Interview for "White Lightning Road" author Harry E. Gilleland, Jr.
Reader Views is happy to have the chance to talk with author Harry E. Gilleland, Jr., who has recently published his new novel “White Lightning Road.” Harry is being interviewed by Juanita Watson, Assistant Editor of Reader Views. Juanita: Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us today, Harry. Would you please give your readers an idea of the storyline in “White Lightning Road”? Harry: The story follows the lives of two young women, who become lifelong best friends from when they meet in high school. Each was a big-city teenager whose family moved them to White Lightning Road, a small country road in northern Louisiana. Both girls shared their disdain of rural life and lived for the day to escape back to the big-city life. Jennifer goes to Baton Rouge to attend LSU, while Sally marries the first boy who will move her back to Dallas. Jenny marries happily. However, her husband is sent to fight in Iraq with his activated Army Reserve unit and killed. Sally’s first marriage is short-lived, and she marries a second time a few years later. They have a son, and all is happy until she discovers her husband is having an affair. Jennifer’s parents are in a tragic car accident a year after her husband’s death, and her father is killed and her mother is critically injured. Jennifer comes back to White Lightning Road to handle her parents’ affairs. Her mother dies. Sally divorces her husband and comes home to her parents’ house for a few weeks to cope. Thus, both Jenny and Sally find themselves back together on White Lightning Road. This starts our story. Jenny becomes involved with her neighbor Michael Garrott, a mysterious man whom everyone assumes is an unpunished murderer. She feels drawn to him, but can she trust him? Sally is her confidante and adviser as she explores her growing feelings for Michael. The second storyline follows Sally as she moves from Dallas to Atlanta for a better job. There she meets an undergraduate student at Georgia Tech who insists on dating her even though she feels he is too young for her. Should Sally follow her heart or listen to her head? The storyline is the romantic adventures of the two women. Juanita: What inspired you to write “White Lightning Road”? Harry: This is my first romance novel. This story just came into my mind and demanded to be written. The origin of the story comes from my background. I am a city-boy. My second wife is a country girl from rural Hico, Louisiana. An aunt and uncle of hers live on White Lightning Road. I learned to appreciate what country life has to offer through meeting all my wife’s relatives and spending time with them. I imagined a story where two big-city girls were brought to this country setting and how they might react as teenagers versus later in life. The story just wrote itself. Juanita: Now, is “White Lightning Road” more of a romance or a mystery? Harry: Definitely more of a romance -- one with a dash of mystery in Jenny’s story. Juanita: Give us a little insight into your two main characters – Jennifer James and Sally Jeffers? Harry: At the start of our story, Jennifer James has experienced a good deal of tragedy within the past year. Her beloved husband was killed serving in Iraq and her parents were just killed as the result of an automobile accident. She is back on White Lightning Road, an environment she hated as a teenager, and she is emotionally exhausted and vulnerable. However, she proves herself to be a strong, intelligent, and educated woman who handles herself well in most circumstances. She is alone in the world and eager to love again, but she has the control to be cautious in her dealings with Michael. Her best friend Sally Jeffers is also emotionally vulnerable as she has just divorced her second husband for his adultery. Soon she finds herself being wooed by a much younger man, a man everyone says is too young for her. Sally is not college-educated, but she is an intelligent and strong woman. She holds a position as personal secretary to a vice-president of a large, national insurance company and handles it with confidence and success. Sally is not a woman to be bullied. Juanita: As the story progresses, neighbor and possible murderer Michael Garrott enters the scene. Tell us about this character and do readers ever get to find out the exact nature of the mystery surrounding him? Harry: Michael Garrott is a tortured soul. He lost his beloved wife and daughter in a car wreck caused by a driver on drugs; then he saw the man get off lightly in the court system since his family is very prominent in the small town of Ruston where he was tried. The man served only one year in jail, with the rest of his sentence commuted to probation. Michael was greatly angered by the man serving only one year in jail after killing his wife and child and expressed his anger openly. When the man was found dead, shot in the heart three times and dumped onto the main street of Ruston late one night, everyone just knew it had to be done by Michael Garrott. There was no evidence to prove this, and Michael denied he had been the murderer, but everyone just assumed it as fact thereafter. For years Michael had been somewhat of a recluse locally when Jenny meets him. Michael