“Maggie thinks that nature is her enemy – that even her own, internal nature is her enemy. So her struggle is about accepting what is natural around her and within her…”
DAY TWO with Janet...
Q: Janet, I love the many contrasts in your novel which so evoke the differences of life in 1904 between the developing West and the more settled East, between high society and the rougher western culture. This thread reverberates throughout the story in many ways, beginning with sixteen-year-old Maggie’s Newport society life and the new life she is forced into in the wilds of Yellowstone, Montana.
In Newport, Maggie sees her future with Edward, the perfect high society catch, yet in Montana she’s drawn to the young but wise mountain man, Tom Rowland. This contrast is echoed in her internal struggle as Maggie both longs to fit into eastern society as easily as her friend Kitty, while at the same time she discovers she’s more like her independent, outcast mother who once disappeared into the West. Was this a theme which suggested itself to you early on? And why was it important for you as an author to write about it? Did you discover as yo
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