December 9, 2024 • 26 mins
Hi,
In this episode, I chat with Kimberly Brock about her novel, The Fabled Earth.
Kimberly Brock is the bestselling author of The Lost Book of Eleanor Dare, which was shortlisted for the prestigious Townsend Prize for Fiction, and The River Witch, recipient of the Georgia Author of the Year Award.
Kimberly, a former actor and special needs educator, received her bachelor’s degree from the University of West Georgia in 1996.
She founded Tinderbox Writers Workshop, a transformative creative experience for women in the arts. Kimberly has been a guest lecturer for many regional and national writing workshops, including at the Pat Conroy Literary Center. A native of North Georgia, she now lives near Atlanta.
Her latest novel, The Fabled Earth, was released in October 2024 through Harper Muse.
Kimberly Brock
The Fabled Earth, Kimberly Brock
North Woods, Daniel Mason
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hi, my name is Mandy Jackson-Beverly and I'm a
bibliophile.
Welcome to the Bookshop Podcast.
Each week, I present interviewswith authors, independent
bookshop owners and booksellersfrom around the globe and
publishing professionals.
To help the show reach morepeople, please share episodes
with friends and family and onsocial media, and remember to
(00:33):
subscribe and leave a reviewwherever you listen to this
podcast.
You're listening to episode 276.
(00:57):
Kimberley Brock is thebestselling author of the Lost
Book of Eleanor Dare, which wasshortlisted for the prestigious
Townsend Prize for Fiction andthe River Witch recipient of the
Georgia Author of the YearAward.
A former actor and specialneeds educator, kimberley
received her bachelor's degreefrom the University of West
Georgia in 1996.
She is the founder of TinderboxWriters Workshop, a
transformative creativeexperience for women in the arts
.
She has served as a guestlecturer for many regional and
national writing workshops,including at the Pat Conroy
(01:20):
Literary Center.
A native of North Georgia, shenow lives near Atlanta.
Kimberly's latest novel, thisFabled Earth, was released in
October 2024 through Harper Muse.
Hi, kimberly, and welcome tothe show.
It's great to have you here.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Hi, thank you so much .
I'm excited to talk to youtoday.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Likewise, and I loved your book the Fabled Earth
absolutely beautiful.
Thank you.
Let's begin by learning aboutyou as a former actor and
special needs educator and whatled you to writing specifically
Southern and historical fiction.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
I suppose I have always been telling stories,
even when I was a very littlegirl.
I can remember getting introuble in first grade for
telling everybody a story aboutour playground behind our school
.
It was a new school a few yearsbefore I started there and they
had pushed all of the dirt inthe back into these hills and
(02:17):
left them there to flatten theplayground and we would play on
those hills and there were woodsbehind the hills and a little
sawmill back there that we couldhear.
But we were little, we didn'tknow what that was and I told
everybody that those mounds weregraves and I told them that
there was a monster or a ghostin the woods.
And I remember having toapologize.
(02:39):
The principal came into classand I had to apologize because I
had scared some of the kids sobad they wouldn't sleep in their
beds at night.
Oh my goodness.
So the storytelling startedearly.
The writing started early.
I wrote a lot in school but mydad always said have a job where
you have good health insurance,you have a smart dad, right.
(03:03):
So I went into teaching and, ofcourse, theater.
I did theater, but I think ifyou look at all of those things,
storytelling is an element andand all of them.
And it wasn't until I had myown children.
They were very small.
When I wrote my first shortstory I had connected.
The very first email I eversent was to another author that
(03:26):
I just picked up her book at thegrocery store and her email was
on the back of the paperbackand I sent her an email to tell
her how much I loved the book.
And we corresponded a littlebit back and forth, which just
thrilled me you don't think awriter is going to answer your
email and she asked if I'd everthought about publishing.
And I wrote a short story for asmall press that she was
(03:49):
running with some other authorsand that's where it started.
So it was almost accidental.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
I love hearing authors publishing stories.
Everyone is unique.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
In an interview for Canvas Rebel you wrote quote
stories were how I experiencedthe world around me and the
larger one that I dreamed of,far from where I spent my days
on a pretty farm in a smallcommunity in North Georgia end
quote.
You went on to say that youstudied theater in college.
Having taught high schooltheater and costume design and
(04:21):
having written plays, I haveseen firsthand how important
theater is to students.
I think theater is the best wayto gain a sense of character
and the character's voice andalso the point of view of the
character, and the quiet timesbetween dialogue when there's
action.
Taking part in an acting classgives us a sense of self, a
(04:46):
sense of what it's like to getup in front of people and speak,
and I think that is such a giftfor everyone absolutely, and
but I also think that it it's aninnate thing.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
if you're an actor, right, you're already doing that
, and when I'm writing, I'malready just doing that.
It's the way that I processstory, it's the way I process
the world.
It's not just in my writing.
I'm very interested in whypeople are doing what they're
doing and why they're moving theway they're moving and why
they're making the decisionsthat they're making and why they
(05:20):
look the way they look.
All of those, why questionsthat go into work in the theater
, I think, when you're settingthat up, so that when people are
watching and hopefully beingengaged in a performance, that
also translates, I think, intomy writing, because I'm staging
(05:40):
it and I'm dressing it, and I'mdressing it and I'm informing it
.
