Interview with Author Jill Stengl

We're talking today with author Jill Stengl, who has been writing for about sixteen years with sixteen books to her name!

I've had the privilege of getting to know Jill in recent years as a critique partner and as a dear friend. She happens to be a good writer too, and it was fun to watch when her book Faithful Traitor won Book of the Year for Historical Romance Short category at the American Christian Fiction Writers Conference in 2005. That year this book also won first place in the Historical Romance Short category, 2005 Inspirational Readers’ Choice Contest hosted by the
Faith, Hope, and Love chapter of Romance Writers of America. The book deserved the honor as it is one of the best short romance books I've ever read.

Tell us a bit about yourself and your writing.

I made my first attempt at writing a book in 1991. Although that effort never sold, the response to it was encouraging enough to keep me going, and I sold my first book in 1994 to Heartsong Presents. Altogether, I have written eight Heartsong books and eight Barbour novellas.

What is the greatest historical novel you’ve ever read and why?

This is a tricky question, since most great novels considered “historical” were contemporary at the time they were written. The first great historical novel that comes to mind for me is A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. It has everything—pathos, romance, villainy, suspense, and heroism.

Did you have any experiences that prompted your love of fiction and historical fiction in particular?

I read voraciously as a child, and books like the Anne of Green Gables series and Caddie Woodlawn taught me to love historical fiction. Living in England for seven years undoubtedly sparked my interest in writing historical stories set in Great Britain.

How much time does it take to research your stories – what balance would you say there is between research and actual writing?

I must confess that often I choose my time period and location, come up with a basic story idea, start writing, then do research as I go. I enjoy crafting my story around the history and geography as I discover it. So I can’t really break down a time difference there. It all goes together.

Describe for us, if you will, your writing style, as in plotter vs. seat of the pants, and do you put more time into developing characters or plot or are they equal?

I started out as a seat-of-the-pants writer, tried to transform myself into a plotter, and am currently discovering that the transformation didn’t work. So I’m back to seat of the pants and content to be so. My characters tend to develop along with the plot and story—I discover who they are and what happens as I go along. This is undoubtedly an inefficient method, but it works for me!

This interview might seem a bit short, but there is more to come, so don't forget to stop back tomorrow. And if you post a comment, you'll have the chance to win Jill's latest book, Lonely in Longtree. See you then!