Author Lise Mayne has two novels to her credit – Becoming Sand and Time Enough. Lise told me that writing featuring family history is “a tricky business and having done it twice, I have some advice to share based on my experience with the writing and also with family responses.” So I invited her to do just that!
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Who would choose to write historical fiction inspired by family history? I often asked myself that while working on my novel Time Enough. For ten years I arose at the “blue hour” before sunrise and worked in the dark living room, bathed in the computer’s glare. Retired from teaching, I could happily have stayed in bed. Afternoon research tempted me down rabbit holes, forcing me to constantly regain focus. Health and life issues interrupted, too.
Fortunately, I shared the joy of travelling to Liverpool, Boston and Isle of Man with my husband, to gain first-hand knowledge. I studied the craft of novel writing through books, online courses, mentors, editors and critique partners. Finally, I had a finished manuscript! Then came two years of submissions and revisions in a loop of rejections. A saner person would have quit, but my motivation outweighed my desire for a quiet life. Why? I had a promise to keep.
It’s the late 1960’s. For three summers, I was sent for a week in August to help Grandma harvest her garden. My grandparents lived in their former café, with a dirt basement, a wood-burning stove and an attic filled with implements and mementos from the restaurant and their farm. I adored watching Grandpa shoot sparks on his grinding wheel, helping Grandma run the wringer washer and treadle sewing machine, and using the stove’s burner lifter to see live flames dancing. Rainy days, I’d climb the steep stairway inside Grandpa’s closet (just like Narnia!) to scramble up into the attic. For hours, I’d play dress-up and flip through old photographs, freed from pestering siblings and chores. I built a world.
After sunny mornings picking vegetables and fruit, Grandma and I would sit on a wooden bench, shucking peas or cleaning berries for canning. Grandma described homesteading in Saskatchewan, where they’d “proved up” two sections, from 1921 to 1936. Some stories were hilarious, salted with ancient expressions: “That fella’s face’d scare a dog off a gut wagon!” She never spared me the harsh realities of devastating hailstorms, wild fires, nasty “no-see-ums” and mosquitoes, and incessant work, with only the winter to rest.
I was curious about Grandpa’s collection of ancient arrowheads, displayed in the kitchen. Grandma said he’d notice the points while walking behind the plough, turning the buffalo grass. He’d lovingly wire them to a board, until it was full. Knowing the cost of survival there, he admired the people immensely. Family members on adjacent parcels never found a single one. He also discovered a stone hammer, which he kept by the door near the bench where he’d sit and smoke, of an evening. I wondered what a stone hammer looked like; she didn’t say. Then grasshoppers, drought, and dust forced them off the farm in the Dirty Thirties, as she called it, disgust in her voice. Before they left, Grandpa performed a ceremony and left the hammer propped in the door. I saw that moment before my eyes, like a film.
They drove away with five kids and not much else. Grandpa’s hand-crafted high chair remained in the empty kitchen. My tears flowed as she said that selling his Percheron horses and losing his land had crushed Grandpa’s spirit; he was never the same. To me, he was quiet but always loving and kind, crafting toys, reading to me from his Life magazine or softly playing his mandolin. He never spoke about the past. Back home, I stood in an aspen glade, sun streaming down, yellow leaves trembling in the wind and silently promised that some day, I’d write that story in a book.
When I turned twelve, Grandpa got dementia. Arising at dawn, he’d roam the neighbourhood to find the barn, if Grandma forgot to lock up. At his funeral, I noticed her dry eyes, her somber face. “I’ve cried all my tears,” she said. I didn’t understand.
Suddenly, the seventies blew in: adolescence, marriage, education, a career, a family. I kept writing, working on a different novel, but the glimmer remained. Then in 1988, while helping Mom clean out Grandma’s apartment, I discovered the homestead papers and two birth certificates, in the bin. Grandpa’s was from Wolverine, Michigan, 1898, and his father’s, Port Erin, Isle of Man, 1872. Grandma had kept them safe.