I'm informing the charactersthat move and speak.
So, yeah, all of that goes intoit, for sure.
I in fact this book.
I just got a message from mytheater director in college.
He said, oh, I see a little ofwhat you're doing there, I think
(06:02):
.
So, yeah, sneaky, but true,absolutely true.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Yeah, and speaking of the book, can you please share
a synopsis of the Fabled Earth?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
So this novel is set on Cumberland Island.
It's one of our barrier islands, the southernmost barrier
island in Georgia, and it's nowa national park.
It's mostly still undevelopedtoday, but in the 1880s the
Carnegie family one of the twoCarnegie brothers, thomas
Carnegie and his wife boughtproperty there and they built
(06:36):
winter homes for their familythere.
So I have you know I lovehistory but I'm a storyteller.
So this is a fictional storythat is set.
It's a dual timeline,historical set in 1959
predominantly, and then withflashbacks to an event that
(06:56):
takes place in 1932, when twoboys drown after a night of
storytelling at one of theCarnegie mansions.
And my main character, cleoWoodbine, was there in 1932.
And she has a lot of secretsabout what happened that night
and the folklore that's told andthe tragedy that occurs.
(07:16):
And she lives for the nextseveral decades on this little
spit of land off of CumberlandIsland that she calls Kingdom
Come, until the daughter of theonly other girl that was there
in 1932 shows up with questionsin 1959 about what happened to
her mother and there's a thirdcharacter.
(07:36):
So the second character, thedaughter, is Frances Flood and
she's a folklorist.
And then the third character isa young girl who has recently
married straight out of highschool and then been widowed
only a few months later.
And she has come to live in afictional town on the coast on
(07:59):
the coastline called Reverie andher aunt ran an inn there and
she's taken over the inn and shehas brought her brownie camera
with her and she's takingpictures of the town and she
develops this eerie doubleexposure photograph by accident
and in the photograph there's aface of one of the boys from
(08:20):
1932 that nobody has seen sincethat night and everybody in town
thinks she's raised a ghost.
So there's a lot of ghosts andfolklore and these three women,
their lives, intertwine aroundthat event in 1932.
And at the end of the bookthere is a true historical event
(08:41):
that takes place In 1959, thelargest mansion, dungeness, that
was built on the island by theCarnegie's, burned in an arson
and nobody's ever been chargedwith that arson.
So I got to speculate a littlebit about that and it's just a
big Southern mythology.
I think it was a lot of fun towrite.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
I love the folklore within the story.
It's wonderful.
But it made me wonder when didyou first visit Cumberland
Island and what drew you to theCarnegie Dungeness ruins and the
stories of the Gilded Agearound the island?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Well, to me it's such a strange thing.
Those Gilded Age mentions justthey look like they fell from
the sky, they don't look likethey belong there at all, like
they look very confused.
Why are we here?
But I so that to me that drewme to the place.
That's very southern, gothic,and so I was always interested
(09:40):
in Cumberland.
But when I was a little girl mydad's best friend had a house
on St Simon's Island, which isnear it's one of our barrier
islands there, and my first tripto the beach was to St Simon's.
So I had this connection.
Although I grew up in thefoothills of North Georgia, I
had this connection to the coastand I have always been
(10:02):
intrigued by the way storiesconnect people around the world
and across regions, and so whenI write I always try and connect
those two areas in my book allthe way across the state that
I'm from.
And I had always wanted to goto Cumberland but had never been
.
And when my husband and I gotmarried in 1996, we got married
(10:24):
I grew up in a house that was100 years old and it had a
hundred year old oak tree outback and we got married in the
backyard.
There were about 25 peoplethere in folding chairs and we
had pound cake that littleladies had made from my church.
It was just very small andintimate and I loved it.
And then a few months later weheard in Georgia, along with the
(10:46):
rest of the world, that JFK Jrhad married Carolyn Bessette in
a secret wedding on CumberlandIsland, and I was so charmed by
that and I thought, oh, we'rejust like the Kennedys.
I was so charmed by that.
I thought, oh, we're just likethe Kennedys.
(11:07):
When it came a few years ago, itwas our 25th wedding
anniversary.
We were looking for somethingto do.
My husband surprised me and gotus a reservation to stay at the
Grayfield Inn on CumberlandIsland.
It is one of the mansions thatLucy Carnegie built for her nine
children.
Then it still exists on theisland and you can stay there.
It is the only place you canstay, unless you camp on the
(11:28):
island.
So we went and while we werepulling up you get there by
ferry alongside the island I waslooking at all those live oak
trees and all the moss and it'svery spooky and it was very
quiet.
There was nobody else in theboat and I realized it would
have been their 25th weddinganniversary too.
(11:50):
Oh, beautiful.
And I had not thought of thatand I thought, well, I've always
said I wanted to write a ghoststory and maybe this is the
place to do it.
So it started there with theidea of this fantastic wedding
and these very wealthy peopleand this kind of unlikely place
(12:10):
and then their, their ghoststory.
And then I looked at that and Ilooked at all the history of
Cumberland and how long thathistory is and the Carnegie
family there and how strange itwas that they were there and how
strange that would have been topeople who were local to that
area to have people of thatimmense wealth there in those
(12:31):
homes and the differences intheir lives.
