The Perfect Love Song

I was fascinated with the idea that someone would finally reach a “perfect” goal—the thing they thought would be The Answer to happiness, only to discover that the “perfect” thing made life more difficult as they lost sight of what matters most.

The main characters in this novel—Jimmy Sullivan and Charlotte Carrington—are the brother and best friend of the main characters in my novel When Light Breaks. Through the years, I’ve received letters from readers asking me “What happened to Jimmy and Charlotte? Did Kara and Jack get married?” So this book is dedicated, in many ways, to those readers. Because they asked what happened to these characters, I felt the need to answer.

So this book was inspired by two questions—what happened to the characters from When Light Breaks, and what happens when someone gets everything they believed they wanted? Further inspiration comes from my deep fascination with myth, legend, and the ability of a story to change a life for the better.

A song is at the core of this story. Are you a songwriter? Why did you choose to have a song change Jimmy’s life?

No, I’m not a songwriter, but I wish I were. I do. I really do. I’ve tried. I’m fascinated with the best songwriters—the ones who can reveal in one refrain what takes me an entire novel to say. I believe that any “story”—whether told in song, myth, legend, novel, fairytale, or poem—can change a life.

I believe story is a search for truth, a language of mystery that somehow reveals meaning. Therefore Jimmy’s song—which is really a story—does offer the truth, does change his life.

Both Charlotte and Kara have “creative” jobs. Can you comment on this choice?

There are certain things that can bind friends together—history, trauma, location—but what brought and bound Kara and Charlotte together were their creative spirits. I believe that we all are creative, yet sometimes people make the choice to stifle their creativity in the name of acceptance or success. Any job—any job whatsoever—is creative if we allow our spirits to make it so. Yet, mostly we are worried about what other people think or what our families think. If we stifle our creativity, I believe we can become depressed, feel stuck.

Being “creative” in a venue we love—writing, painting, poetry, etc.—can be very scary, because if we are truly expressing our creativity, then we are truly expressing our inner selves, and for most of us this is a scary thing to do! So for those who choose to leave a traditional job behind to pursue a creative passion, there is a lot of fear. I believe that the arts—writing, painting, poetry, photography—tell us the truth about our lives much more so than the “facts” of our lives.

Part of this story—The Perfect Love Song—is about just this: how an artistic expression of truth can change a life. How a story doesn’t have to be “factual” to be true. And this miracle is part of a creative life.

Who was your favorite character to write in The Perfect Love Song? Why?

My favorite character—ayha—that’s like asking which of my children I love the most. But IF I must choose, then I will have to say that the narrator’s voice is my favorite “character” because she wrote this novella in her usual witty, wise voice. I love how she was able to step back as a watcher and tell the story as an outsider, yet as someone who loved the characters with fierce loyalty.

How much of a person’s character would you say is shaped by his or her childhood?

In the novel I am writing now, I say this “Words have a way—I know now—of working their way into a soul and forming that soul into a shape and vessel it might not have otherwise been. How many times can a mother tell a daughter what is and is not good for her and that daughter not believe it?”

So, yes, I believe that in many ways our childhoods shape who and what we become. This shaping comes through where we live, the words spoken into our souls, the atmosphere we are surrounded by (love or fear), etc. . . .

When I am asked WHY I became a writer, I often say, “That’s a love story.” And what I mean is that I came to writing through the things I loved as a child—books, libraries, words, and story. If I’d had a different childhood, or different parents, or had never moved in adolescence, would I be the same person or the same writer I am now? Probably not.

When the group of friends arrive in Ireland, they are awed by the majesty of Galway bay. Have you been to Ireland and did you base any of your settings on actual places there?

Yes, I have been to Ireland three times (the number of magic). The first time I visited, I was in college and I went with my parents and sisters. The next two times I went with my husband and daughter, Meagan, who was an Irish dancer.

The places I describe are real; the characters’ overwhelming feelings of awe and grandeur were my impressions exactly. I saw and felt the greenest green, the formidable bay, the overpowering cliffs and the sense of ancient power that permeates this country, and I only hope the reader can sense and taste this mystery.

I have not been to the church in Galway—Church of St. Mary on the Hill—but I describe it in detail through the photos and historical accounts of this fascinating Dominican church. The St. Mary statue in the sacristy is also authentic and her story is full of mystery and myth combined. I can only hope that I wrote of both the church and the statue with enough truth to guard the integrity of their stories.

You create characters like Jimmy, who, though flawed, also evoke sympathy. Throughout your life, have you met people who are this way? What draws you to write about characters like this?

I don’t ever intentionally base any of my characters on people I know. But I do offer this caveat: I only know what I know. Not one of my characters is based on someone I know (so far) or on myself. Although these stories might not be about me, they are from me, from somewhere inside me.

My characters are “created” as individuals, as someone separate from a preconceived notion of a living (or deceased) person, yet I’m quite sure that mannerisms, quirks, experiences, and traits of people I love work their way into my characters’ lives and personalities. I just don’t do it on purpose . . .

I don’t know exactly why I’m drawn to the hurting and wounded character other than my need to write my way into their healing and redemption. I approach a story from only one angle: “I wonder what’s going to happen next,” because therein lies hope. In knowing that something—anything—can happen next, the character then has a chance for healing, or for love, for or something new.

I believe hopelessness (a desperate condition of the heart) comes from thinking that “things will never change.” So I write my characters, and then I take them to places where they are given a chance to make a new choice, to do something different and maybe love again. I am annoyingly hopeful, and yet I know there are conditions and situations of the soul that are sad and desperate. I desire the way of healing, and story is my meager attempt to create this pathway with words.

An intergenerational friendship is key to your story. How have you been significantly influenced by someone quite a few years older than yourself?

I think sometimes I write about things I WISH had happened to me. I don’t believe I do this on purpose, but I often create women who live in small towns, have never moved, and live in a close-knit small town community, which of course never happened to me. I moved around when I was young and I’ve always lived in large cities (Philadelphia, Fort Lauderdale, and Atlanta). So, although there have been many, many people who have influenced my life, I haven’t had that one “mentor” who is older and wiser and has guided my life. Although I wish for one!

In this novel, the absent father makes himself felt in the holes he has created in his sons’ lives. Why did you choose to have Jimmy and Jack come from a broken home?

I didn’t choose to have them come from a broken home; they arrived on the page that way. Okay, I know I wrote it, but they came to me from a broken home. They were wounded and trying to find their way in the world the best they could.

I often find myself writing about injured souls and how they find a way to heal and move through the world in a creative and healing way. Love, I believe, is often the catalyst for a new life and I explore the myriad ways this occurs—love of music, of story, of life, of a person—love at all really.