Interview with Roseanna M. White

Roseanna M. White is the author of A Stray Drop of Blood, senior reviewer for the Christian Review of Books where she also hosts a column and author interviews, and a freelance editor. Roseanna lives in western Maryland with her husband David, two-year-old daughter Xoë, and newborn son, Rowyn.

Tell us a little about your road to publication.

I’m still traveling it! I finished my first book at 13 and immediately started seeking publication. . . hmm, don’t know why publishers passed up that gem! Through rejection after rejection, I just kept writing—it was how I relaxed during college. My actual publication is more about my husband’s business than my own publishing dreams. He has always wanted to get into printing and publishing, and after working at our college’s print shop, he decided to make a go of it. Not wanting to experiment with someone else’s baby, we selected one of my manuscripts to launch WhiteFire Publishing. A Stray Drop of Blood was “too” a lot of things for traditional publishers—too long, too much outside conventional writing rules, too risqué is some ways, too long (did I already say that?)—so it was a natural choice for us, especially since we both believed so fully in the story.

WFP now has other titles to its publication list, so for the rest of my manuscripts I’m still seeking traditional publishers. After attending the ACFW conference in Dallas last September, I signed with an agent and have hopes that soon the historical trilogy I completed last year will find a home. In the meantime, my work with WhiteFire and with our review website, the Christian Review of Books (www.ChristianReviewofBooks.com), has taught me a lot about the industry I never would have learned otherwise.

When you first entered the publishing world, what surprised you the most? Was there any aspect of the business that caught you off guard?

Most surprising was marketing—it was something I dreaded when we decided to launch WFP with A Stray Drop of Blood, but something I’ve since taken to helping others with. At first I thought marketing was a huge, sinister monster that would make my life miserable. But when I started promoting other people’s books with the Review, I found that it’s actually a lot of fun! Authors, even the biggest names, are just people who like to tell stories. And readers aren’t just people who buy your books, they’re the sole reason we get to write them! Finding new ways to appeal to both authors and readers has proven a fun challenge for me, and seeing the appreciation of all involved inevitably makes my day.

Why historical fiction?

When I was a pre-teen, I swore I was born into the wrong time. I wanted to wear hoop dresses and ride horses. Of course, I was also rather fond of indoor toilets;-) The first stories I wrote were always set in the past, usually in some era I had just studied in school. That first novel I wrote at 13 was set in Victorian England. After that, though, I started writing modern works simply because I didn’t want to spend all the time on research. But the historical bug never got out of my system, and after I graduated from college I started getting back to that first love. Stray Drop, of course, was Biblical, but then I put quite a lot of time in my Fire Eyes trilogy—the first book being a rewrite of that very first novel I finished so long ago! And as that baby of mine is off on editors’ desks, I can’t help but think there would be a certain poetic justice to finding my voice in the historical genre, right where I started—in spite of those 14 novels sitting in my My Documents folder that are contemporary!


What are you working on now that you’d like us to know about?

I’m in the process of researching a new series (in between caring for a 2 year old and my new baby, who just made his appearance on February 11!) that is later-Victorian. Set around 1885, the first book is a retelling of the story of Daniel, following a young woman with the gift of prophecy as she travels from her native India into the British circles so heavily influenced by the Spiritualism movement of the day (tea-party séances, calling to departed spirits, etc.) As a Christian who has seen the very real darkness in an un-Christian land, she sees the dangers in this movement that others don’t.

Do you have a favorite historical novel?

Oo. . . gotta say either Jane Eyre or Pride and Prejudice. Traditional, I know, but I’m a sucker for the classics! As for modern historicals, I seem to have a new favorite every time I pick up a new book;-)

Is there anything or anyone that inspires your writing?

Come back tomorrow for part two of the interview with Roseanna White. Leave a comment for a chance to win a copy of A STRAY DROP OF BLOOD.