Get a behind-the-scenes all-access pass to Ellen Gillette's book For Such a Time!
SYNOPSIS:
For Such a Time is written for a Christian audience, it focuses on Veronica, a recently divorced young teacher who finds herself falling in love with a handsome interim priest from India.
Together they help several of her students with difficult situations. She’s glad he won’t be there long enough for her heart to get her into trouble and faces another challenge at the same time: her ex and his new wife have moved in just around the corner.
Veronica keeps hearing God ask if she trusts him. As the story unfolds, hurts
are healed, forgiveness is asked and granted, friendships are forged, and there
is, of course, a very happy ending.
What is the sub-genre and trope? Did your characters lead you to this genre or was that decided before the story began?
When Blushing Books announced they were starting a “sweet romance” imprint, I wrote For Such a Time - editors loved the story but it was TOO inspirational.
My BB editor suggested Pen It! Publications, owned by a friend of hers. Pen It! published it and a children’s story I had written, illustrated and self-published: She-Bear in the Beautiful Garden.
I also have a contract on another sweet romance (hopefully the first in a three-book series) as well as a non-fiction book, Baaad Sheep - When God’s People Let You Down.
Are
you more character or plot driven?
Can I say both? I start with an idea. The characters and plot take on a life of their own and I just try to keep up!
With
many main and secondary characters, how do you keep them separated in your
mind? Do you have a story/vision board
above your workspace?
In a new book, not yet published, there are four daughters in a family. I had to plan ahead, deciding on details like hair style and age in order to make them stand out as the story went along. I keep notes in a notebook so I can refer to them, but for me, the characters become so real as I’m writing that I feel I know them as friends.
I
know from previous interviews that characters take on a life of their own. Were any of the characters in this series
determined to take their own direction instead of where you initially wanted
them to go?
In For Such a Time, I needed a reason why a woman might fall for a priest without there being lurid, sinful scenarios - this was a G-rated book, after all, geared to readers of faith. But even then, I wanted the woman to be relatable, struggling, “real.” I think Christian characters in books need to be as flesh and blood as we are in reality, imperfect, flawed, fully aware of their need for spiritual strength.
Are
any of the male POVs based on anyone you know?
When I sent the Emily Sharpe series (written under the pen name Emily Sharpe) to my daughter, she was sure that Eric, who is a stonemason, was patterned on my husband, who was in construction for many years. Knowing the job, the terminology, etc. helped but Eric is definitely not my husband! I thought of particular people for appearance, job, lifestyle...but none of the men is based completely on someone I know.
Are
any of the female POVs based on anyone you know?
Actually, just one- a flight attendant named Rebecca is mentioned, and my sister Rebecca Burgess recently retired from American Airlines.
The other women are figments of my imagination. with specific experiences, however, I sometimes pulled from my own life: Andy, the mechanic in Running Hot (written under the pen name Emily Sharpe), had been molested by her minister as a teenager. That happened to me when I was 16, so I was able to draw from that to describe her feelings.
I
know that we aren’t supposed to have “favorites” as far as our children, but
seriously, who’s your favorite character and why?
Veronica is a teacher at a Catholic school - and I substitute for local Catholic schools! I think even when we’re writing about experiences outside our own, our backgrounds and expertise help shape the stories and make them more real for the readers.
Series
- Were any of the books harder to write than others?
With the first in the Emily Sharpe series, there was a learning curve, as I took notes from my editor so that it met the publisher’s expectations, but once I embraced the genre, so to speak, it flowed.
Going from that genre to the inspirational romance presented another challenge -- no sex, no language, but still realistically presenting a love story with real emotions and struggles.
I personally think there is a market for a hybrid - real women of faith who can say “fuck it” if that is true to their character. I mean, who DOESN’T say that once in awhile - or at least think it?
This
question is if you write in MULTIPLE POVs not just the hero and heroine - I
love the multiple POVs in a book. It’s
not just the hero and heroine, but we get inside the heads of multiple
characters throughout this series. I
feel that it gives the story further depth.
Do you think you will write another book or series following this
multiple POV outline?
With For Such a Time, Veronica and the priest share their POVs, as well as a few other characters to a limited degree, but mostly Veronica.
How
did you come up with the title for your book?
The Biblical story of Esther deals with a woman being in the right place at the right time in order to help her people. “For such a time as this” is a well-known phrase to Christians and so “For Such a Time” alerts readers to a time of some sort of struggle for which the heroine is prepared by God to weather.
If
you met these characters in real life would you get along?
Absolutely.
Series
question – Did you know in advance that you were going to write this as a
series or did one of the characters in book one demand their own story?
For over a year only a handful of people outside my writers’ group knew that Ellen Gillette was Emily Sharpe. I finally decided to “come out.”
I’m proud of Emily’s books; without them I never would have written For Such a Time. Now, I’m working on the second of a three-book series. Each book has played a part in making me the writer I am becoming.
If
your book/series were made into a movie, which actors do you see as playing
your characters?
In For Such a Time, the priest is from India, so a tall Indian actor would be required. To me, believability is more important than a specific person.
Can
you give us a hint as to what we can expect next? Whether a new book and series or a sequel to
an existing series? Can you share a
small tease?
Whether Emily Sharpe will write a new book remains to be seen, but I do have a contract for Love in Yona Valley about a widower who inherits a house and land from an estranged brother. He moves there with his four daughters only to discover that the brother had some secrets. And of course, HEAs for the daughters … and their father… is all part of the fun.
I’ve begun on the sequel, Joy in Yona Valley that takes the various relationships further, and plan to write a third, Peace in Yona Valley - when I can finish the second around teaching, magazine writing, grandmothering and traveling around Florida for my own sanity’s sake!
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