Patti Callahan Henry, Novelist, Silver Coast Winery, Ocean Isle Beach, NC (Photo by Jo Ann Mathews)

Women and Adversity: Patti Callahan Henry, Novelist

Patti Callahan Henry’s most recent novel, The Story She Left Behind, is riveting and one I’ve seen women reading at the beach and the pool. Readers get enthralled with the story because it starts with Bronwyn Newcastle Fordham telling the reader she’s leaving everyone behind. It’s 2am. She gets in a boat and drives it away.

Fast forward 25 years and Fordham’s daughter, Clara Harrington, enters the story and tells how she was eight years old when her mother disappeared. She receives a telephone call from Charles Jameson, who lives in London, saying he has papers that belonged to Fordham with instructions to give them directly to Harrington. So the mystery continues. The story is about finding Fordham, Harrington’s quest to find her, and Harrington’s precocious daughter, Wynnie.

Henry has written 18 novels. Some are historical fiction while others are contemporary.  On her recent book tour promoting The Story She Left Behind, one stop was  Silver Coast Winery in Ocean Isle Beach, N. C. I had an opportunity to ask her a few questions before her presentation.

Q: What’s the biggest challenge you had to face as a writer?

A: Getting published

Q: What obstacles have you faced as a writer?

A: Finding the right story that I can put everything I’ve got into it, not writing the story somebody else wants me
to write. Also, not writing the story I think will sell or be popular but finding the story that I want to tell and to put everything I’ve got into it.

Henry and three of her novelist friends, Mary Kay Andrews, Kristin Harmel and Kristy Woodson, started Friends & Fiction, a live program that runs Wednesday night at 7 p.m. Eastern time. The group discusses writing and publishing. Check the link below.

Bio

• Henry grew up in Philadelphia
• Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing from Auburn University
• Master of Science degree in Nursing from Georgia State University

Career  

• Pediatric clinical nurse specialist
• 2004 — debut novel, Losing the Moon

Personal

• Married to Pat Henry
• The couple has three children and two grandchildren
• The couple shares their time between Alabama and South Carolina

 More Information:

www.patticallahanhenry.com
www.friendsandfiction.com
www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaGeuTJEy6U

My ebooks available at amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com:
Honoring 23 Black Women, Recognizing 23 Notable Mothers, Saluting 23 Faithful Suffragists