging, secrets, change, and growth, laced with mystery and romance.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I love this review – it perfectly captures what I was hoping to achieve with Lucky Break. Yes, there's a sweet romantic subplot and yes, there's a fun mystery to unravel, but at its heart, this story is about fresh starts, found family, and self-acceptance.

 

This is one of the many reasons I'm so passionate about writing (and reading!) women's fiction. The genre allows for such expansive character development – I get to explore all the different aspects of a person's life, from love and career to friendship and self-discovery. There's room for romance and mystery and personal growth, all woven together in a way that feels true to how we actually experience life.

 

Q: The novel is set in a Midwestern lake town--how important is setting to you in your writing?

 

A: Setting is incredibly important to me – it's almost like another character in my books.

 

My first book, Dear Dotty, was set in San Francisco, which is my favorite city, and I loved getting to showcase this place that's so near and dear to my heart. Lucky Break partially takes place in San Francisco too (I couldn't resist!), but it also gave me the opportunity to spend time in another one of my favorite settings.

 

I absolutely adore the Midwest. I love the lakes, the fireflies, the people, their accents – all of it. My mom is from Wisconsin and I still have a lot of family there, mostly outside Milwaukee, and I always have the best time when I go back for visits. Some of my favorite memories with my cousins are on a pontoon boat or in a dive bar or on an ATV or at a bonfire in a field.

 

There's something positively magical about a Midwestern summer, and I wanted to capture that feeling on the page – the sense of community, the slower pace, the way time seems to stretch out during those long, warm evenings on a screened back porch (insert wistful sigh).

 

I’m heading back to Wisconsin for a week this summer and I cannot wait!

 

Q: What do you hope readers take away from the story?

 

A: That no one is defined by the hand they're dealt. Even though the things that happen to us by chance have a real impact on our lives, people are also so much more than their circumstances.

 

Without spoiling anything, Eliza's journey is really about accepting that sometimes we're just unlucky – that the twists and turns of life are often completely out of our hands. That's the heart of the story.

 

But here's the good news: sometimes we also get really, really lucky too. Life has a way of surprising us, often when we least expect it.

 

I also hope that readers walk away from this book thinking that maybe they should consider adopting a pet in need 😊

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: Speaking of settings, my husband and I lived aboard a boat full time for three years, so I've been eager to dive back into that world – literally and figuratively!

 

I'm currently working on a new story about a woman who becomes infamous on a true crime podcast and decides to hide out on her family's boat, only to stumble into a yacht club murder mystery. I’m loving exploring that insular, dramatic world of boat life and yacht clubs, plus I get to draw from all those memories of living on the water. I’m having a lot of fun with it!

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Don’t let my adorable book covers fool you – these stories are for all types of readers! I'm really intentional about including a diverse array of characters and experiences in my books, and I hope that comes through in the stories. My goal is for people from all walks of life to pick up my books and see a piece of themselves represented on the pages.

 

But most importantly, I hope anyone who picks up one of my books is entertained! I'm going for fun and heartfelt – with a healthy dose of cute dogs because dogs make everything better.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Jaclyn Westlake. 

Q&A with Polly Stewart

 


 

 

Polly Stewart is the author of the new novel The Felons' Ball. She also has written the novel The Good Ones. She lives in Lexington, Virginia. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Felons' Ball, and how did you create your character Natalie?

 

A: I love writing about the Blue Ridge Mountains, and this book (like my last novel, The Good Ones) started with that setting. My family had just visited Fontana Lake in North Carolina, and I was fascinated by these lakes created by the WPA in the ‘30s that resulted in the relocation of entire towns in Appalachia. That was the model for Lake Monroe in the novel, and also led me to the theme of buried secrets.

 

Natalie was a difficult character for me to access in some ways. I don’t have biological siblings, and her role as the youngest of three sisters is so integral to who she is as a person. Once I realized how she’s torn between wanting to please her family and wanting to establish herself as an independent adult, that really unlocked her personality for me.

 

Q: The writer Rebecca Makkai said of the book, “The Felons’ Ball is full of secrets—ones that refuse to reveal themselves and ones that refuse to stay buried. It's also full of wit and empathy and characters as real as your own family members.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I was so thrilled with this, not the least because Rebecca Makkai is one of my favorite writers! I’m especially happy that she found the characters so compelling. The Macreadys are very different from my family, but they became so real to me over the course of writing the book.

