Pump Up Your Book Chats with Eileen Hodgetts, author of ‘Whirlpool’

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ABOUT EILEEN HODGETTS

Eileen Enwright Hodgetts is the author of Whirlpool. She is a much traveled writer. Brought up in England and Wales, she has also lived and worked in South Africa and Uganda and now makes her home in Pittsburgh, PA. Her life experiences allow her to use exotic backgrounds for her novels and to understand how an adventure can begin with just one small incident. For ten years she directed a humanitarian mission in East Africa and is also involved in a Ugandan Coffee Farm. Much of her writing reveals not only her great fondness for the British Isles, but also her British sense of humor which still sees the funny side of most situations.

In addition to writing novels, Eileen Enwright Hodgetts is also an accomplished playwright with a number of national awards to her credit. Her novel, Whirlpool, began life as a stage musical playing at the Niagara Falls Convention Center in Niagara Falls, New York. In 1993 the Mayor of Niagara Falls, NY, proclaimed the summer of 1993 as Whirlpool Theater Days in honor of the production.

The author’s award-winning courtroom drama Titanic to All Ships will open at the Comtra Theater on April 13 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. The drama, created under a Fellowship Grant from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a dramatic re-telling of the Senate Hearings into the tragedy. The play has won several national awards.

To get your copy of Whirlpool by Eileen Hodgetts at Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Whirlpool-Eileen-Enwright-Hodgetts/dp/147510359X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343650696&sr=1-1&keywords=Whirlpool+by+Eileen+Hodgetts

Pick up your ebook copy at Barnes & Noble:

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/whirlpool-eileen-enwright-hodgetts/1109590147?ean=2940014328609

Find out all about Whirlpool at Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14429821-whirlpool

Q: Can you tell us why you wrote your book?

My book is about a woman in the 1920s who wants to achieve fame and fortune by going over Niagara Falls in a barrel. I wrote it because I was very intrigued by the whole question of why a person would risk their life doing something so very dangerous. Having spent some time in and around Niagara Falls I realize that there is nothing “funny” about the subject. The Falls are seriously dangerous, so why are they so fascinating?

Q: Which part of the book was the hardest to write?

Because I have a background in playwriting I love to write dialogue; description is a little harder.

Q: Does your book have an underlying message that readers should know about?

The underlying message is about the cost of fame; and how the desire for fame blinds us to the good things that are already in our lives. Fame is a moving target and if you do something merely to become famous, you will never be as famous as you want to be.

Q: Besides books, what else do you write? Do you write for publications?

I write stage plays and have been quite successful in having them performed and winning prizes. The plays are mainly one-acts and some of them have contained the germ of what would later be a novel, including Whirlpool.

Q: Would you like to tell us about your home life? Where you live? Family? Pets?

I live just outside of Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, with my husband, my cat and my dog. My dog shares my writing tasks by sleeping at my feet every time I go to the computer. I have two children and four grandchildren, and I was born and educated in the UK. When I was first married we moved to South Africa, and then we moved to the US.

Q: Can you tell us a little about your childhood?

I was born and grew up in the south of England. Although we lived close to London, our area was quite rural, and very historic. Our parish church was pre-Norman and was listed in the Doomsday Book. Our local manor house was the home of Bess Throckmorton, the wife of Sir Walter Raleigh. We were surrounded by thatched roofs and half-timbered houses and thought nothing of it. I had a happy childhood; okay I was a miserable teenager, but then who wasn’t? I went through the normal period of wishing that I was a princess who had been kidnapped by gypsies and set down in this very normal home. From a very early age I knew that I wanted to do two things; I wanted to be a writer, and I wanted to live in Africa. By the age of 21 I had managed to do both of those things.

Q: What do you do to get away from it all?

I go to Africa. For the past 12 years I have been leading a mission program called Encounter Uganda. We bring Christian humanitarian relief to some of the poorest of the poor in rural Uganda, near Lake Albert. The area has very little in the way of paved roads, electricity, running water, or natural resources. Leading 50 people on a trek across two continents is definitely getting away from the everyday life.

Q: Are you familiar with the social networks and do you actively participate?

I have a Facebook page, and I know it helps me to promote to my friends and their friends, but I have not yet unlocked the door that will make facebook a really useful tool.

Q: How do you think book promotion has changed over the years?

We have so few book stores left, especially independent stores. I am not sure how books are really being promoted unless they are written by someone who has already published a number of best sellers, or by a famous actor, a politician or a criminal. So much of it is now left up to the author.

Q: What is the most frustrating part of being an author?

People telling you that they have a really good idea for a book and that you should go ahead and write their book for them.

Q: What is the most rewarding?

The sheer joy when someone says “I read your book and I couldn’t put it down”. That makes all the work worthwhile.

Q: How do you think book publishing has changed over the years?

Electronic publishing and the availability of print on demand has changed the whole industry. A writer is no longer required to prove to one layer after another of publishing industry employees that they have written a book that will sell. This has probably led to a lowering of the standard in some areas of publishing, but it has also allowed new talent to spread their wings and get their work in front of the public. The reader has a chance to decide on their own whether or not they want to read a book, and the choice is not made for them by some giant publishing house.

Q: If you could be anywhere in the world other than where you are right now, where would that place be?

I have always wanted to see New Zealand.

Q: Your book has just been awarded a Pulitzer. Who would you thank?

I would thank my husband Graham who has always been my best and most constructive critic, and my God who has given me a talent that I hope I can use to make people happy.

Q: Thank you so much for this interview, (name of author). Do you have any final words?

Start young. Read to your children at every opportunity. Read bedtime stories to them, let them listen to audio books on long journeys, grow their imaginations until they have learned to people the world with stories of their own creating. Storytelling is the oldest of human arts, let’s not replace it with trash t.v. and reality shows.

ABOUT WHIRLPOOL

The year is 1923 and the jazz age is in full swing. Evangeline Murray, a young widow from Ohio, is recruited by the Women’s Freedom Movement to represent the spirit of modern womanhood by going over Niagara Falls in a barrel. Evangeline eagerly embraces her opportunity to achieve fame and fortune, until she sees the power of the River and begins to understand the risk she is taking. Joshua McClaren, an enigmatic battle-scarred veteran of World War I, and the best boatman on the river, reluctantly agrees to launch the headstrong Evangeline. Joshua has seen hundreds of bodies surface in the Whirlpool below the Falls, and has faced death on the battlefields of Flanders and has no respect for the charming, impetuous Mrs. Murray, and her desire for fame. Before the barrel can be launched, each of them will have to face their own demons, painful secrets will be revealed and the Niagara Rivers will claim two more lives. Inspired by true stories of the Falls, Whirlpool is a romance, an adventure, and the closest that most of us will ever come to taking the fateful plunge over the Falls.Whirlpool is a fiction that is based on reality. Seven people have tried to ride over Niagara Falls in a barrel. Four have succeeded and three have died. The first person to make the attempt was Annie Taylor, a middle aged school teacher from Michigan who made a successful journey in 1901. Barrel riding at Niagara Falls is now forbidden by law, but at the beginning of the 20th century Niagara was a haven for daredevils of all types, and many of their exploits are included in the novel.

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A lot of hard work! I sponsor a lot of on line parties, festivals and contests. Book sales don’t magically happen, believe me. An author has to work hard to earn her readers. And then she has to work hard to keep them by giving them something they’ll enjoy reading. I try hard to make my books worth a reader’s time.

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