Books: The Grace of Crows

An Interview with Author Tracy Shawn

Monday, December 23, 2013

Tracy Shawn has a Master’s degree in clinical psychology. Her first novel, set in coastal California, follows the emotional journey of a woman besieged by near-paralyzing anxiety.

Saylor Crawmore, the protagonist ofThe Grace of Crows, is deeply anxious about almost everything. Why did you find her anxiety so compelling?

I have suffered from severe anxiety myself and wanted to write a story that others could relate to, learn from, and ultimately gain perspective and a grounded kind of hope from as well.

That can be tricky—transforming your own life into fiction. What challenges did you face turning Tracy into Saylor?

I really didn’t face too many challenges in this regard because Saylor is a wholly fictional person with her own personality, history, and different kind of fears than me. Although, if she were a real-life person, we definitely would be able to commiserate about our anxiety!

A key moment in the novel comes when Saylor runs into Billy, a friend from her child who’s now homeless. Why is Billy such an important character?

Billy can be seen as a symbol of Saylor’s deep-seated and irrational fear of losing everyone she loves. And yet, he is also a survivor with a loyal heart, the positive mirror of who Saylor really is.

I gather that Billy is based on a real person?

Growing up, I did have a childhood friend who I often thought about in my adult life. One day, I found myself crying just thinking about him, and somehow intuitively knew that something had gone terribly wrong with his life. I called a friend, who still lived in my hometown, and she said that she had picked him up hitchhiking just a week or so before and that he was now homeless and deranged. Unfortunately, I never found him, and from what I know through the grapevine, he probably is dead now. What’s weird is that when I was writing The Grace of Crows, I pictured him living under a pier, and found out later, that for a time, the “real” Billy actually did.

It’s tough getting a novel published. Can you talk about the process of finding a home for The Grace of Crows?

Oh boy, is it tough! I made many mistakes along the way, including querying agents before the novel was ready. After a large number of rejections, I decided to query small, but traditional presses. Interestingly, after months of rejections, I had two that were interested. I signed with Cherokee McGhee and after a year of revisions and editing, it was published!

Can you tell me a little about Cherokee McGhee? That’s an interesting name for a publisher.

It is, isn’t it? I actually don’t know the reason behind the name, but I queried them because I liked that their homepage states that they “strive to bring excellence in literature that may be missing in the celebrity-oriented big houses of New York.”

Tracy Shawn lives and writes on the Central Coast of California. She’s worn many work hats (including waitress, floral designer, receptionist, vocational rehabilitation counselor, and core counselor at a psychiatric center for schizophrenic adults). Her educational background includes a master’s degree in clinical psychology. Tracy enjoys incorporating her educational background and eclectic work history to heighten character development in her short stories and novels. Her writing has appeared in literary journals as well as print and online newspapers and magazines. Her debut novel, “The Grace of Crows” (Amazon link: http://amzn.to/19mA6r1), is about what happens after a woman with debilitating anxiety reconnects with a childhood friend who has become homeless and living under a pier in Malibu. (Amazon Author Page Link:https://www.amazon.com/author/tracyshawn).