Cowgirl in the East Writes the
Gone With the Wind of the West

I have always – every minute of my life – loved the West. My fantasies in childhood were simple and explicit. I was a cowgirl… I rode a jet black stallion. I dressed in black from boots to Stetson, except for the pair of ivory handled Peacemakers, slung low at the hip, which I wielded with the combined skill of Roy Rogers and the Lone Ranger, my two idols. I was very young at the time of this fantasy… I know that, because I remember feeling horribly guilty when Roy Rogers’ first wife passed on, for I had secretly wished her out of the way so I could marry Roy! She died in the year I turned four.

Cowgirl from Weehawken

I tell you all this only to assure you that my love of the Old West is both lifelong and passionate. I learned to ride horses very early, so I could fulfill my destiny of becoming a cowgirl, but my parents took a dim view of my becoming the fastest gun in New Jersey (despite the reputation Jersey has for such pursuits) so fulfillment on that score had to wait a while.

I also only wanted to write novels – to spend my whole life researching and writing, but I grew up, got married (not very wisely, I’m afraid) had two daughters (that was the wise part) got divorced and because I was suddenly on my own, the breadwinner for the household, I knew I couldn’t go to my garret to write, so I had to put both my ambitions on the shelf for a while. I got a job in advertising and marketing to pay the bills.

I tell you this only to let you know that I wasn’t idle before that glorious moment when I was blessed with a New York Times bestseller in So Many Partings and began a whole new life as a novelist… which is surely the single nicest thing that can happen to a person, other than falling in love or becoming a cowgirl.

Taking a Chance

One fine day, my Mother who loved nothing more than books, said to me out of the blue, “Why don’t you write a book about a man named Chance McAllister. That would be a fine name for a rogue.” The name hit me like a lightning strike and from that moment on, Paint the Wind took seed in my brain and the next five years of my life were spent researching and writing it.

So, back to the West… I started work on the western saga of my fantasies… little did I know at that moment, what extraordinary learnings would be demanded of me over the next five years in order to write Paint the Wind.

What It Takes to Write a Saga

The Indians say a story stalks a writer… watches, waits, decides if you’re worthy… and the story that stalked me was an immense canvas, a sort of Gone With the Wind of the West, as one reviewer was kind enough to call it. Inasmuch as I was an avid reader of Louis L’Amour and Zane Grey, I knew that authenticity of detail is absolutely essential to bringing a good Western yarn to life, so… I set out to stalk my story. The Native Americans also say you have to walk your talk.

To do that led me down some pathways that you may find hard to believe, but I must ask you to suspend disbelief for a moment or two, as I had to, for every single astonishing thing I investigated had its reality in the Old West. Paint the Wind is chock-full of truth as well as fiction.

Learning Curve

I made a list of all I would have to know viscerally in order to give my story voice – beyond just plain history and geography:

Silver Mining

Herbal Medicine

• Healing
• Life on a Circus Train
• How to run a ‘house of ill repute’ (aka brothel)
• Gunfighting
• Wilderness Survival
• The plight of the insane in Asylums in the 1880s

Apache Lore and Culture

Ritual Magic

Heartfelt Obligations

It looked both formidable and like the research project of my cowgirl dreams! I generally spend a number of months immersed in learning before writing – then I continue to research as I write. You have to live your characters’ lives – not think them. You have to cry for their pain, laugh for their joy… agonize over a death that you could save them from with a stroke of the pen.

You feel a terrible responsibility toward these characters who have somehow miraculously been given into your care. The simple truth is that you don’t want to fail them, because to you the writer, they have become flesh and blood people whose courage and determination you are tasked with making known to the world.

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To find out how I pursued my story and it pursued me, take a peek at Off to Join the Circus.

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