is wealthy and travels frequently, supposedly for pleasure on hunting and fishing trips. Michael is an intelligent and sensitive man. The readers get to decide for themselves whether he is a murderer. Juanita: What are some of the unique characteristics of rural northern Louisiana and in particular the Lincoln and Claiborne Parishes where the girls grew up? Harry: This is a very rural area. White Lightning Road twists and curves through deep woods and by a large lake. Homes here are miles away from any town. Wildlife is abundant, being seen on the roads and visiting people’s yards and gardens. Hunting and fishing is a way of life here. The people are typically country folk. They are friendly, giving, helpful, and church-going. Everyone knows everyone else and what each is up to. Many are related by blood or marriage. Families stick together and help each other out in any sort of problem. For a hospitalization or death, the community responds with food and assistance. The lifestyle is simple and hard. Farming, ranching, and chicken raising are all hard work and demand a responsible, dedicated attitude. Folks living here appreciate nature and take pleasure in the simple things in life. They are “good people”. Juanita: Harry, you were born in the south and have lived there throughout your life. What do you love about this region of the country? Harry: The friendliness of the southern people and our legendary hospitality. The slower pace of life down south. I love the cuisine – the fried chicken, barbecue, fresh vegetables, plus living in Louisiana, I love Cajun cooking. I love SEC football, being a big fan of both the Georgia Bulldogs and the LSU Tigers. I love having mild winters. (When I lived in London, Ontario, the temperature got down to minus ten degrees with a wind chill of minus thirty degrees one Friday. As I rode to work, I promised myself I would never live anywhere ever again except in the South. I hate driving in snow and ice!) Finally, I love the southern women with their delightful accents and southern charms. Juanita: What are some of the themes you address in “White Lightning Road”? Harry: I contrast big-city life with rural life. The theme of country life’s intimate relationship with nature runs throughout the story. Likewise, I address the theme of small-town, rural communities being close-knit where everyone knows or is related to everyone else so that whatever happens is gossiped about among the community. I also present the idea that how one looks at something influences what they see. There is sometimes much to be liked and appreciated in things that we dismiss without trying to see the good there. Jenny and Sally were dismissive of rural life as teenagers, for example. Juanita: Who is your reading audience? Who did you have in mind when you wrote “White Lightning Road”? Harry: Anyone who enjoys a good romance story. I guess this is mainly women readers. Juanita: Harry, you’ve been a writer for many years. Tell us about your writing pursuits and do you have plans for any more novels? Harry: From 1968 until 2001 I was strictly a scientific writer. In my career as a Ph.D. microbiologist, I wrote numerous grant applications and authored over forty-five journal articles in my research area. I began writing poetry in 2001. My first two books published (2003, 2005) were collections of my poetry. Then I branched out into writing creative prose with a fantasy novella, Bob the Dragon Slayer, in 2005. White Lightning Road is my fourth book and my first romance story. I do have plans for another novel. In fact, it may be a sequel to White Lightning Road. Juanita: What was your career prior to writing and did you always have the dream of being a full-time author? Harry: I was a faculty member in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Louisiana State Health Sciences Center’s School of Medicine in Shreveport from 1975 until I retired in July 2004. For twenty-nine years, I taught microbiology to sophomore medical students and to microbiology graduate students and performed research in vaccine studies. Toward the end of my scientific career I began writing poetry. Yes, I did dream of becoming a full-time writer upon retiring from my academic career. I hope to remain a full-time writer the remainder of my life. I love being a creative writer. Juanita: Who have been your literary influences? Harry: My literary influences were actually poets, Poe and Tennyson being my favorites. I guess that is why I started my creative writing as a poet and a rhyming poet at that. I always have loved these two poets’ works. Juanita: Harry, how can readers find out more about you and your endeavors? Harry: My picture and all my books are shown at my Lulu Press website: http://www.lulu.com/harry . Also, anyone interested in sampling my poetry can read the numerous storoems and poems I have posted at: http://www.gillelands.com/poetry/ . Juanita: Thanks for talking with us today, Harry. We look forward to seeing more of your books in the future. Do you have any last thoughts for your readers today? Harry: I would like to thank the readers for their interest in my books. I hope that they will enjoy reading White Lightning Road as much as I enjoyed writing it.
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