Author Interview: Melinda Inman
How long did it take you to finish writing this duology featuring Earth’s first family?
A Bible-based novel begins with research. For Fallen and Refuge, the investigation began at least twelve years before the first publication and included seminary courses, study of the original languages, interviews with pastors and theologians, and consulting numerous commentaries. I also embarked on a concentrated study of angelology and demonology to assure that I presented these supernatural beings in Biblically accurate ways. I submitted my manuscripts for evaluation to theologians and retired editors who had previously worked for Christian publishing houses. All of this took time. These stories are foundational, so careful attention was paid to every detail. From the time I wrote the first draft until both had been published took more than eight years.
You’ve also written another novel based on your great-grandparents’ courtship and marriage, No Longer Alone. It’s on my To Be Read list, and I hope to get to it soon. Was research for this book more or less challenging than that of your other works?
No Longer Alone and its sequel, The Shadows Come, coming this fall, are based on the real-life young adulthood of my great-grandparents Prentis and Avery Pinkerton during their courtship and early marriage in the early 1910s. Their story is mostly set in rural Wakita, Oklahoma, as well as in Kansas, around the town of Kingman. Therefore, these novels required a different type of research.
I studied rural life on the plains from 1913-1918, just as Prentis and Avery began courting, consulting local history sources and incorporating firsthand stories told by Avery.
Old-time farming methods and how things were done when the Model T was new and real horses provided the majority of the horsepower also required investigation. I worked on careful descriptions of scenes and techniques we don’t witness any longer. I also consulted ranchers about the care of livestock at that time. As a result, the setting reminds me of what we read in the Little House on the Prairie stories.
Then there was the war. I carefully aligned the timetable of the war with the recollections from living people, fitting all of the pieces together, and then, I fleshed out the mannerisms, cadence of speech, quirks, and ways of life of each character, interlacing them all into the story. Having begun my life in Wakita, I’m familiar with the local residents of that time.
This was a very personal project, because I love these people, and I wanted to get their story right, true to their personalities and to the character of the town and its people. My sources tell me I’ve captured it perfectly, so I’m grateful for that! It required years of hard work. I labored over these stories for at least nine years.
What would you say is your writing quirk?
My quirk used to be that I had to write my rough drafts in a mad dash of solid writing that took me four to six weeks. I was barely able to sleep while drafting, for dialogue and ideas awakened me. I carried little notebooks around, so I could jot down words, ideas, and scenes when the moment hit, lest I lose them. Now I’m an older writer with a chronic illness, so drafting is more measured and considered. A rough draft now takes me about a year, but it’s more tightly written.
Who are your go-to authors when you are craving a good read?
I prefer classical stories of old by Jane Austen, Louisa May Alcott, Elisabeth Gaskell, Victor Hugo, Sigrid Undset, and Charles Dickens. When I want a cozy, feels-like-home read, I often reread Little Women by Louisa May Alcott or Two from Galilee by Marjorie Holmes.
In Fallen, you paint a clear picture of what sin has done to marriage since the fall of man. One thing you wrote that stuck out to me was this: “He (Ish) didn’t want to talk to Ishah. He wanted to be alone. God had said it wasn’t good for him to be alone, yet this is what he now desired. Had eating the fruit destroyed his relationship with his wife?”
When I read this, I wanted to highlight it a hundred times and frame it on my wall. It had never crossed my mind that this behavior resulted from sin! It has helped me have more sympathy for my husband when he is less-than-loveable.
Thank you so much for telling me that! That’s encouraging! Some readers tell me that Fallen should be required reading for those planning to marry. God gave humanity this story. All the details I include in my novel are taken right from Genesis, my theological research, and my understanding of human nature. My husband and I have been married for 42 years. In our early marriage, we had to work through much of what you witness Ish and Ishah experiencing. Two sinners living together always need the Lord’s help. We’ve worked on our marriage, and in the process, we’ve learned a lot about marriage, often what not to do!
After writing this book, did you see marriage in a different light?
