An Interview with Lindsay Brown

Lindsay Brown is the author of The Dolan Girls: As The Seasons Go By, a sweet, cozy, coming-of-age middle-grade novel. Aside from writing and storytelling, you’ll find her gardening, baking bread, woodcarving, and playing games with her family. Her favorite spot is curled up in a cozy chair with a book and cup of tea, listening to the rain outside.

What inspired you to start writing this book?

I’ve always loved writing, but it took a long time for it to occur to me that I could actually take it seriously. One time after a visit to my parents, I was driving with my three girls back home. It’s a long, long drive and they were watching a movie, so I had some time to think. I started creating this storyline in my head with characters that resembled each of my girls. It was a story that would tell the many stories my sister and I would tell and retell of the days growing up on a little farm. But these characters would be like my kids living through those experiences. It was basically a fun and creative way to pass along a lot of fun and memorable parts of my history. It took me five years from that point to give myself the permission to actually do it—and a lot of encouragement from my husband. I actually test-read the first couple of chapters to my girls and didn’t tell them who wrote them because I was so nervous that they were terrible. But the girls loved them and wanted to know what happened next, so that kept me going.

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

Since this was a book full of memories, I wanted to have little ties here and there to my family history. Dolan is my maternal grandma’s maiden name. I never got to meet her because she died when my mom was twenty, but I loved the stories my mom would tell us about her. She sounded like such a wonderful woman, so this was my way of honoring her part of our history. It was an easy choice for me because I had such a defined idea of what the book was about.

I pull so much on the themes and parallels of nature throughout the girls’ journeys as well, so one of my daughters insisted on the subtitle “As The Seasons Go By” and I loved that. The cover represents that theme as well. If you start at the bottom right corner and move clockwise, you can see the seasons changing through the botanical graphics. The book communicates that life is full of seasons; we can have very dark winters, but those often lead to spring and its new life, summers of bounty, and an autumn of transition/change.

What books are you reading (for research or comfort) as you continue the writing process?

My next book is a vastly different genre and age group, so I’m in some very different books. I recently read The Consequence of Anna, by Kate Birkin and Mark Bornz. It was so fantastic, so creatively written. It really inspired me with its varied points of view. I was feeling this desire to have this multi-POV, told-from-different-angles kind of story for my next book, and The Consequence of Anna really gave me the permission to play around and try out what I was leaning toward for this first draft. We’ll see how it goes and what I want to keep! Currently, I’m reading A Song to Drown Rivers by Ann Liang and loving it. She’s beautifully descriptive and her storytelling is captivating.

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

I’ve done ALL kinds of things. Bookkeeping, private investigating, family photography, being an executive assistant, retail, pastoring at a church. I enjoyed something about all of these jobs, but I really loved pastoring people. Being invited into people’s lives and walking with them through challenges, joys, questions. It taught me a lot about the human experience through those years, much more than I could have learned in my own little slice of the world.

Where is your favorite place to write?

We have a little cabin in the woods that my grandfather built back in the sixties. There’s a long story about it that we don’t have time for here, but we only recently got the chance to use it again a few years ago. Something I’ve really enjoyed immensely is taking a whole weekend to stay up there by myself in the quiet, so I can deep dive into one of my books without any distractions. Otherwise, my main writing spot is a table in our bedroom and I love that spot too.

Do you have any writing rituals?

This is always evolving. But I know I like the house cleaned up first. I like my desk clean, too. I find my creative juices flow better without those distractions around, but it’s not always possible, sometimes it’s just messy and you have to ignore it. I love lighting a candle and making a cup of tea. Sometimes I like a little jazz on in the background, other times I need silence. If my cat would ever obey and stay on my lap, then that would be a part of the ritual too.

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

My readers will primarily be young girls, though I know some moms who have thoroughly enjoyed the read as well. It’s cozy and super nostalgic. For my young readers, I would love for them to come away from the book feeling hopeful and happy with who they are. One of the things my main character, Agnes, learns is that it’s much better to be true to herself than to change in order to please others. That’s a timeless truth, and one that can always bear repeating. I also purposely wanted the adults to be helpful, dependable, and safe. There is a lot of fun to be had when the child characters don’t have adults around to rein them in, but for this book, I wanted my characters to have wise and helpful guides to depend on. I think it’s good for kids to know that they can find adults like that to trust and help them through difficulties. Maybe that’s a parent, maybe a teacher, maybe a school counselor, regardless, we all need wise voices to speak into the tough stuff of life.

Are you a writer, too? Submit your manuscript to Atmosphere Press.