And I came up with CleoWoodbine and her grandfather.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
After I read your book, I started doing a little
research about that area.
I I came up with Cleo Woodbineand her grandfather.
After I read your book, Istarted doing a little research
about that area.
I fell in love with the way thetrees fall over the road and
the moss dangling from thebranches.
Oh, it is absolutely gorgeous.
And you're right.
You know, those big mansions dolook like they kind of fell
from the sky.
Big mansions do look like theykind of fell from the sky.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
It's amazing and it feels very.
You feel very out of time andplace while you're there.
So I liked the idea of it beingthis backdrop for a very
conventional little southerntown in 1959, even though it
still is an imaginary town.
I didn't want it to be too realeither.
(13:19):
I kind of liked keeping thatsoft edge to everything.
And then the Carnegie's aresort of the old gods in the
background, you know, in a timethat's fading and social changes
happening in 1959.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
And let's talk a bit about your characters.
So Cleo Woodbine, frances Floodand Audrey Howell are the main
protagonists of this fabledearth.
A fable is their connection anda beautiful way to bring these
characters together and explorewhat happened decades ago and
how it affected their lives andthose around them.
What came first, the women orthe fable?
Speaker 2 (14:00):
I think Cleo came first.
Out of everything, cleo camefirst and Cleo was difficult to
know.
Cleo didn't want me to know her, she didn't want anybody to
know her.
So she was an interestingcharacter and it was easier to
get to know her, her I could notget to know her in her hardened
(14:22):
state in 1959.
It was easier to get into Cleofrom 1932 as a young girl
showing up and and being sort ofhaving a capacity to be
impressed at that point with allof the wealth and what her life
might be if she meets thisfamily.
(14:44):
And her grandfather is afolklorist and a watercolor
illustrator and lived in acottage that they provided.
The Carnegie's provided for himand published a small little
book of his folk tales andillustrations, and she's
aspiring to do the same thing.
So I think that's where thefolklore started.
(15:10):
When I think about ghost stories, and specifically that day I
was thinking about ghost storieslooking at the island and I
thought you know, our storieshaunt us, they follow us, but
what if they really literallywalked alongside us?
And so Cleo's grandfather'sfolktale characters literally
(15:30):
walk alongside her and haunt her, and so that's where that
connection began.
And so that's where thatconnection began, but it is a
much broader metaphor, I think,for not just this one fictional
person, also for that region,for the South.
I think the South is a bighaunted house.
(15:50):
I think it's all a folklore,it's all a fable.
But our country, our wholecountry, our whole world, the
way stories, folklore hastraveled through centuries and
across oceans, and our familyfolklore, all of our families.
We have folklore in ourcommunities, so I was trying to
(16:14):
drill it down into the story ofthis woman.
But then each of the characterspresents their own ghost story
or their own folklore that theybring with them.
Frances Blood's mother has aGerman folktale and that's how
she and Cleo originally becamefriends.
They talk about that folklore.
So the stories do connect allthe characters and that was the
(16:38):
theme that was running throughthe whole book.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
And it worked so well .
Now, Jimmy is a character thatyou just fall in love with.
He is a gem and in his own way,he brings everyone together.
So did you draw on students?
You've taught to add depth andreality to his character.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yes, I did.
Now, he is a fictionalcharacter, but I did my best to
highlight his humanity.
Every one of the characters inmy book is somehow a little bit
atypical and he's just one ofthem.
And he's just one of them, thethe, the child that I taught
(17:25):
that had Williams syndrome.
Specifically I, I was verymoved by her capacity for joy
and despair and wonder.
And I think a lot of thecharacters in this novel have
been stunted in some way or theyare jaded and struggling with
(17:49):
the capacity to embrace thedivine or wonder or magic in the
world around them, or wonder ormagic in the world around them.
And Jimmy does not hold back.
Jimmy embraces all of it, thegood and the bad, and
experiences it very broadly.
(18:09):
He vibrates at this very highlevel and I think there's such
bravery in that, there's suchcourage in that to be that open.
He's gregarious and he'sforgiving and he's loving and
he's horrified and he lives veryloudly Right.
(18:31):
And that's what I wanted.
I wanted a character that wasmoving through this world where
everybody's holding on so tightand he just flies.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Oh, that's so beautiful, the way you've said
that Jimmy just attracts joy,and he feeds people joy too.
I think that's what's soprecious about him.
Now, what are your thoughts onthe idea that reading fiction
helps develop empathy?
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I think it's the whole point.
There's the whole point.
I don't think I could sit andmake up stories all day long,
and what would be the point,except just to entertain myself
when I and even then, even ifI'm entertaining myself, there's
a.
There has to be a purpose to it.
There has to be a function.
(19:16):
It should change you.
Like I write historical fiction,I grew up in the 80s.
I, you know, I don't knowanything except what I read or
what I hear from other peopleabout a time that I did not live
through myself, and I know thatI'm going to get things wrong,
(19:39):
but I hope that when you writeor when you read, it changes you
.
So by the time you're at theend of the work, you may not see
things the same way as you sawthem when you set out reading it
or writing it or listening toit, and I think that it opens
the world in ways that you don'texpect.
