Okay…since I’m traveling so much and writing so much, it’s hard to find the time to read everything I want to read. When I do sit down, I want to be totally enveloped in the story, swept away, and not go to sleep until I finish.
My good friend, Heather Davis, did that to me with her book, THE CLEARING.

A fellow writer at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Heather really knocked my socks off with the fresh, original, time-travel romance that had me crying at the end. I’ve been telling everyone I know about this book!
So, I asked Heather if she’d join me for an interview to talk about THE CLEARING. Welcome my friend, Heather…

MARLEY: Hey hon! Thanks for being here. As you know, I totally loved your book. How did you come up with the idea/premise for THE CLEARING?
HEATHER: I used to live in a small rural town in the North Cascades. At the back of my neighbor’s field was a red barn, which I could see from my writing desk. Some days the mist would get so thick on the field that the barn would disappear. It got me wondering what was really on the other side of the mist… and Henry Briggs came walking out – a boy stuck in the endless summer of 1944.
MARLEY: How did you research the book?
HEATHER: I read some books on the WWII experience – the best of which was a book about army nurses. I also checked out period films, including The Best Years of Our Lives, a film about returning WWII GIs. In working on WWII, I checked in with military protocol with an expert in the writing community, and I also spent a lot of time talking to the elders in my family about their lives during the war. It was fascinating to hear their stories of sacrifice and survival during those tough, emotional times.
MARLEY: What do you think is the most distinctive element of your voice in your books?
HEATHER: I think in The Clearing, I was learning more about writing in Third Person, with my telling of Henry’s story. It was more about the poetry of description and the way he would have seen the world than about my own voice. In both of my books so far, I like to think that I have a “storyteller’s” voice and that I want to wrap my readers into the world I am creating, whether it’s fantastical or realistic.
MARLEY: What do you think is the most challenging part of writing?
HEATHER: A challenging part of writing is holding all the threads of the story in your mind and fighting through the “messy middle” — keeping the end in mind and trudging forward word by word. My favorite part of writing is actually revising! Drafting a new story is very hard, slow work for me.
MARLEY: What did you want to be when you “grew up”? Was writing always part of the “dream?”
HEATHER: I have wanted to me a stand-up comedian, a filmmaker, and a lawyer – not in that order. All three have much to do with writing – so I guess being a novelist is my perfect job. When I was little I wrote plays, stories, poems, screenplays – this has always felt right.
MARLEY: As I’ve told people, THE CLEARING was excellent and I ate it up like a piece of chocolate cake. What have been some of your most recent reads that you’d recommend?
HEATHER: I just finished a great steampunk novel called Boneshaker by Cherie Priest, which was super fun and action-packed. And, I also just started your Ghost Huntress series, Marley – which I love!
MARLEY: Awww…you’re the best. What’s your favorite places to visit? Any upcoming trips?
HEATHER: I did a lot of traveling in college and lately I’m getting into it again. I love, love, love Hawaii. I want to go back to Paris someday soon. I have dreams of visiting the Greek Isles and also Italy. I will go anywhere with great food.
MARLEY: A girl after my own foodie heart! So, what’s the craziest thing you’ve done in the name of researching a book?
HEATHER: Hmm, I don’t think anything’s crazy in the name of researching books. I’ve written to FBI experts, food scientists, studied rock climbing online, visited cemetaries — when you need information, you can find it in unusual places.
MARLEY: In THE CLEARING, your character travels through a mist into the WWII era. If you were to come upon a similar time traveling mist, where would you want to go? What time period? And why?
HEATHER: I think I would choose the period between the wars – maybe Paris in the late 20s to early 1930s. I would love to hang out with the literati at Shakespeare and Company in Paris – you know, James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, etc… I wouldn’t say anything, I’d just absorb.
MARLEY: Okay…what’s next for you? When’s your next masterpiece coming out?
HEATHER: I’m writing a YA called Wherever You Go — it will be out in Fall 2011 from Harcourt. It’s the story of Holly, a girl who’s caring for her grandfather with Alzheimer’s, and Rob, her boyfriend who died in a crash six months earlier and finds that Holly’s grandfather is the only one who can help him move on. It’s about family, communication, loss, and the things that hold us back.
Thanks so much for the interview! Now, I want everyone to go out and get her book!