An Interview with Margaret Philbrick

Margaret Ann Philbrick is an award-winning poet and author who writes at the intersection of art, culture, community, and faith. Her new novel, House of Honor, received a Kirkus Star Review, saying, “Philbrick’s thriller is a gripping tale about the intersection of art and crime. The author’s skill at drawing her characters is impressive; even the supporting players, feel entirely fleshed out in this nuanced and moving novel.”

Margaret’s first novel, A Minor – A Novel of Love Music and Memory also garnered critical praise. In addition to fiction, she enjoys writing non-fiction and poetry. She is the contributing editor of Everbloom: Stories of Deeply Rooted and Transformed Lives, a collection of essays and poetry intended as an aid to help women find their own unique voices. Margaret’s poems have been featured in numerous anthologies and her articles in dozens of publications. Margaret is a longtime member of the Redbud Writers Guild, an international writing guild of Christian women, and a member of the Door County Published Author Collective, a gathering of published authors welcoming both men and women authors who live in beautiful Door County, Wisconsin.

She is a lifelong gardener and believes that all of us are toiling in a garden of grace every day, we just have to stop, smell, and see the beauty.

What other professions have you worked in? What’s something about you that your readers wouldn’t know?

My twenties were spent at Leo Burnett Advertising in Chicago working on a variety of Kellogg’s products. During my thirties I chose to stay home with our three kids and read loads of kids’ books at the local “Book Nook,” sing silly songs, play race cars on the car mat, dress up, and get them outside as much as possible. In my forties I went back to school and obtained a Master’s degree in Teaching (M.A.T.) and became a writing and literature teacher in classical schools. I loved all of these different fields and they formed and shaped who I am as a writer today.

Tell us the story of your book’s title. Was it easy to find, or did it take forever?

Titles always come to me before I write the book. It’s weird. They pop into my head like Athena popped out of Zeus’s head. Pretty random; it just seems to happen.

How did it feel when you first saw your book cover? Or when you first held your book in your hands?

The book cover for House of Honor was pure magic! I’ve been through a variety of cover iterations on a variety of books and that’s expected. But this gorgeous cover was the first cut. I screamed when I opened the email attachment because I loved it so much. Immediately, I wrote them back and said, “I LOVE IT! No changes.” That’s a miracle.

If your book had a soundtrack, what are some songs that would be on it?

It does have a soundtrack! My son Nathaniel, who the book is dedicated to, loaded the playlist that I created onto Spotify so readers can hear it.

What is one thing you hope readers take away from reading your book? How do you envision your perfect reader?

Such a great question because this syncs up with the key aspect of writing a novel, staying tethered to your purpose. My purpose in this book is threefold: that people would come to know Caravaggio and his art, that they would stand in awe of living art and allow it to impact their souls and that Orazio Bordoni’s journey would help the reader find their way home.

What was the most rewarding/meaningful part of publishing your book?

Seeing how much more beautiful the book became because of the publisher’s creativity and contribution.

What new writing projects are you currently working on? Or, other projects that are not writing?

Our daughter is a professional dancer and I need to write a novel about the off-the-charts, upside-down, competitive-to-a-fault world of dance. Both of my novels have male protagonists and I’m dying to write a female protagonist or a dance couple as co-protagonists, that would be romantic and fun! My first novel is a classically music-based romance about a piano prodigy and his teacher, this one is fine art-based so dance is next!

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