(20:00):
You find that you have thingsin common with people that you
never dreamed you would have incommon good and bad and it makes
you reconsider the world.
It makes you.
I think a story is like theriver in this book, where there
are.
There's a spot in the riverthere between Cumberland and the
mainland where the river runsboth ways, like are.
There's a spot in the riverthere between Cumberland and the
mainland where the river runsboth ways, like it does in a
(20:22):
salt creek, and they call it thedividings, and I think people
are human beings, are creatureswho tell stories.
We're it.
We're the only ones we exist.
We live in a fixed point, butwe have the capacity, from that
fixed point, to reflect on thepast or dream about the future,
(20:46):
and we do it all at the sametime, and that's a story.
That's how a story connects us,it's how a story travels, and I
think that is what I wanted towrite about.
That's empathy.
That's what creates empathy,that we can look at all of it at
once and see ourselves and oneanother.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yes, and feel the way someone else feels.
Let's talk about books.
What are you currently reading?
Speaker 2 (21:11):
I am right now reading Northwoods by Daniel
Mason.
Yeah, I've been waiting.
It's been sitting here foreverin my office and I have a friend
who kept saying you've got toread this, you've got to read
this and it is fantastic.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yes, that one's on my list too.
I don't know about you, butit's so difficult.
You have a pile of books toread stacks beside my bed,
stacks in my bookcases, stacksbeside my desk but every now and
again at the weekends I justgrab a book that I've wanted to
read for a long time and sneakit in.
It's kind of fun, I know,before we go.
(21:52):
I was just wondering if there'sanything you'd like to talk
about regarding the TinderboxWriters Workshop that you
created.
Did you keep it afloat duringCOVID?
Speaker 2 (21:59):
So during the time between writing my last book,
which was the Lost Book ofEleanor Dare, which was a huge
historical fiction and I didn'tsit out to write historical
fiction, so I sort of stumbledinto it and had to learn the
ropes.
It took me many years and then,while it was on sub to
(22:19):
hopefully find a home with aneditor which thankfully it did I
wasn't sure what I wanted towrite next.
It took me a while to writethat book and it was very hard
to sort of get started withsomething new.
And I decided during that timethat I didn't know how to do a
whole lot, but I knew how toopen up space and I could sit
(22:39):
and listen to people and wecould tell stories.
And I kept hearing women saythey weren't creative, or I used
to be creative and not creativenow, or I just I don't have
time or I just feel so drainedall the things.
And I would hear it while I waswalking through the grocery
store.
I would hear it at school withmy kids and my kids are mostly
big and grown now, but at thattime I was sort of in the thick
(23:02):
of it.
So I was hearing it a lot frommoms, but also older women that
I knew, and so I rented a spaceand sat down and started
teaching some creative writingand creative skills.
And women came they came from Idon't know where and we would
sit for about six weeks and dothese classes and they would
(23:25):
write, they would paint, theymade quilts, they made cookbooks
.
It was you know, it ran thegamut what they were doing with
anything creative in their lives.
They were creating, they weremaking, and then it became a
retreat.
For a little while I was doingretreats out on Sullivan's
Island in South Carolina Twice ayear.
(23:46):
We were doing this and it wasfantastic.
And then COVID, and so Iactually COVID was not all bad
for me because I wrote anotherbook and you know I'm publishing
.
So I have not been back to theworkshops in the six weeks
format that I had or theretreats, but I'm kind of
(24:08):
revisiting it and I've done someonline teaching and I'm hoping
that I'll get back to doing thatin some form, because it was
great for me too.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
I love what you just said, then, about being great
for you too.
I think as a teacher and astudent whichever one you are
there is a give and take and alearning between both.
You might be a teacher, butyou're still learning through
something that you hear fromyour student.
I miss that about teaching too.
Kimberly, it's been lovelychatting with you, and I
(24:38):
thoroughly enjoyed the FabledEarth.
It's a beautiful, beautifulstory.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Thank you so much.
This was lovely.
It's fun having your accent andmy accent back and forth.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Yeah, and you know what?
I never think I have an accentuntil I hear someone like you
speak, and then I go oh yeah, Iguess we both have an accent.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
I know.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
I do love your accent .
Speaker 2 (25:02):
I tried in college to get rid of it.
We moved and lived in Seattlefor four years and I was
teaching kids.
I was a reading specialist fora short period and I was
teaching reading and theirparents would come in and say
you should hear my kids soundout their bowels.
They all sounded like me.
I just gave up.
(25:26):
This is it.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Well, I would love to hear those kids speaking now.
Kimberly, I love your accent.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
I think it's great and I love your book.
You take care.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate your time today.
Bye-bye.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
You've been listening to my conversation with author
Kimberly Brock about her newbook.
You've been listening to myconversation with author
Kimberly Brock about her newbook, the Fabled Earth.
To help the show reach morepeople, please share episodes
with friends and family and onsocial media, and remember to
subscribe and leave a reviewwherever you listen to this
podcast.
To find out more about theBookshop Podcast, go to
(25:59):
thebookshoppodcastcom and makesure to subscribe and leave a
review wherever you listen tothe show.
You can also follow me at MandyJackson Beverly on X, instagram
and Facebook and on YouTube atthe Bookshop Podcast.