The research and the writing of Fallen required me to poke and to prod at everything I had previously been taught or told about marriage. I was face to face with God’s Word and what was written. I knew what the ancient narratives said and the original languages of the Scriptures. I also knew what the New Testament says about Adam, Eve, and marriage. All of that study brought personal growth to our marriage. The theology I studied and hashed through with my husband on long walks and in theology classes we attended jointly helped us to discover marriage as God meant it to be. It definitely impacted our marriage. We do marriage differently now. All of that study, in turn, produced Fallen.
In Refuge, you wrote: “Just because we were wrong doesn’t mean God’s promise has failed. It simply means we didn’t understand His plan or how He intends to fulfill it.” And also, “None of us comprehend the consequences of sin until we commit it.”
Do you relate to Cain’s character in any way?
I am Cain. I think we all are in part, in the broken places of ourselves. We rarely comprehend the consequences of our actions. Cain is the embodiment of what a sinner set on pursuing sin looks like, and we’re all sinners. We each have within us the capacity to commit any type of atrocity, given the right circumstances, mindset, and hardness of heart. It’s an awful reality that we don’t like to consider, but it’s a fact. As a believer, I’m more like Abel. But as a sinner, I’m Cain.
Jesus told the story of the prodigal son, and God included pagans from even Moab in his own family tree. In that parable, Jesus took the boy nobody wanted to be redeemed and saved him, the kid who treated his excellent father in a shameful way, the good Jewish boy who ate the pigs’ food and who fed the unclean pigs! Given Jesus’ storytelling model, I chose to redeem Cain. It created a powerful vehicle to reveal God’s grace and the Gospel, a powerful way to show that God can redeem anyone. It made for good storytelling. Thank you, Jesus!
Both Refuge and Fallen have won the Radiax Press International Christian Fiction "Reality Calling Pre-Christian Godliness Fiction Award,” chosen by two of the premier book reviewers in the world, Peter Younghusband and David Bergsland. I am humbled and grateful for this honor.
What can we look forward to reading next? I have two projects releasing this fall. One is a novella entitled Benjamin’s Blessing that is Book #2 in a series written with a group of Christian writers. If you loved 7 Brides for 7 Brothers, you’ll love this modern take on the story. Book 0 releases in October and is already available for preorder at Refusing to die the way her father did, Janis Woodsman has only a few months left to live. Her choice has caused a rift in her marriage. A rift that fear widens and only the love of God can seal. Thaddeus, her husband, is not the only one upset about her unwillingness to fight, but her seven sons too. Alone in her choice she prays that the Lord will do what she seems to be unable to: make her family understand, or at the very least grant them all peace….and give her sons wives. It should have been a simple party to bring the mafia lords and their political allies together, but Father Popov discovers his daughter, Olga, has seen the dark side of their beloved father. Not only her, but the other six Mafia kings’ daughters know too, one of them far too much. Before he and the other kings can do anything about it, his daughter and the other six princesses disappear without a trace. However, their footprints lead to the snows of Halden, Idaho, in the mountains. But will they be safe there?
The other project releasing this fall is my next full-length novel, The Shadows Come, the sequel to No Longer Alone. This novel begins in 1917 as America enters The Great War.
All the men we know and love from the first novel must register for the draft and await the lottery. Simultaneously, life falls apart for Avery and Prentis as unforeseen health challenges put Avery at risk, bringing unexpected grief and loss. Jack is also in danger, but no one knows where the threats originate. All appears easy to explain away, but it is not.
As troops are called into action, characters we love are moved around the world like chess pieces, their lives and possible deaths in the hands of generals and world leaders. Inexplicably, woven through all of this is a strange flu, originating right in the middle of the country, at the new camp in Fort Riley, Kansas, then called Camp Funston.
War, sickness, calamity, and loss engulf all of our characters. They must learn how to rely on the Lord during dark times over which they have no control, times when their destinies are entirely outside their own determination.
Who will live? Who will die? What will become of the characters we came to know and love so well in No Longer Alone? The Shadows Come reveals their story.
Let’s see the links! Social media, your books, blog, etc.
Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/MelindaVInman/
Website: https://melindainman.com/
Blog: https://melindainman.com/blog/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MelindaVInman
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/melindavinman/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/melindavinman/
Amazon Author Page: http://bit.ly/MelindasBooks
I loved learning more about Melinda. She is awesome!!!
ReplyDeleteShe really is!
Delete