BEHIND THE BOOK with Janet Sumner Johnson

All books, no matter the genre, have some reality in them. Some truth that called to the author, and pushed them to write the book.

When I was 19, I found myself at a weekend retreat with a bunch of college friends where everyone had paired off but me. Talk about awkward. I wasn’t a writer then, but I have always loved writing, so I begged some paper and a pen and sat down and wrote.

I started with stream-of-conscious about how I was feeling, but soon I found myself telling the story of Annie...