If you have a favorite indiebookshop that you'd like to
suggest we have on the podcast,I'd love to hear from you via
(26:22):
the contact form atthebookshoppodcastcom.
The Bookshop Podcast is writtenand produced by me, mandy
Jackson-Beverly, theme musicprovided by Brian Beverly,
executive assistant to Mandy,adrian Ohtohan and graphic
design by Francis Barala.
Thanks for listening and I'llsee you next time.
Hi, my name is Mandy Jackson-Beverly and I'm a
bibliophile.
Welcome to the Bookshop Podcast.
Each week, I present interviewswith authors, independent
bookshop owners and booksellersfrom around the globe and
publishing professionals.
To help the show reach morepeople, please share episodes
with friends and family and onsocial media, and remember to
(00:33):
subscribe and leave a reviewwherever you listen to this
podcast.
You're listening to episode 276.
(00:57):
Kimberley Brock is thebestselling author of the Lost
Book of Eleanor Dare, which wasshortlisted for the prestigious
Townsend Prize for Fiction andthe River Witch recipient of the
Georgia Author of the YearAward.
A former actor and specialneeds educator, kimberley
received her bachelor's degreefrom the University of West
Georgia in 1996.
She is the founder of TinderboxWriters Workshop, a
transformative creativeexperience for women in the arts
.
She has served as a guestlecturer for many regional and
national writing workshops,including at the Pat Conroy
(01:20):
Literary Center.
A native of North Georgia, shenow lives near Atlanta.
Kimberly's latest novel, thisFabled Earth, was released in
October 2024 through Harper Muse.
Hi, kimberly, and welcome tothe show.
It's great to have you here.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Hi, thank you so much .
I'm excited to talk to youtoday.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Likewise, and I loved your book the Fabled Earth
absolutely beautiful.
Thank you.
Let's begin by learning aboutyou as a former actor and
special needs educator and whatled you to writing specifically
Southern and historical fiction.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
I suppose I have always been telling stories,
even when I was a very littlegirl.
I can remember getting introuble in first grade for
telling everybody a story aboutour playground behind our school
.
It was a new school a few yearsbefore I started there and they
had pushed all of the dirt inthe back into these hills and
(02:17):
left them there to flatten theplayground and we would play on
those hills and there were woodsbehind the hills and a little
sawmill back there that we couldhear.
But we were little, we didn'tknow what that was and I told
everybody that those mounds weregraves and I told them that
there was a monster or a ghostin the woods.
And I remember having toapologize.
(02:39):
The principal came into classand I had to apologize because I
had scared some of the kids sobad they wouldn't sleep in their
beds at night.
Oh my goodness.
So the storytelling startedearly.
The writing started early.
I wrote a lot in school but mydad always said have a job where
you have good health insurance,you have a smart dad, right.
(03:03):
So I went into teaching and, ofcourse, theater.
I did theater, but I think ifyou look at all of those things,
storytelling is an element andand all of them.
And it wasn't until I had myown children.
They were very small.
When I wrote my first shortstory I had connected.
The very first email I eversent was to another author that
(03:26):
I just picked up her book at thegrocery store and her email was
on the back of the paperbackand I sent her an email to tell
her how much I loved the book.
And we corresponded a littlebit back and forth, which just
thrilled me you don't think awriter is going to answer your
email and she asked if I'd everthought about publishing.
And I wrote a short story for asmall press that she was
(03:49):
running with some other authorsand that's where it started.
So it was almost accidental.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
I love hearing authors publishing stories.
Everyone is unique.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
In an interview for Canvas Rebel you wrote quote
stories were how I experiencedthe world around me and the
larger one that I dreamed of,far from where I spent my days
on a pretty farm in a smallcommunity in North Georgia end
quote.
You went on to say that youstudied theater in college.
Having taught high schooltheater and costume design and
(04:21):
having written plays, I haveseen firsthand how important
theater is to students.
I think theater is the best wayto gain a sense of character
and the character's voice andalso the point of view of the
character, and the quiet timesbetween dialogue when there's
action.
Taking part in an acting classgives us a sense of self, a
(04:46):
sense of what it's like to getup in front of people and speak,
and I think that is such a giftfor everyone absolutely, and
but I also think that it it's aninnate thing.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
if you're an actor, right, you're already doing that
, and when I'm writing, I'malready just doing that.
It's the way that I processstory, it's the way I process
the world.
It's not just in my writing.
I'm very interested in whypeople are doing what they're
doing and why they're moving theway they're moving and why
they're making the decisionsthat they're making and why they
(05:20):
look the way they look.
All of those, why questionsthat go into work in the theater
, I think, when you're settingthat up, so that when people are
watching and hopefully beingengaged in a performance, that
also translates, I think, intomy writing, because I'm staging
(05:40):
it and I'm dressing it, and I'mdressing it and I'm informing it
.
I'm informing the charactersthat move and speak.
So, yeah, all of that goes intoit, for sure.
I in fact this book.
I just got a message from mytheater director in college.
He said, oh, I see a little ofwhat you're doing there, I think
(06:02):
.
So, yeah, sneaky, but true,absolutely true.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Yeah, and speaking of the book, can you please share
a synopsis of the Fabled Earth?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
So this novel is set on Cumberland Island.
