The Blog

A Conversation With Louise Miller, Author of The Late Bloomers’ Club

Jul 17, 2018 | Guest Author

Debbie Harpham

Copy-of-Louise-Miller-and-books-1

In this Q&A session, Louise Miller opens up about her personal journey as an author and her inspiration for writing.

Q: What inspired you to write THE LATE BLOOMERS’ CLUB?

When I was ready to start a second book, I knew that I wanted to write about sisters. My
first novel, THE CITY BAKER’S GUIDE TO COUNTRY LIVING, was about finding
your family. This time I wanted to explore some of the relationships that shape us from the
very beginning. I grew up the youngest of four, so I have a lot of experience with siblings.
I’m curious about the way we all fall into roles in our families, and how we can get stuck in
those roles, and how to get unstuck. I knew I wanted to write about a sister who left and led
an adventurous life, and another sister who stayed at home and took care of their parents,
and what happens when the two of them come back together to make a decision that would
effect both of their lives.

While I was playing with this idea, my partner sent me an NPR piece about a missing dog in
Vermont who, after a year and a half on the run, had finally been captured. Many people in
the surrounding towns, including an AP reporter, shared reports on a community message
board with information about the dog—sightings, capture attempts, photos—that finally led
to the dogs capture. I knew immediately that the missing dog story, and the way the
community came together to save him, would be a fun framework to build a novel around. I
had my main characters and a missing dog, and the rest of the pieces of the novel quickly
snapped into place.

Q: THE LATE BLOOMERS’ CLUB takes place in the same fictional town as your
debut novel, The City Baker’s Guide to Country Living – but it is not a sequel. What
inspired you to return to Guthrie, and how is your new novel different from your first?

Creating a town was one of the things I was most excited about when I first started writing a
novel. I’ve always been drawn to stories where you can imagine yourself living in the town or
city it takes place in, like Richard Russo’s Empire Falls, or the television shows Gilmore Girls
and Friday Night Lights. Guthrie is my Stars Hollow. I always felt the hum of the whole town
when I was writing, no matter what scene I was in. When I turned in The City Baker’s Guide to
Country Living, I felt finished with the story of Livvy, Martin and Margaret, but the town of
Guthrie felt full of stories to discover.

The City Baker’s Guide to Country Living is about finding belonging in a town, so it’s written
from an outsider’s perspective. I was excited to look at Guthrie from the point of view of an
insider. Nora Huckleberry, the protagonist in THE LATE BLOOMER’S CLUB, was born
in Guthrie and never left. She is the owner of The Miss Guthrie Diner, which acts as a hub
for the community. It was delightful to write about the town from a local’s perspective.

Q: The heart of THE LATE BLOOMERS’ CLUB is about the power of family and
community. What do you hope readers will take away from the story?

I hope readers will take away that it’s never too late to pursue your dreams, no matter how
large or small. I am my own best example—I have known I wanted to be a writer since I was
20 years old, but didn’t start writing in earnest until I was almost 40, and published my first
novel at the age of 45. I am evangelistic about doing what you love, and will happily give a
pep talk to anyone who thinks it’s “too late.” Seriously. Email me. It’s only too late when
you are dead!

I also hope THE LATE BLOOMERS’ CLUB inspires readers to open up their thinking
about themselves and the people around them. It can be so easy to get locked into seeing
yourself (or others) in a certain light. At the beginning of the story, Nora is fixed in her role
as the responsible one, a giver, and one of the arcs of the story is how she learns to
receive—from her sister, from her friends and from the community.
One of the things I love most about life is how full of surprises everyone is if you take the
time to listen. A couple of years back, the Powerball prize had grown to some astronomical
sum, and each of my coworkers, most of whom I had worked with for at least 12 years,
chipped in $5 towards buying a group of lottery tickets. In the days leading up to the contest
drawing, one by one they shared their biggest daydreams. We didn’t win, but I learned more
about my coworkers and their passions in those few days than I had in a decade. Almost
every character in THE LATE BLOOMERS’ CLUB has a secret passion that you might not
expect. I hope that the readers are surprised by some of the characters, and that it sparks
their curiosity about the people around them.

