WHEN THE OCEAN FLIES
Heather G. Marshall
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GENRE: Women's Fiction
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BLURB:
An email from a stranger tells Alison Earley that her natural father, whom she has known for only six years, has died suddenly. What begins as a short trip back to Scotland for a funeral soon becomes a journey that puts adoption, sexuality, and identity on a collision course as Alison finds herself caught between the life and family she has so carefully constructed on one continent and the family from which she was taken on another.
Shunned by her father's family, reunited with her natural mother, and reconnected with a long-lost love, Alison finds herself trying to shepherd her youngest child towards college while questioning everything she thought she knew about herself.
When her natural mother uncovers a series of letters written to Alison from the grandmother she never knew, resurrecting stories of generations of women--stories long buried by patriarchal rule--Alison realizes that she must find the courage to face and reveal the secrets of her own past. At what cost, though? And who and what will be left in the aftermath?
When the Ocean Flies explores the pain of separation and abuse, and the power of love to heal even over huge gaps in time and geographical distance.
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Excerpt One:
Blue microfiche, the image yellowed. Alison perched on the edge of the chair. There was her name. Not her name, now. Not Alison. The one she started with: Jayne. Jayne Kerr. The handwriting small and neat. Mother’s name: Mary MacGilavry Kerr.
Jayne.
And Mary.
The tight signature at the bottom: her mother’s signature. She lifted one hand to the screen. Her chest clenched. She pulled her notebook from her bag, copied the name, as though she was likely to forget. Father’s name ______________.
Heat. Red cheeks in this gray basement. She wished she were stoat, or beaver, water creature, able to dive down. Cool, dark water. She held her breath. Held her tears. Who are these people? This Mary? This Jayne? Who am I? Jayne and Alison, like two separate people, with two separate lines of possibility, one body. No father. She couldn’t look at it a second longer.
She pushed the chair back, suddenly taken by the need to burst up, out, back to light and air.
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Topic : What was the greatest challenge in writing this book and how did you overcome it?
Getting myself out of the way! I am an adoptee and I started toying with the idea that would ultimately become When the Ocean Flies when I first met my biological parents—my mother nineteen years ago and my father seventeen years ago. The reunion process brought up lots of questions for me—who am I and what even makes me who I am? How true is the narrative that we believe about ourselves—the one we are given by the people we grow up amid, by time and place? Can we change it? Insert a plot twist?
I read a lot about the adoption experience from the adoptee perspective, and I knew I wanted to write about it, too, but that I wanted something larger (and more compelling) than my own life. I wanted to write fiction, not memoir.
As I wrote, my own life kept inserting itself. I’d start down a fictive path and find myself having wandered off into memoir territory. I finally gave in. This might have been the long way home, so to speak, but it worked for me. I had to allow myself to write my actual story first. I ended up with over six hundred pages. Having those words on the page did three things. It was a clearing out that allowed me to open space internally, emotionally to explore what the novel might be, to really dig into the fiction I wanted to create. Yes, based on events in my own life, but not the actual places, people, events. It affirmed that I truly did not want to write memoir. And it allowed me the distance required to write well and to explore key ideas: who we are as individuals and women, what causes us to alter ourselves for the promise of acceptance and belonging, how we can connect even over huge gaps in time and geographical distance, and how we might heal and live full and satisfying lives.
Once my own life was out of the way, I was able to connect deeply with wholly fictional characters like Eilidh, the grandmother who writes the letters in the novel. I was unbounded by what had happened and fully open to what might happen next on the page.
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Heather G. Marshall is an adoptee, author, speaker, teacher, coach, and traveler. Her short fiction has been published in a variety of journals, including Black Middens: New Writing Scotland, and Quarried, an anthology of the best of three decades of Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel. Her first novel, The Thorn Tree, released in 2014 (MP Publishing). Her TED talk, “Letting Go of Expectations,” centers around her adoption and reunion. Her second novel, When the Ocean Flies, released in February 2024 (Vine Leaves Press). In her writing, Heather explores family, adoption, women (especially older ones), the natural environment, and how these intersect. When she isn’t writing, she likes to hike, travel, practice yoga and meditation, do a wee bit of knitting, and, of course, read. Originally from Scotland, Heather is currently based in Massachusetts.
Links to Heather’s socials
Website: https://heathergmarshall.com
Substack: https://heathergmarshall.substack.com
Instagram: @heather_g_marshall https://www.instagram.com/heather_g_marshall
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/heather.marshall.3956
Buy links for When the Ocean Flies
Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/when-the-ocean-flies-heather-g-marshall/20885419
Waterstones: https://www.waterstones.com/book/when-the-ocean-flies/heather-g-marshall/9783988320452
Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/when-the-ocean-flies-heather-g-marshall/1144381375
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Thanks for hosting!
ReplyDeleteThis looks like an enjoyable novel. Thanks for hosting this tour.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Michael!
DeleteThanks for hosting me and When the Ocean Flies! It's lovely to be here!
ReplyDeleteThe cover looks good. This sounds like a really good story.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Marcy!
DeleteSounds like a great read.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Rita!
ReplyDeleteSounds so good. Thank you for the excerpt & guest post! :)
ReplyDeleteHow would you define success as a writer?
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