It's one of our barrier islands, the southernmost barrier
island in Georgia, and it's nowa national park.
It's mostly still undevelopedtoday, but in the 1880s the
Carnegie family one of the twoCarnegie brothers, thomas
Carnegie and his wife boughtproperty there and they built
(06:36):
winter homes for their familythere.
So I have you know I lovehistory but I'm a storyteller.
So this is a fictional storythat is set.
It's a dual timeline,historical set in 1959
predominantly, and then withflashbacks to an event that
(06:56):
takes place in 1932, when twoboys drown after a night of
storytelling at one of theCarnegie mansions.
And my main character, cleoWoodbine, was there in 1932.
And she has a lot of secretsabout what happened that night
and the folklore that's told andthe tragedy that occurs.
(07:16):
And she lives for the nextseveral decades on this little
spit of land off of CumberlandIsland that she calls Kingdom
Come, until the daughter of theonly other girl that was there
in 1932 shows up with questionsin 1959 about what happened to
her mother and there's a thirdcharacter.
(07:36):
So the second character, thedaughter, is Frances Flood and
she's a folklorist.
And then the third character isa young girl who has recently
married straight out of highschool and then been widowed
only a few months later.
And she has come to live in afictional town on the coast on
(07:59):
the coastline called Reverie andher aunt ran an inn there and
she's taken over the inn and shehas brought her brownie camera
with her and she's takingpictures of the town and she
develops this eerie doubleexposure photograph by accident
and in the photograph there's aface of one of the boys from
(08:20):
1932 that nobody has seen sincethat night and everybody in town
thinks she's raised a ghost.
So there's a lot of ghosts andfolklore and these three women,
their lives, intertwine aroundthat event in 1932.
And at the end of the bookthere is a true historical event
(08:41):
that takes place In 1959, thelargest mansion, dungeness, that
was built on the island by theCarnegie's, burned in an arson
and nobody's ever been chargedwith that arson.
So I got to speculate a littlebit about that and it's just a
big Southern mythology.
I think it was a lot of fun towrite.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
I love the folklore within the story.
It's wonderful.
But it made me wonder when didyou first visit Cumberland
Island and what drew you to theCarnegie Dungeness ruins and the
stories of the Gilded Agearound the island?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Well, to me it's such a strange thing.
Those Gilded Age mentions justthey look like they fell from
the sky, they don't look likethey belong there at all, like
they look very confused.
Why are we here?
But I so that to me that drewme to the place.
That's very southern, gothic,and so I was always interested
(09:40):
in Cumberland.
But when I was a little girl mydad's best friend had a house
on St Simon's Island, which isnear it's one of our barrier
islands there, and my first tripto the beach was to St Simon's.
So I had this connection.
Although I grew up in thefoothills of North Georgia, I
had this connection to the coastand I have always been
(10:02):
intrigued by the way storiesconnect people around the world
and across regions, and so whenI write I always try and connect
those two areas in my book allthe way across the state that
I'm from.
And I had always wanted to goto Cumberland but had never been
.
And when my husband and I gotmarried in 1996, we got married
(10:24):
I grew up in a house that was100 years old and it had a
hundred year old oak tree outback and we got married in the
backyard.
There were about 25 peoplethere in folding chairs and we
had pound cake that littleladies had made from my church.
It was just very small andintimate and I loved it.
And then a few months later weheard in Georgia, along with the
(10:46):
rest of the world, that JFK Jrhad married Carolyn Bessette in
a secret wedding on CumberlandIsland, and I was so charmed by
that and I thought, oh, we'rejust like the Kennedys.
I was so charmed by that.
I thought, oh, we're just likethe Kennedys.
(11:07):
When it came a few years ago, itwas our 25th wedding
anniversary.
We were looking for somethingto do.
My husband surprised me and gotus a reservation to stay at the
Grayfield Inn on CumberlandIsland.
It is one of the mansions thatLucy Carnegie built for her nine
children.
Then it still exists on theisland and you can stay there.
It is the only place you canstay, unless you camp on the
(11:28):
island.
So we went and while we werepulling up you get there by
ferry alongside the island I waslooking at all those live oak
trees and all the moss and it'svery spooky and it was very
quiet.
There was nobody else in theboat and I realized it would
have been their 25th weddinganniversary too.
(11:50):
Oh, beautiful.
And I had not thought of thatand I thought, well, I've always
said I wanted to write a ghoststory and maybe this is the
place to do it.
So it started there with theidea of this fantastic wedding
and these very wealthy peopleand this kind of unlikely place
(12:10):
and then their, their ghoststory.
And then I looked at that and Ilooked at all the history of
Cumberland and how long thathistory is and the Carnegie
family there and how strange itwas that they were there and how
strange that would have been topeople who were local to that
area to have people of thatimmense wealth there in those
(12:31):
homes and the differences intheir lives.
And I came up with CleoWoodbine and her grandfather.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
After I read your book, I started doing a little
research about that area.
I I came up with Cleo Woodbineand her grandfather.
After I read your book, Istarted doing a little research
about that area.
I fell in love with the way thetrees fall over the road and
the moss dangling from thebranches.
Oh, it is absolutely gorgeous.
And you're right.
