Interview With Author Barbara Sontheimer
Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Victor’s Blessing is my debut novel, and truly a labor of love. I spent years researching and writing and truly hope it is enjoyed.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Victor’s Blessing.
My mother was an invalid for a number of years, and I would sit with her and we would talk about fun things like mermaid, faeries and ghosts. And she had read that during the revolutionary war General Washington had to let the soliders of the Continental army go home in the spring to put in their plants, otherwise their families would starve while they were out soldiering. With her old rheumy eyes my mother turned to me and said, “What if they found out later that he had been killed earlier that year, and that it was his ghost that came home to save his family from starving?” I got chills.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I literally write in a closet! No windows, just four walls with a door. I share my space with an abandoned elliptical, Oreck vacuum, and card tables and chairs. But is works for me.
I just sit down and hope my clumsy fingers can keep up!
What authors, or books have influenced you?
I love so many, but here goes
Daphne Du Maurier
Emily Bronte
Charlotte Bronte
Rosamund Pilcher
Anita Shreve
Kahlid Houssani (I hope I did not mis spell his name)
Mave Binchy
Lavyrle Spencer
What are you working on now?
Oh! Thanks for asking! (I am so excited) a three-part series about brides that came from France in 1721 to the shores of modern day Biloxi Mississippi. These women founded the future creole and Indian families that built the are. I’ts going to be so fun.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I feel that reader reviews are the absolute best.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
It is a jungle out here! And we erroneously thought the WRITING was the hard part. No no no it is by far the promoting.
Best advice, watch as many podcasts as you can, read as many books, talk to as many people and it never hurts to just ask for help.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
This thing that we call failure is not the falling down, but the staying down.
What are you reading now?
A book about Mississippi during 1690. I do research constantly but for FUN I recently finished Drowning Ruth and loved it.
What’s next for you as a writer?
I hope I can continue to write as long as I am able.
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Wuthering Heights
The Shell Seekers
Green Mansions