 

I always know that a book is on the right track when I can imagine myself hanging out with the characters, and I definitely felt that way about Natalie and her sisters and parents. They’re not always nice people necessarily, but I wouldn’t mind being invited to their parties.

 

Q: The story takes place in a Southern town--how important is setting to you in your writing?

 

A: It’s the most important! A writer friend of mine from California told me about 10 years ago that he didn’t really hit his stride as a writer until he moved home from the East Coast to the West Coast. I was living in California at the time too, and I thought that sounded ridiculous—a real writer can write anywhere!

 

When I moved back to Virginia, I realized that he was right. There’s something about the area where I grew up that really motivates me creatively. I know the people, the landscape, the accent, and it’s very generative for me.

 

Q: Did you need to do much research to write the novel, and if so, did you learn anything that especially surprised you?

 

A: The Macready family were moonshiners in the past, and one of the questions in the novel is whether they’re still making illegal liquor in the National Forest near their home.

 

I knew a little about moonshine because it’s still very much around in the part of Virginia where I live, but I did do some fun research on the federal raids in the ‘90s that drove the industry even more underground.

 

To me moonshine represents the general refusal to follow the rules of conventional society that we see in Appalachia, for better and for worse.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I’m in the midst of revising my third novel, The Glass House. It’s about a series of murders in a wilderness area in the Blue Ridge and the intertwined lives of two sisters and their daughters. I know it doesn’t sound like an upbeat topic, but I’m having a great time writing it!

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Like the sisters in The Felons’ Ball, I’m a registered yoga teacher. Between kids, writing, and my day job, I don’t have time to teach right now, but it’s a huge part of my life, and I had a great time writing the yoga scenes in the novel.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Polly Stewart. 

July 16

 


 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

July 16, 1862: Ida B. Wells born. 

Tuesday, July 15, 2025

Q&A with Tess Sharpe

 


 

 

Tess Sharpe is the author of the new novel No Body No Crime. Her other books include the YA novel The Girls I've Been.  

 

Q: What inspired you to write No Body No Crime, and how did you create your characters Mel and Chloe?

 

A: This was really my “necessity is the mother of invention” novel. I was actually supposed to write another book two years ago, but I was working on a TV pitch that had some similar elements to the book I was supposed to write and I was really worried about voice bleed.

 

But I had to write something in this chunk of time I had, so I asked myself: what if you take everything you normally take very seriously and kind of flip it and make fun of it and lean into the campiness and absurdity of rural crime and modern gold rush country? And thus, No Body No Crime was born.

 

I’ve written about Harper’s Bluff—the place where Mel and Chloe are from—before. It’s the setting of my first YA novel and also the setting of my next YA novel. It’s a fictional place that’s part of the larger “Calabama” fictional world I’ve created in far NorCal where all my books are set. I do like to think of all of them existing in the same world.

 

I tend to fictionalize the main towns the books take place in and then all the other landmarks and places are real. But I had scribbled down some vague history of the town and the family it was named after a million years ago and was always drawn to the idea of writing about a Harper ranch daughter—because really, what would it be like to have roots that deep in a town that’s named after your ancestors?

 

I’m also very in love with opposite attract stories. Chloe and Mel couldn’t be more different in terms of their upbringing, but they find themselves in the same place, the same roles—forced into becoming killers in self-defense—and of the same mind in a lot of ways.

 

They’re very much two sides of a coin. They’re both queer girls in a small town—one who doesn’t really care who knows because everyone has already written her off for many other reasons and one who has kept it hidden out of necessity because she has to care what people think.

 

Mel is really a heroine after my own heart—hard-scrabble, sarcastic, resilient, but with that heart of gold for the people she loves.

 

And Chloe as the fallen princess archetype is something that really intrigued me. Her entire world-view about good and evil gets shattered in a split second when she witnesses a hit and run that kills a child and realizes there will be no justice unless she brings it herself and then she changes as a person in split seconds repeatedly, always trying to pivot, always trying to survive, always trying to protect.

 

To write someone who is constantly in this state of survival and change was really intriguing, because Mel is much more steady in ways, partly because Mel has grown up in trauma and chaos and Chloe has it introduced to her later in life, when she’s already formed her ideas about the world…and they’ve been proven wrong.

 

Q: How would you describe the dynamic between them?

