COTT: Interview with Clash Winner Susan Page Davis

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COTT: Interview with Clash Winner Susan Page Davis

This week, we’re pleased to feature the winner of the July Clash

of the Titles competition. Susan Page Davis is the author of more than

sixty published novels. She’s a two-time winner of the Inspirational

Readers’ Choice Award, and also a winner of the Carol Award, the

Will Rogers Medallion, and was a finalist in the WILLA Awards and the

More Than Magic Contest.

A Maine native, she now lives in Kentucky. Her historical romance The

Outlaw Takes a Bride is a finalist in the 2015 Will Rogers Medallion

Awards.

Her latest accomplishment is having her brand new June release, River

Rest, be chosen as the July Clash of the Titles victor.

We asked Susan to tell us a little about writing River Rest. Here’s what

she had to say.

CBA: What made you choose the setting for your story?

SPD: My great-aunt left a journal she wrote in the 1920s

and ’30s. It gave such a vivid picture of life in rural Maine that I

wanted to write a story in that setting. I decided to push it back to

1918, near the end of World War I, because of the added tension and also

because my grandfather (Aunt Belle’s brother-in-law) served in WWI. He

was drafted close to the end of the war, and I adapted some details of

his story to fit in for my heroine, Judith’s brother. River Rest is

purely fiction, but many of the events in it were inspired by things

that really happened in my family.

CBA: Do your characters have anything in common with real

people?

SPD: In real life, my grandmother (Aunt Belle’s sister) was

a schoolteacher before she married my grandfather. Judith has a lot in

common with both my Nana and Aunt Belle. She loves her bird feeder, she

learns to make quilts, and she cooks many of the same things my Nana

served. Her life on the farm is a lot like theirs was. I love Judith

because she keeps on, even when she is tempted to fall into depression

as her father did. She knows people are depending on her, so she

perseveres.

CBA: You mention your story was inspired by your great-aunt’s

journal. What’s the best thing you learned from reading what she

wrote?

SPD: My Great-aunt Belle, who wrote the journal, died in

1939, long before I was born. She was 55, and she died from

complications of appendicitis. I never got the chance to know her, and I

would love to be able to sit down with her for a cup of tea. As a side

note, I had acute appendicitis myself in 1985, and it was no fun then,

with modern medicine to help me out. Aunt Belle noted so many cultural

things in her diary—who she voted for, the famous boxers of the day, the

way the neighboring farm boys were building tractors out of truck

chassis, and all the community events and gossip. She never had children

of her own, but she doted on her nieces and nephews. I think I would

have loved her.

Thanks to Susan for her insights. You

may visit her at her website at: www.susanpagedavis.com .

River Rest by Susan Page Davis

River Rest sounds like an interesting read. Here’s more about the

book:

Unable to depend on her father to heal the crumbling family,

Judith is afraid to trust the mysterious neighbor, Ben, who lives with

his own grief.

Maine, 1918

Judith Chadbourne gave up her teaching job after her mother’s death

to help her father with her five siblings. But when her father sinks

into deep depression and her brother Joel is drafted, the household

chores and farm work may overwhelm her. Neighbor Ben Thayer offers to

buy their farm, shocking Judith and angering her father. An outsider

from New York, Ben seems rich and mysterious, but his heart aches from

his own loss. Judith accidentally breaks the antique crystal Christmas

ornament her mother loved. The splintering star echoes her family’s

shattering. Ben’s efforts to help make Judith suspicious, but when Joel

falls critically ill at the army camp, Ben’s aid brings the beginnings

of trust. After the armistice, and the community and family start to

recover from the strain of the war, but Judith learns independence is

lonely. When Ben is injured, she is the only one who can help him. Can

love take her beyond the frozen Maine winter?