Melchior: Vengeance Is Mine is a sweeping saga that shows the generational effects of our choices. The tapestry of interwoven characters was rich and well done, in my opinion. I’ve seen written that during the development of the novel, your husband passed away. How was the novel’s development affected by your grief, and how did that grief affect the novel?

Writing has always been a bit if an escape from reality and yet an opportunity to look at life—my life as well as life in general—from a fresh angle. John suffered the effects of Leukemia for four years before he passed away, so my writing during those years shadowed that reality. Many questions arose while I watched the man I loved suffer and die. At the same time, God’s grace remained tangible and held me together far better than I realized during the ordeal. The dual reality of grief and comfort, testing and surrender, informed the complexities of the novel. I realized I could no longer simply tell a “story.”  Rather, I reflected through character, plot, and setting something of life’s mystery, which pointed to something beyond me as a writer and humanity as a whole. That is the core of Melchior’s journey—to realize that he didn’t have to understand God or even himself; he simply needed to allow God to grow inside him no matter what was happening around him. Continue reading →