Dear Friends,
This week I visited the place where it happened, the landscape where, thirteen years ago, I had a terrible hiking accident, which later planted the seeds for my newest novel, HEART OF THE WILD. That place is Sewanee, TN, but I didn’t return to revisit that particular no-good-very-bad day, but to interview a professor about another book I am just starting to explore and write. And the crazy part? The nutty part? These two books have nothing to do with each other. Meaning, the subjects are so diverse that they should not be converging in the same quaint college town tucked in the mountains. (I am too nervous-nilly and superstitious to tell you what I am exploring until it is real).
What does that mean? That this place holds the seeds of two novels? That these mountains are a portal to the imagination? That these powerful Sewanee valleys are redeeming my terrible day by offering me something new? Or is it all just a coincidence?
I don’t know, but I do know that I loved waking up in the old Rivendell Writer’s Colony on the edge of a bluff where I wrote most of Becoming Mrs. Lewis and seeing the fog fill the valley at dawn like a bowl of milk.
I loved watching the sun set over the plateau and I loved visiting a place where something bad happened while beginning something beautiful and new. I will always love Sewanee, TN, although logically I should not. But logic never has much to do with love.
In the coming months, I have so many exciting things to tell you about Heart of the Wild, but the first happened this week! Kristy Woodson Harvey and I announced on Substack that our books will be in the next Friends & Fiction Subscription box, which is available to order now! Get Kristy’s Falling for Peachtree Bluff, and my Heart of the Wild with exclusive Friends & Fiction swag! YOU CAN WATCH OUR VIDEO HERE.
And you can find the box HERE.
This week was also a huge publishing week for books I love and want to read.
Love You More by Emily Giffin
Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt by Ben Reeves (See our interview with him next week on Friends & Fiction!)
Single Girls by John Searles (Click HERE to watch this week’s Friends & Fiction interview with John.)
Habits of the Sea by Shea Ernshaw with one of the most gorgeous first editions I’ve ever seen.
That’s it for now and tell me what you’re reading and a place you love even when logic tells you that you should not!
As always, yours,
Patti
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Patti Callahan Henry is a New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Globe and Mail bestselling author of seventeen novels and a podcast host. Patti is the co-host and co-creator of the popular weekly web show, podcast, and online community, Friends & Fiction.
She lives in Mountain Brook, Alabama with her husband. Her newest novel, The Story She Left Behind was released on March 18th, 2025.
Be sure to follow Patti on social media and visit her website for the latest updates & announcements and appearances!
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