Happy Read Across America month + Women’s History month. What a perfect time to celebrate the release of Shannon Hitchcock’s latest historical mg, Wild Mountain Ivy (Carolrhoda Books).
About the Book:
Twelve-year-old musician Ivy spends the summer at her uncle’s Bed & Breakfast in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains as she recovers from a recent illness. There she learns The Everly House has had a long history―including as a sanatorium, a treatment center for tuberculosis patients, in the 1920s.
Soon Ivy starts having dreams about a girl named Jessie Pearl, a TB patient who stayed at the house a hundred years before. Separated by a century, Ivy discovers Jessie was an adventurous musician like herself, who struggled to adapt to her sickness.
Along the way, Ivy makes discoveries that turn her summer in the mountains into a new beginning.
About the Author:
Shannon Hitchcock says her love of stories began with her mother’s voice:
“In her slow Southern drawl, she read the fairytales, Hansel and Gretel, and Jack and the Beanstalk.“
Shannon grew up on her grandparents’ farm in rural North Carolina and it’s no wonder many of the voices of her numerous middle grade novels and picture books have a southern tone to them.
Full disclosure: Shannon and I have the same literary agent, Deborah Warren, at East West Literary Agency. It is extra special to have her on the blog today.
Let’s Ask Some Questions!
Inspiration
Q 1. We understand the premise of this story was inspired in part when you re-read one of your childhood favorite books during COVID, and also because the rights to one of your own novels became available. Can you tell us more about this, and how these pieces of Wild Mountain Ivy came together?
Shannon Hitchcock: My debut novel, The Ballad of Jessie Pearl, was originally published in 2013 and went out of print when its publisher closed its doors and returned all rights to me. I was determined to find a new publishing home for Jessie, which is set in the 1920s and is about my grandmother living through the tuberculosis pandemic.
About this time, Covid struck, and while cooped up at home, I reread my favorite book from childhood, Requiem for A Princess, by Ruth M. Arthur. That book is a ghost story that weaves a present-day girl with the ghost of a girl from the 16th century.
Shannon Hitchcock: An idea took shape. I decided to write my own ghost story and weave Jessie Pearl from my debut novel with a present-day girl living through Covid. I suggested to my agent, (Deborah Warren), that we pitch it as a two-book deal.
Process — piecing it together.
Q 2. How do you tackle such a daunting challenge as weaving two separate stories –Ivy’s and Jessie’s and their time periods together so seamlessly?
Shannon Hitchcock: Honestly, I used Requiem for A Princess as a guide. I outlined that book and made notes about how my story would fit into that structure.
Q 3. What was the research like for this book?
Shannon Hitchcock: Luckily, I’m a packrat so most of the research had already been done when I was writing The Ballad of Jessie Pearl.
Shannon Hitchcock: That said, 2013 was a long time ago and I had to reread all my notes and also a couple of reference books. I also talked with friends suffering from long Covid.
Mysteries and Discoveries
Q 4. What comes first when you begin to write a mystery? Do you know the ending from the start? Do you begin with a list of “red herrings”?
Shannon Hitchcock: Since The Ballad of Jessie Pearl is based on a family story, I stayed true to my grandmother’s history. That meant I knew the ending, just not exactly how I would get there.
Q 5. What discoveries did you make while writing this book? Did an unexpected character show up on the page? A secret room in The Everly House? (No spoilers.)
Shannon Hitchcock: I used Ancestry.com and found lots of information about my grandmother and her family, (census records, obituaries etc.) that made its way into the book.
Details, details…
Q 6. They say each of our books is tiny bit autobiographical. Are there parts of you in this book?
Shannon Hitchcock: I set the book in Asheville, where I now live, and all of the landmarks are places that I frequent on a regular basis.
Q 7. Do you work with a critique group or beta readers?
Shannon Hitchcock: I use a critique group for my picture book biographies, but I prefer beta readers for my novels.
Revisions!
Q 8. Let’s chat about revisions. How many drafts did this story go through before you sent it to your agent? Were there any significant changes? Characters you ended up cutting?
Shannon Hitchcock: There were probably around four drafts before I sent it to my agent. The most significant changes happened after my editor Amy Fitzgerald requested revisions on spec.
In the original manuscript, I had used flashbacks from The Ballad of Jessie Pearl. Amy requested I strip out all the flashbacks and write new material about what Jessie’s life had been like in a tuberculosis sanatorium. That revision took months to pull off.
Happy, Happy Book Birthday to Wild Mountain Ivy.
And thank you so much to Shannon Hitchcock for joining the blog today.
To learn more about Shannon Hitchcock and her books,
check out her website: https://www.shannonhitchcock.com
and follow her on Instagram: @hitchcock_shannon
Up next:
Join us as we celebrate the Book Birthday of
QUESO, JUST IN TIME
by Pura Belpré Award recipient (Efrén Divided) Ernesto Cisneros.
~Quill Tree Books~
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