Bob Adams
Ellen Alderman & Caroline Kennedy
Larry Bond
Po Bronson
J. Carter Brown
Rita Mae Brown
Art Buchwald
James C. Christensen
Michael Connelly
Pat Conroy
John Dufresne
Umberto Eco
Lolis Eric Elie
Nicholas Evans
Richard Ford
Diana Gabaldon
Tipper Gore
Katherine Graham
Melissa Fay Greene
David Guterson
Susan Fisher-Hoch & Joseph B. McCormick
George Jones
Alfred Kazin
Thomas Kelly
Karen Kijewski
Alfred Knight
Ted Koppel
Jon Krakauer
Alan Lightman
Elizabeth McCracken
Jay McInerney
Walter Mosley
Kem Nunn
Robert B. Parker
Brenda J. Ponichtera
Annie Proulx
Mario Puzo
Julee Rosso
Carol Saline & Sharon Wohlmuth
Lauren Slater
Elizabeth Marshall-Thomas
Joanna Trollope
Scott Turow
Alice Walker
Children's Authors
Mary Chapin-Carpenter
Caroline B. Cooney
Paula Danziger
David Diaz
Mem Fox
Kevin Henkes
William Joyce
Kathleen Krull
June 1997
For Jan Karon, it took determination
to bring the world her gentle novels
Interview by Alice Cary
When an interviewer recently aimed some literary flak at Jan Karon, the author was ready and waiting with a mighty counterattack.
The incident occurred in Denver at the launch of a nonstop publicity tour for "Out to Canaan," the latest of Karon's quartet of Mitford novels. The interviewer seemed intent on dismissing her work, noting that books like hers aren't the type to end up on the "New York Times" bestseller list.
"Bingo!" Karon replied, her face lighting up. "Whoa!"
She joyfully broke the news that the previous week "Out to Canaan" had debuted on that very list as number seven. Indeed, Mitford is a publishing phenomenon, so much so that Karon is trying to respond to the demands of her fans and publisher with Mitford newsletters, reading group guides, audio books, a cookbook, two novellas and a special Christmas edition.
For those not yet in the know, Mitford is an imaginary town in the North Carolina mountains, a Mayberry-like place in which old copies of "Southern Living" are neatly stacked in the jail cell awaiting inmates' perusal. It has been dubbed "The Little Town with the Big Heart," for Karon has penned gentle tales filled with a broad cast of characters, much of the action revolving around Father Tim, Mitford's Episcopalian minister and his flock of saints and sinners.
But why the fuss? Why have these quiet books struck such a resounding chord?
Karon was inspired to write after realizing that few modern books appealed to her; those that did tended to be at least 20 to 30 years old. (Although she does recommend the "village novels" of British writer Miss Read, with whom she corresponds; Jon Hassler, whose "A Green Journey" and "Dear James" also have village settings; Rosamunde Pilcher's early work; and the works of Conrad Richter and A.B. Guthrie, Jr.)
"I think there are thousands upon thousands of readers out there looking for a clean read, not a sappy read, but just a fresh, brighter look at life," she says. "You can be looking for a casserole recipe in a magazine and all you can find is how to have a better orgasm!"
Chatting on the phone during a rare pause in her book tour, Karon is exactly what she preaches: endlessly enthusiastic, determined, heartfelt with a Carolinian drawl. In a nutshell, homespun yet savvy.
Her gripes about the media are ironic given that she was once an advertising executive.
She explains that her philosophies haven't changed: "I always respected my readers in advertising; I respect my readers in fiction. I don't think people are stupid and I've never tried to lie to them. I just tried to give them good, solid information in a bright, interesting way."
Despite her successful career, Karon felt something was missing. So at age 50, the native North Carolinian moved to the town of Blowing Rock, perched high in the Blue Ridge Mountains, to pursue a dream of writing.
It's a beautiful area, full of high peaks and hidden hollows, lush scenery that fills the spirit while taking your breath away. Karon describes Blowing Rock in words that might have been lifted from one of her novels: "If you drive down the hill at night, all of a sudden this little town opens its heart up to you right before your very eyes. The streetlights are sparkling, the cars are off the streets, and there's this little village three blocks long.
"Blowing Rock has been an inspiration to me, because I see people there living lives based upon the kinds of values [my characters have] in Mitford. There's a sense of confirmation in the mountains that I never find anywhere else."
Not at first, however. After Karon turned her life upside down and took up her pen, she found herself wrestling with a plot outline that refused to take shape. She began to fear her impulsive quest might turn into a nightmare. One night, however, as she envisioned an Episcopal minister walking down a street and encountering a dog and a mountain boy, Mitford was born. She took a sample to the editor of the local weekly paper ("The Blowing Rocket"), who suggested she publish an installment each week. "So [the story] started to run," Karon remembers, "and the first thing you know I was on deadline. Now I'm a newspaper columnist, something I'd never dreamed I'd be or want to be. I wrote the darn thing for two years, and then I said, 'By george, I have a book here.'"
She started sending her manuscript to publishers. At first there were no takers, until she stumbled across a small Christian press called Lion, with whom she eventually signed a contract for three books: "At Home in Mitford," "A Light in the Window," and "These High, Green Hills."
Her initial glow turned to concern, however, when she learned that Lion caters to a small, Christian market. "I never wrote my book for a Christian market," she explains. "My books have a Christian theme but I write for a general market. My work wasn't getting out to the general market and that was heartbreaking."
The former executive took matters into her own hands, faxing bookstores, calling booksellers across the country, writing hundreds of letters -- in a word, becoming a one-woman self-promotion whirlwind.
One bookseller was so taken with her novels that he put her in touch with a New York agent, who in turn helped her get a contract with Penguin. As a result, Penguin and Lion now co-publish the first three books, while Penguin has exclusive rights to "Out to Canaan."
With all the attention her books are now receiving, Karon faces some different challenges -- as she terms it, "the agony and the ecstasy of having to fight for the time to protect my work." She explains, "My own world has to be kept very gentle or I can't write these books. My work comes out of a place that's very deep and very tender, and if I allow that to be assaulted, there will be no more Mitford."
Back in Blowing Rock, Karon's proud friends and neighbors try to shield her from fans who come poking about with increasing frequency in search of Mitford's imaginary sites and characters.
"The day before yesterday," Karon relates, "my neighbor knocked on the back door and said she was working in the garden when a carload of people came by and asked where I lived. She told them, 'You know, I think she lives around here somewhere, but I don't know where.'"
THE MITFORD BOOKS
At Home in MitfordPenguin, $11.95, 014025448X
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Support your Penguin, $11.95, 0140254544
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Penguin, $11.95, 0140257934
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Viking, $23.95, 067087485X
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