 Everyone
has a dream. It may be something simple like relaxing
on a deserted beach with Tim McGraw or even Mike
the plumber from Desperate Housewives while sipping
on a frozen strawberry daiquiri as he rubs sunscreen
all over your back. (Okay, maybe that’s
just my dream! C’mon, now! Play along with
me here!) Then again, if you are a writer your
dream may be a tad different. If I had to guess,
I think it might involve some magical fairy dust
sprinkled upon the novel you put all your blood,
sweat, and tears into writing from the one and
only Ms. Oprah Winfrey. Anything Oprah even remotely
is associated with soars. You don’t need
me to tell you that! It’s a given.
This month’s jewel, Jacquelyn Mitchard,
has been blessed with a once in a lifetime experience
that seems too truly remarkable to even describe.
Her novel, The Deep End of the Ocean,
was chosen as Oprah’s FIRST book club selection.
(I don’t know what I would do if Oprah gave
me a little ring-ding-ding and said, “Hey,
Jen! That column of yours is a winner. How about
if we add it to my magazine?”) Can you imagine
the impact it must have had on Jacquelyn’s
career? More importantly, how about the pressure
to exceed its greatness in her next book? As you
will read, her life was changed forever, in some
good ways and unfortunately in some not so good
ways. With fame comes a price.
What one thing I know for sure is that Jacquelyn’s
latest release, Still Summer,
is an absolute must-read novel. I was lucky enough
to have landed an advance copy and I am still
talking about this book to anyone who will listen.
Being able to interview her, though, was even
better. What follows is the conversation we had
about her amazing career and all of her numerous
writings. She is such an extraordinary person
with a story of her own to tell. As part of this
interview, five lucky readers will win a copy
so don’t forget to look for the trivia question
at the end of the column.
Go grab some iced tea and get to know the sensational
and prolific Jacquelyn Mitchard!
Find her books in our catalog.
Jen: I read on Wikipedia
that your writing career began with you as a newspaper
reporter back in 1976 and now you are a syndicated
columnist with Tribune Media. So that my readers
can get a glimpse into your career path and how
it all evolved, please tell us a little bit about
your educational and professional background.
Jacquelyn: 1976?
It’s interesting to know that I began my
professional career so early! Actually, it was
1979; but I’ve found so many ages and descriptions
for my background (including that I’m one
of three sisters, although I have only one brother)
that it’s exciting to learn something new
about myself. I got out of college early, after
only three years, and lied about my age to get
my first job. There were no computers then; they
couldn’t check. I decided a couple of years
ago, you know, I’d like my five years back;
so off to the DMV I went with my birth certificate.
And the woman there – you can imagine her….
The kind of African-American woman who’s
seen it all five times, said, “Don’t
you know that anyone can make one of those things?”
I was aghast. She meant my birth certificate!
Who knew? I said, “But why wouldn’t
I make myself TEN years younger?” She just
said, “Tell your story walking….”
So I’m 54 on my medical and driving records
and 49 in real life. I get lots of compliments
on having such nice skin “for my age.”
Jen: At what juncture
in your life did you decide to write a book? And
what was the defining moment that made you take
the leap and finally just do it?
Jacquelyn: It was
tragedy. My first husband died just after he’d
turned 40. I was in my thirties. It was clear
to me that everything I’d ever thought of
as “someday” was right now. Dan’s
death was evident proof of that. I’d never
even considered writing a novel seriously; but
I had a story I’d told Dan about that came
from a dream….and I found myself writing
that story as though it happened to a large Italian
family in the restaurant business, like my husband’s.
I realized that it was my mourning. It also showed
my sons that tragedy gives you no permission to
live small.
Jen: According to USA
Today, your novel The Deep End of the Ocean was
named one of the ten most influential novels in
the past twenty-five years. What an accomplishment!
Please tell us about your Oprah experience and
how your novel being chosen as her first book
club selection changed the path of your career
forever.
Jacquelyn: It
was second to the Harry Potter series, which is
sort of like the Cubs being a great baseball team.
But I’m a Cubs fan, and I’m gratified.
I was only irritated when, after Oprah Winfrey
recently chose Cormac McCarthy’s ‘The
Road’ as one of her novels, one critic said
now Ms. Winfrey was getting down to the real stuff,
that she began her club with ‘inspirational
fluff’ such as ‘The Deep End of the
Ocean.’ Excuse me. Neither in my book nor
‘White Oleander’ or ‘This Much
I Know is True’ is there a word of fluff,
inspirational or not. That everyone didn’t
fall off a bridge and drown at the end is, I suppose,
inspirational…anyhow, rant passed. It was
a wonderful experience! I loved the people on
the discussion group. I loved the baby carrots!
