Title: Midwife of the Blue Ridge
Author: Christine Blevins
Publisher: Berkley Trade
Paperback: 432 pages
ISBN: 978-0425221686
1. First off, congratulations on the big novel sale! Give us the elevator pitch. What’s your book about?
I set out to write the kind of book I love to read-an adventure story!
It’s 1763, and Maggie Duncan is a young Scottish midwife who comes to America as an indentured servant. She is bound out to a family upland on the frontier of Virginia. There she meets Tom Roberts, a man who makes his living in the peltry trade by going to hunt deep in the wilderness, beyond where all maps end.
Maggie’s immigrant tale is combined with Tom’s yearning to see what lies beyond the horizon. I threw in a few faithful friends, an Indian uprising, a despicable Englishman, a giant named Figg, and a dog named Friday. I mixed it all up with a good portion of peril, action, tragedy and romance and wound up with Midwife of the Blue Ridge.
2. Most new novelists have an interesting story to tell about their journey to publication. What’s yours? Did you use an agent? Make sure to tell us about the day you found out you’d sold a book.
Having no writing credentials, or previously published works, or connections in the world of publishing, I followed the route of sending out query letters to literary agents. I got a lot of good response, but also suffered quite a bit of rejection. But I loved my story so much, I figured eventually someone else would love it as well, and I kept at it. Eight months of querying resulted in an offer that spurred a couple other offers, and I decided to sign with fabulous Nancy Coffey.
I put the book in Nancy’s capable hands and dove into research for my next project. After seven months of hearing nothing (other than Nancy telling me there was nothing to hear) I came home from work one day and checked my voicemail: “Hello, Chris. This is Nancy. We have an offer from a very good editor…”
I could only scream. Of course my husband Brian, came running in. Unable to speak, I handed him the phone. He listened for a minute, threw the phone down, and we grabbed each other, jumping up and down and around in a circle, singing “An Offer! An Offer!” making our dog go crazy leaping and barking – a pretty silly scene that devolved into a mini conga line – a real happy, happy, joy, joy moment for sure!
3. Do you have another book in the pipeline? What are you working on now?
My next book titled The Tory Widow will be published by Berkley in April of 2009. Another adventure story-it begins in 1775, when the colonies are on the brink of war. (Can you tell I have a thing for American history?)
A young widow running her late husband’s printing business in New York City is drawn to the patriot cause, and one handsome Son of Liberty in particular. When war erupts, and the world is thrown upside down, Anne Merrick does what she must in order to survive in a Loyalist city occupied by the British.
4. What’s your writing process like? Morning writer, night writer, or something in between?
I started writing as a hobby about eight years ago, and the ol’ day job and family (I have four kids) kind of required me to become a nightime writer. I researched and wrote MIDWIFE from about nine to midnight most nights. Now, with a book deal in place and a deadline, I still work nights, but I have switched to a four day workweek at the day job, and I get a lot more daylight writing in.
Because I sit in front of a computer all day long as a graphic designer, when it’s time to write, I always begin with pen and paper. I write in longhand in a small spiral notebook until it is almost illegible with scratchouts, scribbles and itty bitty writing in the margins, and then I take it to a computer, where I work it even more. That manuscripts like A Tale of Two Cities were once completed with pen and ink is a wonder to me.
5. There seems to be an unusually high percentage of writers who own cats. Here at the The First Book, we’re doing a study to find out if there’s a direct relationship between writing success and cat ownership. Do you own a cat? If so, tell us about him or her. If not, tell us what you have against cats.
The Blevi are dog people, and so we have a dog who thinks he is a person. His name is Dude (we are also big, Big Lebowski fans), and he is the sweetest and most loveable goldendoodle on earth, and I am way too attached to him.