You know, those big mansions dolook like they kind of fell
from the sky.
Big mansions do look like theykind of fell from the sky.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
It's amazing and it feels very.
You feel very out of time andplace while you're there.
So I liked the idea of it beingthis backdrop for a very
conventional little southerntown in 1959, even though it
still is an imaginary town.
I didn't want it to be too realeither.
(13:19):
I kind of liked keeping thatsoft edge to everything.
And then the Carnegie's aresort of the old gods in the
background, you know, in a timethat's fading and social changes
happening in 1959.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
And let's talk a bit about your characters.
So Cleo Woodbine, frances Floodand Audrey Howell are the main
protagonists of this fabledearth.
A fable is their connection anda beautiful way to bring these
characters together and explorewhat happened decades ago and
how it affected their lives andthose around them.
What came first, the women orthe fable?
Speaker 2 (14:00):
I think Cleo came first.
Out of everything, cleo camefirst and Cleo was difficult to
know.
Cleo didn't want me to know her, she didn't want anybody to
know her.
So she was an interestingcharacter and it was easier to
get to know her, her I could notget to know her in her hardened
(14:22):
state in 1959.
It was easier to get into Cleofrom 1932 as a young girl
showing up and and being sort ofhaving a capacity to be
impressed at that point with allof the wealth and what her life
might be if she meets thisfamily.
(14:44):
And her grandfather is afolklorist and a watercolor
illustrator and lived in acottage that they provided.
The Carnegie's provided for himand published a small little
book of his folk tales andillustrations, and she's
aspiring to do the same thing.
So I think that's where thefolklore started.
(15:10):
When I think about ghost stories, and specifically that day I
was thinking about ghost storieslooking at the island and I
thought you know, our storieshaunt us, they follow us, but
what if they really literallywalked alongside us?
And so Cleo's grandfather'sfolktale characters literally
(15:30):
walk alongside her and haunt her, and so that's where that
connection began.
And so that's where thatconnection began, but it is a
much broader metaphor, I think,for not just this one fictional
person, also for that region,for the South.
I think the South is a bighaunted house.
(15:50):
I think it's all a folklore,it's all a fable.
But our country, our wholecountry, our whole world, the
way stories, folklore hastraveled through centuries and
across oceans, and our familyfolklore, all of our families.
We have folklore in ourcommunities, so I was trying to
(16:14):
drill it down into the story ofthis woman.
But then each of the characterspresents their own ghost story
or their own folklore that theybring with them.
Frances Blood's mother has aGerman folktale and that's how
she and Cleo originally becamefriends.
They talk about that folklore.
So the stories do connect allthe characters and that was the
(16:38):
theme that was running throughthe whole book.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
And it worked so well .
Now, Jimmy is a character thatyou just fall in love with.
He is a gem and in his own way,he brings everyone together.
So did you draw on students?
You've taught to add depth andreality to his character.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yes, I did.
Now, he is a fictionalcharacter, but I did my best to
highlight his humanity.
Every one of the characters inmy book is somehow a little bit
atypical and he's just one ofthem.
And he's just one of them, thethe, the child that I taught
(17:25):
that had Williams syndrome.
Specifically I, I was verymoved by her capacity for joy
and despair and wonder.
And I think a lot of thecharacters in this novel have
been stunted in some way or theyare jaded and struggling with
(17:49):
the capacity to embrace thedivine or wonder or magic in the
world around them, or wonder ormagic in the world around them.
And Jimmy does not hold back.
Jimmy embraces all of it, thegood and the bad, and
experiences it very broadly.
(18:09):
He vibrates at this very highlevel and I think there's such
bravery in that, there's suchcourage in that to be that open.
He's gregarious and he'sforgiving and he's loving and
he's horrified and he lives veryloudly Right.
(18:31):
And that's what I wanted.
I wanted a character that wasmoving through this world where
everybody's holding on so tightand he just flies.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Oh, that's so beautiful, the way you've said
that Jimmy just attracts joy,and he feeds people joy too.
I think that's what's soprecious about him.
Now, what are your thoughts onthe idea that reading fiction
helps develop empathy?
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I think it's the whole point.
There's the whole point.
I don't think I could sit andmake up stories all day long,
and what would be the point,except just to entertain myself
when I and even then, even ifI'm entertaining myself, there's
a.
There has to be a purpose to it.
There has to be a function.
(19:16):
It should change you.
Like I write historical fiction,I grew up in the 80s.
I, you know, I don't knowanything except what I read or
what I hear from other peopleabout a time that I did not live
through myself, and I know thatI'm going to get things wrong,
(19:39):
but I hope that when you writeor when you read, it changes you
.
So by the time you're at theend of the work, you may not see
things the same way as you sawthem when you set out reading it
or writing it or listening toit, and I think that it opens
the world in ways that you don'texpect.
(20:00):
You find that you have thingsin common with people that you
never dreamed you would have incommon good and bad and it makes
you reconsider the world.
It makes you.
I think a story is like theriver in this book, where there
are.
There's a spot in the riverthere between Cumberland and the
mainland where the river runsboth ways, like are.
There's a spot in the riverthere between Cumberland and the
mainland where the river runsboth ways, like it does in a
(20:22):
salt creek, and they call it thedividings, and I think people
are human beings, are creatureswho tell stories.