I loved being the first anything (no one though
the Oprah book club would succeed, because fiction
had failed so miserably before on the show). I
had NO IDEA it would become a bestseller... that
is, a number one bestseller. It’s given
me the privilege to tell stories, though no other
has sold nearly 4 million copies. But they’ve
all been well-read and, with the exception of
one, nicely reviewed (and that one REALLY deserved
it). How has my life changed? I don’t know.
Some friends fell away. They didn’t like
how busy I’d become. That scored my heart.
I have the same friends from long ago. I didn’t
change as a person in any sense. I learned I had
enemies. Never knew that. I learned I was sought-after
for things I couldn’t do – such as
reviewing books. I’m still happiest being
a mom, friend, wife and sister. My career is my
job. It’s a great job and I just love it
and fall deeply into its web. But as a priority,
it comes after the other things in my life that
count.
Jen: You latest
release, Still Summer, is similar to your previous
work in the sense that it is so powerful, engrossing,
and addictive. How did you arrive at the premise?
Jacquelyn: It
was the only time I did the ‘What if?”
exercise. I thought, what if four people who were
friends for life found themselves in hell, but
hell was paradise? What if they were women who
had to save their own lives (hence the reason
some people have called this a new genre, “chick
noire,”) but they were in circumstances
that looked benign, but were as dangerous as Everest
– sun and salt water being as lethal as
cold and wind at the end of that day. I wondered,
what would that do to personalities, tear them
apart? Build them up, both?
Jen: How much research
went into the writing of this book? Are you an
avid sailor?
Jacquelyn:Oh, sure,
uh-huh. NO! We did go to the Virgin Islands to
do research, for a long weekend – my cousin
Janis (who is referred to in the book as the cousin,
Janis), my friend Karen (who is based on my pal
Holly and on herself), my co-worked Pam English,
who played the daughter part, and me….My
friend Beth Gutcheon was to the yacht club born
and helped me tinker with some terms; and my beloved
friend and student Pat Kesling-Wood, whose new
novel ‘Lottery” is just out, actually
lives in Honolulu on a yacht called Orion. Her
gang in the harbor all pulled together to make
what went wrong on the Opus plausible. They helped
so generously. The four of us who went to St.
John’s and took a four day sail on the real
Opus – which really is owned by two people
called Lenny and Michelle – except Micelle
is a very pretty woman, not Michel, a French-Canadian
man, got invaluable help. Lenny and Michelle let
us tape hours of material about what things were
called, how they stored food, how the motor worked,
what could go wrong. Sailing is like flying. It’s
safe but not forgiving. If one thing goes wrong,
so much else can go wrong in an instant. There’s
a tipping point... and it’s amazing that
more people don’t have fatal accidents out
there, especially what they call “bareboat”
cruisers, who have a great deal of bravado and
not much experience.
Jen: What part of STILL
SUMMER was the most challenging to write and why?
Jacquelyn:There
were two parts that were very hard to write. The
part that involved the boarding of the ship by
drug smugglers was difficult to create in a manner
that involved dramatic tension, without making
the two Hispanic smugglers into stereotypes. I
mean, there weren’t too many choices about
how to create them, because “mules”
who do the actually running of drugs from Third
World countries where cocaine and heroin originate
are not usually doing this because they’re
tired of working as investment bankers –
although investment bankers in the United States
sometimes are the people who really profit from
this, as from other nefarious kinds of behavior.
The American kid who was introduced to the work
and intended only to do it briefly was inspired
by the true-life story ‘A Hole in My Life,’
by Jack Gantos, who did almost exactly the same
thing….In this situation, he could have
done much to stop the encounter; but he also was
afraid and was determined to do this in order
to start his life over. The other part was the
ending. It’s called ‘Still Summer,’
because so much had changed, for every one of
the people, and it was still the same season:
Only a few short weeks had passed. I wanted to
create an ending that underlined the shock and
ambivalence of that fact. It couldn’t be
a “happy” ending but there had to
be some peace and resolution. I wrote an alternative
ending, a sort of coda, and I may use it somewhere
else.
Jen: Each of your lead
characters in STILL SUMMER has a story to tell
with plenty of baggage to tow. If you had to choose,
who is your favorite character and why?
Jacquelyn: Well,
I suppose it would be Holly Solvig. Holly was
such a human being; and for her, the circumstances
brought out a heroic character. Although she had
so much to live for, she realized that her life’s
purpose had been saving lives, as a nurse; and
that didn’t change in crisis.
Jen: Not only have you
written novels for adults, but also you have written
children’s books and now young adult. If
you had to choose, which genre is the most rewarding
to write and why?