Mom shook her head. “Who’d want that junk?” She had no nostalgia for homesteading. Trauma, more likely. The glimmer still in my mind, I retrieved them, wondering about the family’s journey. Twenty-four years later, I began the novel that would become “Time Enough.” No one could tell me about the emigration from Isle of Man to Michigan and on to Saskatchewan. Nor could I find genealogical records, ships’ manifests or gravestones on Isle of Man. I had four documents and a box of tiny, undated photographs. Undaunted, I built a world using books, archival records, journals and online images of strangers from the 1900’s. I researched the culture and history of Isle of Man and Michigan. Then a long-lost cousin shared maternal family history from Manitoulin Island. Weaving memories of my experiences at my grandparents’ home and Grandma’s stories, I kept writing. The stone hammer moment was the end, where I had begun. Promise kept. At last.
My advice for writing historical fiction based on family history? Write with care, respect and most of all, love. Your intuition will tell you what to leave out or change. Remember, you can’t slander the dead, so be honest. It’s worth depicting the past, as best we can. Otherwise, it disappears.
Before writing, consider Margaret Atwood’s three questions: Who am I writing for? What do I have to tell them? How do I want to make them feel?
Then promise to see it through. You’ll make amazing discoveries and find your way. Follow the glimmer.
“…I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep. And miles to go before I sleep.” Robert Frost
Many thanks, Lise. What a poignant family story and some great advice for telling family stories.
Time Enough by Lise Mayne
A sweeping historical novel about the challenges of emigration and holding on to one’s identity and sense of “home.”
Emigration comes at a cost, even more so when it’s forced. Traditions, culture, belongings, everything must be abandoned. What endures? 1904. A Manx family subsists on a small-hold farm. Their lives are bound by tradition and love, steeped in folklore and belief in faeries. The grandparents, son William, Euphemia and their six children share a tiny cottage. The men work as miners. Despite poverty and the tragic loss of three sons, Grandad upholds the Manx belief: “Traa dy liooar.” Like the triskelion, their symbol of the three-legged man, he insists they will not fall. There’s time enough; all will be well. When change imposes a critical dilemma, does belief matter? The father, William, is dying of lead poisoning. How will Euphemia and her eldest son, Henry, support them all? William’s younger brother, Thomas, offers emigration to Michigan. Euphemia suspects his motives: they started as lovers and parted as enemies. Their history could destroy everything. Henry, almost thirteen, longs to remain with his grandparents. His grandmother makes him promise to help his mother. The die is cast. They must go. After a perilous voyage, their hopes are shattered. Fighting for survival against deception, exploitation and abuse, they stumble along, just. Then, tragedy strikes. William is killed and Euphemia’s secret is inadvertently revealed. Devastated, Henry breaks his word and flees. Euphemia must remain to protect her children. Henry travels to Canada, still pining for Man, clinging to his beliefs. The triskelion turns again; Henry falls in love. Now he must confront his mistakes and find a way to heal his broken family, for a new life to begin. On a three-decade journey from Isle of Man to Saskatchewan, via Michigan and Manitoulin Island, we are immersed in the moving saga of Euphemia and Henry as they seek independence and gain strength. A sweeping novel about what endures in an unfamiliar place. Can forgiveness restore love and bring hope?
In addition to her website, you can reach Lise on Instagram on Blue Sky, or on Facebook.
A few other posts on using family stories for inspiration:
- Family Stories – Gift From the Past
- The History Behind The Godmother’s Secret
- Exploring Family Heritage in Fiction
- From An Ancestor Search to a Historical Novel
FOR MORE ON READING & WRITING HISTORICAL FICTION FOLLOW A WRITER OF HISTORY. There’s a SUBSCRIBE function on the right hand side of the page.
M.K. Tod writes historical fiction. Her latest novel THAT WAS THEN is a contemporary thriller. Mary’s other novels, THE ADMIRAL’S WIFE, PARIS IN RUINS, TIME AND REGRET, LIES TOLD IN SILENCE and UNRAVELLED are available from Amazon, Nook, Kobo, Google Play and iTunes. She can be contacted on Facebook or on her website www.mktod.com.