Q: In both The City Baker’s Guide to Country Living and THE LATE BLOOMERS’
CLUB, food plays a prominent role. Do you feel that your career as a chef prepared
you to describe food in writing? Is cooking a delicious dish harder than bringing it to
life on the page?

It’s funny, I feel like writing about food has changed my relationship to my work as a chef as
much as being a chef has had an effect on my writing. I pay much closer attention to baking
when I am writing about it, trying to take every detail in. And my career as a chef has actually
become part of my writing process! I do my best mulling and problem-solving while
chopping flats of strawberries or rolling out hundreds of shortcakes. I write mostly in the
afternoons after work (I’m usually in the kitchen around 7 a.m., and out by 2 p.m.) and my
routine is to end my writing session by typing out a list of questions to ponder the following
day while baking. That way when I sit down to write, I don’t waste a lot of time trying to
figure out what comes next.

I find that writing about food is a million times more difficult than actually making food.
Baking requires precision, and when I first started writing kitchen scenes, I had to fight the
urge to include every step of the process when writing about making dessert. Now I am
much looser—so much so that my copy editor found my character was cracking too many
eggs in one of the cake-baking scenes!

Q: Do you see any similarities in what you do in the kitchen and what you do in your
writing space regarding the creative process?

Absolutely. When I am creating a plated dessert, I’m playing with different flavors and
textures, trying to balance sweet and tart, hot and cold, all to highlight the star of the
dessert—ripe peaches or dark chocolate—and to bring all of those elements together to
create something new. I think of novels in the same way—I have my main characters and
plot, but I balance the story with subplots and secondary characters, with imagery and
language. The external desires of the characters need to be balanced with their interior needs.
Writing a novel is a wonderful balancing act—just like when I am making a dessert, it’s
thrilling to see all the pieces work together.

Q: Why did you become a writer?

Writing is my way of processing the world. Even as a kid, I would need to write in a journal
to understand what I was feeling. Writing allows me to live many lives, and it gives me an
excuse to go towards the things I love or am curious about or fascinated by. My whole life, I
have received so much through reading—comfort, understanding, joy. I’m always trying to
create something that would bring others some happiness, to make them laugh, or to feel
less alone. To creative a world they could escape into when their own lives are tough. I can’t
begin to tell you how much it means to me when readers write to tell me they related to one
of my characters or that the novel brought them some comfort. This kind of connection is
at the heart of why I write.

Q: Where do you write?

I write pretty much everywhere–at home, in coffee shops and cafes, at the library, at work in
the women's locker room. I write character notes in the kitchen while I bake. I have a
membership to a private library near work, which is great when I need silence, but
sometimes a little noise is helpful.
The only hard and fast rule about writing that I have discovered is that I like to write during
the day. After seven or so, my brain is ready to take a break.

Q: What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

To go towards the stories that bring you joy—whether that is writing a sweeping love story
or a bloody crime novel. Writing a novel is a long process, and what makes it possible is your
own love of the characters and the story.
I also like to encourage writers to write what they love to read–there can be a lot of pressure
to write literary fiction or to write more commercially (depending on who you talk to) but I
think the best work comes from writing what excites you, and not thinking about market,
etc.

One of the things that helped me the most was finding my writing community–writing can
be such an isolating process. It is incredibly helpful to have writing friends to share work
with, to go to readings with, to talk about craft with. Writing friends have helped me at every
stage of the writing and publishing process.

And for writers with day jobs and families, my advice is to lose all preciousness about your
writing practice–writing 15 minutes a day is better than not writing at all. A novel is built
sentence by sentence. You can write a novel draft in a year just by getting 250 words down
on the page every day. Don’t let your busy life get in the way of you pursuing your work

AUTHOR VISITS 

Author visits with Louise are available via NovelNetwork.