Heroine Interview from A Sound Among the Trees by Susan Meissner

» Posted on Dec 1, 2011 in Blog | Comments Off on Heroine Interview from A Sound Among the Trees by Susan Meissner

This week I’m hosting Marta Perry with Katie’s Way, Susan Meissner with A Sound Among the Trees, and Pamela S. Meyers with Thyme for Love. If you want to enter the drawings for the books, please leave a comment on one of the post during the week with your email address. I will not enter you without an email address (my way to contact you if you win). If you don’t want to leave an email address, another way you can enter is to email me at margaretdaley@gmail.com. The drawings end Sunday (December 4th) evening.

Interview with the heroine from A Sound Among the Trees by Susan Meissner:

1. Marielle, tell me the most interesting thing about you.

I don’t spend much time thinking about what makes me interesting. I am not sure I know what that might be. I can tell you I prefer comfort over style. I’d much rather wear jeans, cotton shirts, and cozy Birkenstocks, over anything fancy. Dressing up – for me – is just putting on a little black dress with ballet flats and silver hoop earrings and that’s it. I don’t know if that makes me interesting, but it does make me easy to make spontaneous plans with!

2.  What do you do for fun?

When I lived in Arizona, I lived hiking and photographing the desert in bloom. I still like to be outdoors and I will learn to love my new home in Virginia, a place that has no desert. There is beauty everywhere, I think; you just have to look for it.

3.  What do you put off doing because you dread it?

I was single for a long time, watching my friends marry and start their families. I wanted so much to be where they were. There aren’t many things I put off doing except maybe confronting people who stand in the way of my dreams. And usually the only people who do that are the ones I let do that.

4.  What are you afraid of most in life?

I admit I worry that I will never quite measure up to the task of being second. I am the second wife to Carson, second mother to his kids. I always thought I’d be first. And it’s not like Sara is out there, married to someone else. She died and left this man I love a widower. Their marriage ended not in a break-up but in a death. That makes me second in a different way than the woman who marries a divorced man.

5.  What do you want out of life?

I just want a home and family that are mine and only mine. I want to have children of my own, and I want Carson to feel about our future kids the way he feels about Hudson and Brette. And I guess I want to love Hudson and Brette as much as I will love my own child. I really do want that. I want a family. I want to be loved and needed and I want to give that same love back.

6.  What is the most important thing to you?

I’ve always believed that when you commit to something, you give it your absolute best. And I think it’s important to do the right thing at the right time, especially when it is in your power to do it. I am Carson’s second wife but I know I can’t be Adelaide’s second granddaughter. Just because I married Adelaide’s dead granddaughter’s husband, that doesn’t mean I am the new granddaughter. Somehow I will find a way to be someone to Adelaide, even if it is just her friend.

7.  Do you read? If so, what is your favorite type of book to read?

I like mysteries, like Nero Wolfe books, and classic Agatha Christie. The Mirror Crack’d is my favorite.

8.  If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

I wish I didn’t worry how I compare to Sara. I know someday I will be past all that. It just seems like that day is a long way off.

9.  Do you have a pet? If so, what is it and why that pet?

I don’t right now. But I see us getting a dog at some point. These kids need a dog. Hudson has a rabbit, but a rabbit isn’t like a dog. It just isn’t.

10. If you could travel back in time, where would you go and why?

I don’t suppose it’s any big surprise that I would head straight back to 1862 and sit down with Susannah Towsley Page. I sleep in her old bedroom every night, I walk past her portrait every day, and her unseen presence seems to be everywhere in this house. I just want to let her know I am amazed by what she did for love. I think I always will be…