 

A: The thing I love about Chloe and Mel is that they’re both profoundly changed by their love for each other and how they had to survive together as teens…and they’re also incredibly stunted by that experience when they’re reunited in their 20s.

 

They revert right back into their teen selves at times because they’re being forced to survive again and together and no matter how much they’re bickering, no matter how many secrets are being kept, they still love each other more than anything—enough to die for each other, to kill for each other, to face down a group of feral peacocks…or an entire political crime family—together.

 

Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: Normally my answer to this question is “my endings never change!” It’s very hard for me to start a book without knowing the end first. But this book evolved more than any other novel I’ve written during the writing of it. I think it’s because I stopped and started it so much. Typically, I write a proposal, I put it on sub, it sells (hopefully!) and then I dive into finishing it and that all happens in like, a six-month period.

 

But I wrote the proposal for this, it went on sub for longer than I’m typically on sub, I kind of was like “Oh, my weird little book is not gonna sell. That’s sad!” and then we had a meeting with an editor and then there was a bit of a wait for the offer after, which caused me to think it was totally dead in the water or I had botched that meeting…luckily I hadn’t! And then suddenly we had an offer!

 

But because we’re in the age of AI, contract negotiations understandably took a long time to hammer out very new contract language to protect the work and to protect the publisher, so as a full-time writer with a lot of projects, I had to focus on other stuff I had already been paid for while that was happening.

 

When I got a really comprehensive AI clause from my publisher (thank you, Macmillan! Still the best and most detailed AI clause I’ve seen!) I was able to pick the book up again, after a wait of quite a few months.

 

So it gave me a lot more time to contemplate the book, the characters, and the direction the book was going to take. It evolved quite a bit during those waiting times—for the better, I think!

 

Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: I had a terribly generic working title for this book. I’m one of those writers who really nails a title every eight books or so. They’re a big struggle for me most of the time. Which is why I turn to writer friends when I’m stuck…which is exactly what I did here!

 

I could not for the life of me to come up with something good that my agent didn’t shoot down (he said I couldn’t call it In the Bush which I thought was a very funny title, but I also understand why he shot that down, he’s savvier and smarter than me).

So I turned to one of my lovely writer’s groups, gave them the breakdown of the book and was like GO! The amazing thriller author Cindy R.X. He had suggested No Body No Crime and everyone said: “Oh, that’s perfect! Also the hilarious Taylor Swift connection!” and Cindy was like “Wait, that’s a Taylor Swift song?” which was so funny. Taylor does have a lot of songs, so it’s understandable when we can’t keep track of all of them.

And thus, we had a title! I really love it because our central problem circles around no one finding Toby Dunne’s body after my girls kill him and dispose of him as teenagers, but we also delve into the grief and violence that is experienced when there isn’t a body to bury…but I can’t go too far into that without getting TOO spoilery.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I’m about to dive into revision for my 2026 YA thriller, How She Fell, about a teen filmmaker who is thought to have fallen to her death off the bluffs near a small town…and only her best friend knows the truth: that she was pushed. It’s a book told both in prose and in illustrations in the form of story-boards.

 

I’m also knee-deep in my next adult thriller, about a childfree woman who finds herself thrust into a nightmare when her family influencer sister and husband are murdered, leaving the guardianship of their children to the sister.

 

It explores parasocial relationships and circles around the question of who are you and how do you form true identity when your entire life—from your mother’s pregnancy with you to your birth to your every childhood and teen milestone—has been monetized for content and served up to an audience of millions by the parents who are supposed to protect you?

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: You can find me on instagram @forest_of_arden and same on Threads. And if you like behind-the-scenes publishing stuff, go to tess-sharpe.com to sign up for my newsletter, WRITE. COOK. REPEAT.

--Interview with Deborah Kalb 

Q&A with Elisabeth Rhoads

 


 

 

Elisabeth Rhoads is the author of the new novel Haggard House. She lives in California. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write Haggard House, and how did you create your character Adam?

 

A: Haggard House, while my debut in terms of publishing, is actually the third novel I’ve written. Like many authors, I had to get through those “practice” novels—although I certainly didn’t think of them like that at the time—out of the way, before I could write something and polish it to a level that I felt comfortable releasing into the world.