We're it.
We're the only ones we exist.
We live in a fixed point, butwe have the capacity, from that
fixed point, to reflect on thepast or dream about the future,
(20:46):
and we do it all at the sametime, and that's a story.
That's how a story connects us,it's how a story travels, and I
think that is what I wanted towrite about.
That's empathy.
That's what creates empathy,that we can look at all of it at
once and see ourselves and oneanother.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yes, and feel the way someone else feels.
Let's talk about books.
What are you currently reading?
Speaker 2 (21:11):
I am right now reading Northwoods by Daniel
Mason.
Yeah, I've been waiting.
It's been sitting here foreverin my office and I have a friend
who kept saying you've got toread this, you've got to read
this and it is fantastic.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yes, that one's on my list too.
I don't know about you, butit's so difficult.
You have a pile of books toread stacks beside my bed,
stacks in my bookcases, stacksbeside my desk but every now and
again at the weekends I justgrab a book that I've wanted to
read for a long time and sneakit in.
It's kind of fun, I know,before we go.
(21:52):
I was just wondering if there'sanything you'd like to talk
about regarding the TinderboxWriters Workshop that you
created.
Did you keep it afloat duringCOVID?
Speaker 2 (21:59):
So during the time between writing my last book,
which was the Lost Book ofEleanor Dare, which was a huge
historical fiction and I didn'tsit out to write historical
fiction, so I sort of stumbledinto it and had to learn the
ropes.
It took me many years and then,while it was on sub to
(22:19):
hopefully find a home with aneditor which thankfully it did I
wasn't sure what I wanted towrite next.
It took me a while to writethat book and it was very hard
to sort of get started withsomething new.
And I decided during that timethat I didn't know how to do a
whole lot, but I knew how toopen up space and I could sit
(22:39):
and listen to people and wecould tell stories.
And I kept hearing women saythey weren't creative, or I used
to be creative and not creativenow, or I just I don't have
time or I just feel so drainedall the things.
And I would hear it while I waswalking through the grocery
store.
I would hear it at school withmy kids and my kids are mostly
big and grown now, but at thattime I was sort of in the thick
(23:02):
of it.
So I was hearing it a lot frommoms, but also older women that
I knew, and so I rented a spaceand sat down and started
teaching some creative writingand creative skills.
And women came they came from Idon't know where and we would
sit for about six weeks and dothese classes and they would
(23:25):
write, they would paint, theymade quilts, they made cookbooks
.
It was you know, it ran thegamut what they were doing with
anything creative in their lives.
They were creating, they weremaking, and then it became a
retreat.
For a little while I was doingretreats out on Sullivan's
Island in South Carolina Twice ayear.
(23:46):
We were doing this and it wasfantastic.
And then COVID, and so Iactually COVID was not all bad
for me because I wrote anotherbook and you know I'm publishing
.
So I have not been back to theworkshops in the six weeks
format that I had or theretreats, but I'm kind of
(24:08):
revisiting it and I've done someonline teaching and I'm hoping
that I'll get back to doing thatin some form, because it was
great for me too.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
I love what you just said, then, about being great
for you too.
I think as a teacher and astudent whichever one you are
there is a give and take and alearning between both.
You might be a teacher, butyou're still learning through
something that you hear fromyour student.
I miss that about teaching too.
Kimberly, it's been lovelychatting with you, and I
(24:38):
thoroughly enjoyed the FabledEarth.
It's a beautiful, beautifulstory.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Thank you so much.
This was lovely.
It's fun having your accent andmy accent back and forth.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Yeah, and you know what?
I never think I have an accentuntil I hear someone like you
speak, and then I go oh yeah, Iguess we both have an accent.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
I know.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
I do love your accent .
Speaker 2 (25:02):
I tried in college to get rid of it.
We moved and lived in Seattlefor four years and I was
teaching kids.
I was a reading specialist fora short period and I was
teaching reading and theirparents would come in and say
you should hear my kids soundout their bowels.
They all sounded like me.
I just gave up.
(25:26):
This is it.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Well, I would love to hear those kids speaking now.
Kimberly, I love your accent.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
I think it's great and I love your book.
You take care.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate your time today.
Bye-bye.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
You've been listening to my conversation with author
Kimberly Brock about her newbook.
You've been listening to myconversation with author
Kimberly Brock about her newbook, the Fabled Earth.
To help the show reach morepeople, please share episodes
with friends and family and onsocial media, and remember to
subscribe and leave a reviewwherever you listen to this
podcast.
To find out more about theBookshop Podcast, go to
(25:59):
thebookshoppodcastcom and makesure to subscribe and leave a
review wherever you listen tothe show.
You can also follow me at MandyJackson Beverly on X, instagram
and Facebook and on YouTube atthe Bookshop Podcast.
If you have a favorite indiebookshop that you'd like to
suggest we have on the podcast,I'd love to hear from you via
(26:22):
the contact form atthebookshoppodcastcom.
The Bookshop Podcast is writtenand produced by me, mandy
Jackson-Beverly, theme musicprovided by Brian Beverly,
executive assistant to Mandy,adrian Ohtohan and graphic
design by Francis Barala.
Thanks for listening and I'llsee you next time.
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