On beach reads and houseguests
Interview with T. Elizabeth Bell, who uses Martha's Vineyard's beaches, towns, and pastures to spin her Island romances.
There I was at dinner time, with a house full of guests during the Fourth of July weekend on the island, letting those guests take over my kitchen and not even offering to help.
That’s not like me. First of all, I love to cook. Second, I normally would feel guilty letting everyone else do the work. But when my husband suggested that I might want to get up and set the table, I actually resented it.
I blame it all on T. Elizabeth Bell. Settled in an armchair with the last fifty pages of her new book, Sheepish, I had to find out if Aly, the tech-savvy web designer, would live her life in San Francisco alone or return to Martha’s Vineyard and live happily ever after with Whit, her fisherman/guitarist love interest.
Yep, I’m a sucker for a romance novel. Usually when they are set in the 19th century, but Bell’s contemporary one, about an upwardly mobile Millennial recovering from a layoff, a cheating boyfriend, and a hyper-focus on success, while visiting her best friend on the Vineyard, was totally worth being rude to my guests Not least because there is a lamb named Dandelion that Aly has to bottle feed, while staying at the pastoral up-island farm where much of the up-island romance takes place.(I swear I made it up to my guests at the post-dinner cleanup).
Like any reader, I had questions afterward, and Bell graciously agreed to provide the answers. .
Jan: What came first, the lamb and the up-island setting for Sheepish, or the love story itself? In other words, where did the idea for the story begin?
T. Elizabeth Bell: Baaa!
My first novel, Goats in the Time of Love, featured a goatscaper (because there is such a thing!) and, obviously, goats. I enjoyed running an animal theme through the novel, so I decided to go with chickens for my second, Counting Chickens, and tie in the Island’s famous and famously eccentric Chicken Lady, Nancy Luce. (Her house was actually a stop on the up-Island tour-by-carriage in the 19th century.) So with goats and chickens covered, I wanted another very Vineyard-y animal. Sheep run through the Island’s history, in addition to being cute, so sheep it was.
Jan: Friendships are important in this book. I especially like Aly’s relationship with her best friend, Hannah, and their very sister-like conflicts. How did you develop these two and their friendship?
T. Elizabeth Bell: Ah. I suppose Hannah and Aly’s friendship is a combination of the friendships I have and those I wish I had! The novel tests Aly and Hannah’s deep ties of affection by the very different paths through life they chose. But mostly, I just wanted to have a Hannah as my best friend!
Jan: Me, too!
I always find writing the romantic part of my novels the hardest part of the job. This is your third romance set on Martha’s Vineyard; how did you learn to write romance and how did you get started writing this series?
T. Elizabeth Bell: Ok, being honest here: I don’t read romance, except for Jane Austen! But when I started writing, that’s what came out. And it’s awfully fun to re-imagine what it’s like to fall in love, that heady, powerful rush of emotions. (And really good sex.)
With Goats, I didn’t set out to write a novel. I wrote a first chapter for the heck of it, sent it to a Vineyard writer friend with the idea that we could take turns writing chapters, just to see what came out! She demurred; I kept going and ended up with a draft of Goats in the Time of Love.
Jan: In Sheepish, there is a definite theme about the risks of making too many sacrifices for financial success and how there are other valid ways to live a life. Although you recently retired, you were a hardworking DC lawyer for many years. Does that theme come from your own life lessons or from the conflicts you invent to make the romance suspenseful?
T. Elizabeth Bell: DC is full of people who do sacrifice their happiness (and often their families) for money and ambition. While I was incredibly lucky to be able to work part-time, I was surrounded by people who could not—or would not—if it meant jumping off the career ladder. I’m also watching my own kids and my friends’ kids facing hard decisions like those made by Aly, Hannah, and Whit. Real conflicts, real life.
Jan: The book introduces the reader to a lot of the sights and experiences in nearly every corner of the Vineyard that could function almost as a vacation guide for visitors to the island. Did you do that from the first or was it a result of feedback from readers?
T. Elizabeth Bell: That’s one of my goals, to give my readers a virtual vacation to Martha’s Vineyard! And yes, I’ve had readers use my novels as guidebooks to the Island, which I love hearing about.
Jan: I loved how you referenced your main characters from your previous books, Goats in the Time of Love and Counting Chickens, so that your fans get a mini-update on how they are doing. (Yes, still together!) Is there a special series-satisfaction that comes from starting by reading them in order: Starting with Goats, moving to Chickens before getting to Sheepish , or do you advise readers to just jump in wherever they want?
T. Elizabeth Bell: Jump in anywhere! The little easter eggs are there in the later books if you read them from first to last, but I’d pick up whichever one catches your fancy.
Available at Edgartown Books, Bunch of Grapes, Bookshop.org (supporting indie bookstores!), Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and Kindle Unlimited. T. Elizabeth Bell will be appearing at the Authors' Festival at the Edgartown Library on July 17 from 5:30 to 7 pm and at a book talk at the West Tisbury Library on August 9th from 3:30-4:30.
This is a great opening to draw readers and writers into both the book and the interview! The interview itself is charming. I'm ready to read!
Nice questions...and great answers