Visitor: Elizabeth Gauffreau
We have a visitor today, and Liz is here to tell us all about her new book baby. (Notice how I dodged spelling her last name again. Polishes nails on shirt.) Liz is one of my Story Empire partners and a great author. Check out her work, and make sure to use those sharing buttons on the way out.
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Introduction
Thank you for hosting me on my blog tour for The Weight of Snow and Regret, Craig! Today begins a series of character spotlights, which fellow author Diana Peach recommended as a good way to pique potential readers’ interest. But first, here is what The Weight of Snow and Regret is all about.
Description
For over 100 years, no one wanted to be sent to the Sheldon Poor Farm. By 1968, no one wanted to leave.
Amid the social turmoil of 1968, the last poor farm in Vermont is slated for closure. By the end of the year, the twelve destitute residents remaining will be dispatched to whatever institutions will take them, their personal stories lost forever.
Hazel Morgan and her husband Paul have been matron and manager at the Sheldon Poor Farm for the past 20 years. Unlike her husband, Hazel refuses to believe the impending closure will happen. She believes that if she just cares deeply enough and works hard enough, the Sheldon Poor Farm will continue to be a safe haven for those in need, herself and Paul included.
On a frigid January afternoon, the overseer of the poor and the town constable from a nearby town deliver a stranger to the poor farm for an emergency stay. She refuses to tell them her name, where she came from, or what her story is. It soon becomes apparent to Hazel that whatever the woman’s story is, she is deeply ashamed of it.
Hazel fights to keep the stranger with them until she is strong enough to face, then resume, her life—while Hazel must face the tragedies of her own past that still haunt her.
Told with compassion and humor, The Weight of Snow & Regret tells the poignant story of what it means to care for others in a rapidly changing world.
Creative License
I took some creative license with the number of residents who were living at the Sheldon Poor Farm when it closed in 1968. There was no way I could individualize 22 people, and I didn’t want just a lump of “old and disabled people,” so I changed the number to 12. I then faced the challenge of creating them. The Library of Congress overcame this particular block. I don’t think the novel would have come into being without these images.
To kick off our character spotlights, allow me introduce you to hobo raconteur/liar Philo Roy. The excerpt below is from ten-year-old Hazel’s point of view.
Excerpt from “Over the Hill to the Poor Farm” Chapter
On the front steps of the poorhouse sat a man smoking a cigarette, somehow maneuvering it through a big, black mustache that covered his mouth and most of his chin. He raised a hand in greeting. “New arrivals! How d’ye do? Beautiful day, eh? Just got back from Florida, m’self.”
No one answered the man’s greeting. The man with the pipe spoke for the first time. “Philo, don’t be a nuisance. Get your ass off the steps.”
Philo jumped up, laughing. “Don’t be a nuisance, the man says. Move your ass, the man says. They see me coming—and it’s here comes trouble! They see me going—and it’s there goes trouble!” He laughed some more and poked his cigarette through his mustache.
Philo sounded so cheerful, Hazel wondered if he might not be right in the head. He dragged the duffel bag from the sheriff’s car and disappeared inside the house, hollering from the doorway, “Come on in! The place ain’t much, but it’ll do in a pinch,” followed by a gruff voice telling him to “Shut up, Philo.”
Books2Read Purchase Link: https://books2read.com/WeightofSnow
Author Biography
Elizabeth Gauffreau writes fiction and poetry with a strong connection to family and place. Her work has been widely published in literary magazines, as well as several themed anthologies. Her short story “Henrietta’s Saving Grace” was awarded the 2022 Ben Nyberg prize for fiction by Choeofpleirn Press.
She has previously published a novel, Telling Sonny: The Story of a Girl Who Once Loved the Vaudeville Show, and two collections of photopoetry, Grief Songs: Poems of Love & Remembrance and Simple Pleasures: Haiku from the Place Just Right.
Liz’s professional background is in nontraditional higher education, including academic advising, classroom and online teaching, curriculum development, and program administration. She received the Granite State College Distinguished Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2018. Liz lives in Nottingham, New Hampshire with her husband. Find her online at https://lizgauffreau.
Click/tap to follow blog tour: https://lizgauffreau.com/the-weight-of-snow-and-regret-blog-tour-2/
