Authors Interviewing Characters: Peggy Webb Interviews Victoria Logan
Authors Interviewing Characters: Peggy Webb Interviews Victoria Logan
About the book:
Rachel, a schoolteacher and widow with two small children and a feisty grandmother, is living an ordinary life on their Logan Ranch in Colorado until a madman dubbed the Collector comes calling.
The Collector has been terrorizing Manitou Springs for almost a year by snatching their pop-up toasters and favorite clocks, their lawn chairs and potted plants. Soon he’s taking their dogs… and then their children. As dark and mysterious as Pikes Peak brooding over the town, the Collector leaves behind a trail of terror and tears.
When he sets his sights on the Logan Ranch, Hank, a former military helicopter pilot, is determined to keep his vow to his fallen friend to protect Rachel and her family. But Fate takes a hand.
Rachel finds herself pitted against an enemy as evil as Hannibal Lecter with only two tools in her arsenal—her fierce determination and a mystical gift, passed from her sun-struck, magnolia-scented mother from the Louisiana bayous, that uses the fragrance of flowers to warn her of evil.
An unexpected interview with an aging cowgirl:
The Logan Ranch takes my breath away–a house that looks like it grew there along with the deep green woods, a sweeping blue sky that goes on forever, and mountains towering over everything. Majestic but a bit scary-looking, too. Suddenly, I’m faced with a spry old lady wearing boots and a Stetson.
“I’m Victoria Logan,” she says, and you must be the writer.”
PW: Yes. I’m Peggy Webb. Nice to meet you, Victoria.
I look behind her, but I don’t see the much younger woman I expected to interview, Rachel Logan. The gray-haired cowgirl laughs.
VL: I guess you’re looking for Rachel. She had a last-minute event at school, and I told her to go about her business and let me handle you.
PW: I’m not sure this is going to work. Rachel is clearly the star of the book, and I had hoped to discover some things she didn’t reveal between the pages.
VL: PSHAW! I raised her and her two sisters. I know everything there is to know about the Logan sisters. You want to talk secrets? I could tell you things that would raise the hair on your head.
PW: Such as?
VL: I forget. I’m not as young as I used to be, you know. Come inside, and I’ll make you a cup of tea. It’s a ritual here, you know.
This is Victoria, being every bit as cagey and maddening as she was when I tried to make her fit neatly into the story. Of course, she refused. She was always her own self.
PW: Of course, I know. I made it up.
Victoria laughs and serves me a cup of good Earl Grey with honey and cream, just the way I like it.
VL: You’re wanting to know why I called my three granddaughters’ mother the Bohemian.
PW: I have some idea. I created Delilah Broussard.
VL: You don’t even know the half of it. Oh, I made out like it was because she was born in the bayous outside New Orleans and wore flashy clothes and gold bangles and rode every horse on the ranch without saddle or bridle. But the fact was, I had to cut her down to size because I felt a little bit intimidated by her.
PW: You? A woman who chased off a cougar with a shotgun and rode into snow storms to rescue lost cattle? A woman who single-handedly kept the ranch together while raising Rachel and Jen and Annie? Why didn’t you tell me earlier so I could write the truth?
VL: You writers don’t know everything you think you do. We characters like to keep a few secrets so you won’t get too big for your britches.
This interview is making me squirm. But what else did I expect from Victoria Logan?
PW: What else did you keep from me?
VL: Like what, for instance?
PW: Let’s talk about the gift Delilah passed on to her daughters. You said you didn’t believe in it. Or was all that a lie?
VL: I never tell a lie. But then, I never tell everything I know, either.
She eyes me, trying to judge whether I’ll fall for that. I don’t bat an eyelash, just stare at her, blue eyes to blue eyes.
VL: You’re a stubborn one, I see. Maybe ornery, too. Could be, that’s why I’m the way I am.
PW: I admit it. You’re part me.
VL: Thought so. I guess I owe you the truth, then. The fact is, I was involved when all three of my granddaughters were put to the test by evil, and I saw the gift at work. I called it mumbo jumbo… but you’d have to be a fool to deny that there are things in this world we will never understand. That doesn’t mean they’re not real.
PW: Thank you.
VL: Maybe you ought to give me credit for the gift instead of the Bohemian.
PW: It’s a done deal.
VL: You could change that in the edit.
She gives me a cagey grin and pours me another cup of tea. I make no promises.
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Peggy Webb is the USA Today bestselling author of more than 100 novels in multiple genres, including her bestselling crime thrillers. The late, great Pat Conroy called her a “truly gifted writer,” and reviewers call her “one of the Southern literary greats.” Peggy, an accomplished musician, composed the blues lyrics credited to one of her characters in her latest thriller, Black Crow Cabin. The former writing instructor at Mississippi State University lives in a Southern cottage among the rose gardens she designed and planted. Discover more on her website at https://peggywebb.com/ and on her Facebook fan page at Peggy Webb, Author https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61556749028521
Category: Interviews, On Writing
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