Jacquelyn: Oh,
I can’t choose. I’m so new to writing
young adult books that I’m all starry-eyed
about it now and just LOVE it. You can take so
many chances you can’t necessarily take
with a mainstream adult novel. I love the point
of view of a teenage or young adult – for
whom every day is a lifetime and every incident
is a universe. And of course, there are a hundred
adult novels I want to write – most notably
a great ghost story. I won’t live long enough
to write all I want to write. The children’s
books are so incredibly moving to me. I’d
love to write more… but I’d do middle-grade
(third and fourth grade novels) because that’s
a fun time… reading it myself!
Jen: You stay quite
busy writing books and a column, but you also
contribute articles to many magazines. Please
tell us how you manage to balance such a large
family and a writing career. What does your typical
work day look like?
Jacquelyn: Bedlam.
I really can’t make sugar-coat this. I have
a hundred things going on at every moment, rocketing
back and forth between the kids’ needs and
the needs of my work. My husband stays home, but
unlike some writers’ husbands who stay home,
he doesn’t really “take over.”
There are things I need and want to do and he
has a great many interests and projects of his
own. So, I’m torn. I work very long days
because they’re broken up into bits.
Jen: I have to admit
that I was tickled when I read that your favorite
book is A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith.
(It is one of my all-time favorite books as well.)
Besides that novel, what are some of your other
favorite books? What are you reading now?
Jacquelyn: : Some
of my other all-time favorite books are The Child
in Time, by Ian McEwan, everything by Brian Moore
but especially The Great Victorian Collection
and I Am Mary Dunne, Unless by Carol Shields,
In the Gloaming by Alice Elliott Dark, Ordinary
People by Judith Guest, Jane Eyre by Charlotte
Bronte, The Pact by Jodi Picoult, The Law of Similars
by Chris Bohjalian, Remains of the Day by Kazuo
Ishiguro, Here on Earth by Alice Hoffman, More
Than You Know by Beth Gutcheon, Lonesome Dove
by Larry McMurty, The Great Gatsby by the Bard
of Minnesota…. I could do this all day.
You notice the absence of “real” novels,
such as those by Thomas Pynchon and Cormac McCarthy
and Don DeLilo and even Toni Morrison. I agree
with B.R. Meyers, who wrote A Reader’s Manifesto,
about the pretentious and portentous quality of
much modern literary fiction. I just don’t
have time to be bored by my leisure.
Jen : Please tell us
about your website. (It’s quite fabulous
by the way. I love the graphics!) Do you have
a newsletter? E-mail notification of new releases?
Blog? Do you participate in author phone chats?
Jacquelyn: I am
just starting a newsletter. The first one will
go out in August. I do email notification of new
releases and a multi-media presenter for each
one. I write a blog and am learning to add photos
to do. The website designer (Steve Bennett of
AuthorBytes) is a stone genius at this stuff.
I visit book clubs by phone almost every week
and love it. And I have three lovely MySpace pages
(oprah_author, deepend_author and stillsummerbook)
that have some amazing graphics on them as well.
It’s like a second job (although I think
I already have three or four). I like my website
to be a clubhouse where people can come and hang
out and read or listen to a couple of things at
a time, not just read my (nicer) reviews or stories
about me.
Are you currently working
on a new project? If so, what can you tell us
about it?
Jacquelyn : I’ve
just finished a novel about two people who become,
essentially, each other’s life support –
who would never have met except for one critical
factor in their lives, surrogate pregnancy. They
never meet face-to-face and they may mean more
to each other at some points than anyone else
on earth. I’m just starting a novel about
a mother who knows her son committed a kind of
crime…and I’ll soon be writing book
two of my series of novels about psychics Mallory
and Meredith Brynn, born one minute before and
one minute after New Year’s Eve, one who
can see only the future and one who can see only
the past. An incident on their thirteenth birthday
(which isn’t the same day, or even in the
same year, but which they celebrate on New Year’s
Eve) changes them forever in that they can no
longer see each other’s dreams but begin
dreaming of events – not such great events
but actually threatening events – that will
or have happened to people they know….
Jen: I truly appreciate
you taking the time out of your schedule to be
with my readers. It has been an absolute pleasure
getting to know you. I wish you all the best!
Jacquelyn: I loved
doing this. The questions were fun. Please encourage
everyone to come to my website, www.jackiemitchard.com,
listen to the podcasts, and ask me to visit their
book clubs or leave a comment. The readers are
what this is all about. A book isn’t completed
until the reader takes my hand, you know. It’s
a dance; and I’m not writing these for myself!
Thank you for having me.
I hope you enjoyed our chat and please check
out her website. It’s very impressive and
it is chock full of interesting tidbits. Speaking
of which, the first five people to e-mail me at
jensjewels@gmail.com
with Jackie’s website address will win a
copy of STILL SUMMER. Good luck!
In early September, I’ll be interviewing
Michael Gates Gill, author of How Starbucks
Saved my Life. You won’t want to
miss it! Enjoy what’s left of the summer!
Until next month….Jen
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Meet
the Author: featuring Jen's Jewels