 

The first novel I wrote was a Hallmark-style romance. I made sure to hit every trope in the genre, but it wasn’t terribly creative. My second was a dystopian novel. It was much more creative, but structurally, a mess.

 

The concept of Haggard House came to me just before bed one night, when I had the image of a woman finding animal heads at her door, and the subsequent mystery behind their appearance. I immediately knew I had to write it.

 

Interestingly enough, Adam, the protagonist, was the most difficult to write, and had the most evolution as a character. In fact, it wasn’t at first apparent to me that he was the protagonist. One of the early drafts that I shared with my brother, was very dominated by Adam’s mother, Sarai.

 

My brother asked me an insightful question: “If you had to pick one character that this story is about, who would it be?” I had to think about it a bit, but I came to the conclusion it was Adam. That helped immensely in refocusing the story.

 

However, that was just a start. No matter what angle I wrote the story from, I couldn’t get Adam’s character. He never seemed quite right. It wasn’t until I was close to the final draft, that another insightful early reader sent me a copy of William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying, and suggested that I think about the possibility of writing each of the characters in first person, as Faulkner had done.

 

I had thought of this possibility before, but never wanted to do it because I knew how much work it would be. I realized I had to at least try it and see if it worked. As soon as I switched into first person, that’s when things started to work. Before that, the story had felt like magnets, with all the poles opposing each other. But as soon as I made the change, the poles aligned, and the pieces came snapping together.

 

Q: How did you research the novel, and what did you learn that especially surprised you?

 

A: Writing Haggard House has been a process of finding myself in situations where I didn’t want to do something, only to discover that the only way to move forward was to do the very thing I was avoiding.

 

I had done some half-hearted research, but the first editor I worked with told me I needed to do more before it was even worth paying her to help me. I knew she was right, so I did quite a bit of research at that stage.

 

I had no idea what I was doing, but I think it helped enormously that I already had the manuscript. If I hadn’t had the framework of the story to narrow down what I needed to know, I think I would have been too overwhelmed to even get started.

 

Some of the more specific research I did was in the chapter-by-chapter work. For example, there is a chapter with an old fur trader and his wife. It was very common for fur traders to take Native Americans for wives, so I did a lot of research on what tribes were in the area at that time, what their culture was, what kind of clothing they wore, what they ate, etc.

 

I read about three books on the Menominee people, and drew myself a picture of the woman’s clothing based on what I read, for just one chapter of the novel.

 

I also went broad. I spent a lot of time reading the Michigan Historical Collection volumes. Many of the narratives in this collection are first-hand accounts of Michigan residents in the exact timeframe in which my story is set. I wrote lists of words people were using, places they frequented, animals they came into contact with, etc.

 

One thing that surprised me was a reference to a certain kind of bread I came across in The American Woman’s Home by Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe. The bread is called salt-rising or milk-rising bread. The way it is described in the book is nothing short of disgusting.

 

I had to know more about it, so I researched and found an article in Popular Science that says the bread rises due to the growth of bacteria, rather than yeast. And just which bacteria? Clostridium perfringens, a pathogen associated with gangrene. The good news is, when you bake the bread, the bacteria is killed off, and you’re left with something safe to eat.

 

The bread made it into the novel; under another name I discovered for it: milk-emptyings bread. I also made the bread myself, and fed it to my husband (with some protest on his part). It wasn’t bad, but it made our apartment stink for days. It goes without saying, my husband is very patient.

 

Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: I knew from the start how the novel would end, and this has been something I’ve noticed has been an indicator of whether I will be able to finish a story or not. The exact circumstances of the ending changed a bit, but the ending itself was there from the start.

 

Q: What do you hope readers take away from the book?

 

A: As with many authors, many of the ideas and struggles from the characters in the story have mirrored my own. I hope what readers take away from the novel is hope—that no matter what they may have gone through, or what ideological mazes they may have gotten caught up in—there is always a way forward, even if it’s not easy.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I’m working on a new novel, set in roughly 90 AD Rome. It started as a kind of adventure novel, but now it’s taken a turn towards a time-travel romance. What it will end up as in the end remains to be seen. I’ve learned to be open to the process and not to try to control the outcome.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I’ve been learning Japanese for over six years now (although with admittedly slow progress), and one of my goals is to have Haggard House translated into Japanese. I’m far from being skilled enough to do it myself, so after the novel is published, I plan to find a translator and work to get Haggard House into Japan!

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb