The Launch!
How do I feel about this book being launched at last? Truth be told, it’s a relief. The joy and feelings of accomplishment will come later, when I’m meeting with readers, making presentations about the story, responding to reader questions of what was imagined and what was historical.
Then it’ll feel real, like all the hours of research and writing were worth it. It’s with reader feedback where I accept that maybe, just maybe, I silenced the harpy voices telling me when I’m writing not to bother “it’s such a bad book.”
With the Enduring Tides is bittersweet as it’s the last book I wrote with Jerry by my side, answering questions, letting me bounce ideas off of him, sharing the frustrations and the moments when something I wrote moved him. But it’s also a bridge book, between Across the Crying Sands (2025) and book Three, Beyond the Breaking Waves (2027).
Engineering a bridge requires a correct assessment of place, a good analysis of the load bearing qualities, built with the right materials, and created with a firm foundation. (My engineering Jerry would be proud.)
The launch means I’ve addressed those bridge-building qualities and can look forward to the third book being ready to receive its readers. It’s another step in the process and worth celebrating. I will!
Behind the Story
This story—and With the Enduring Tides—came to me through a reader who later became a research assistant and then a friend. Actually, I was the research assistant to her good work.
The opening scenes about Mary and her horse came from an interview Mary did in the 1940s. She had a terrific memory for details and names, all of which helped give depth to the story.
Census records gave us information about land the Gerritse’s owned and in whose name the plots of ground were held. That they moved around, loved Manzanita, Seaside and Cannon Beach, spread the story into new environs.
Tidbits of newspaper accounts told us where the children were going to school and about the passing of Mary’s parents and the will! The infamous will. Early newspapers from small towns often carried a sentence or two about visitors or a tragic situation and when the legal system got involved.
Finally, stories about the Remittance men—especially Herbert Logan—appeared as though in a tabloid. And I found treasures in footnotes.
…is a founding member of Women Writing the West. She’s won numerous awards including the WILLA, Will Rogers Gold Medallions, The Wrangler from the Western Heritage and National Cowboy Hall of Fame, the CAROL and been short listed for the Spur, Christy and Oregon Book Award. Her latest novel is like many others, based on the lives of actual historical women. Jane divides her time between California and Central Oregon living with her dog Rupert (who writes a column for Jane’s Story Sparks newsletter).
Blog 