New England Roots, a Texas Desk

My roots run deep in New England — that cool, reserved, salt-and-granite part of the country that teaches you to watch before you speak. I carry it with me even now, a long way from the coast.

I grew up in a small Texas town, waiting every year for the Neiman Marcus Christmas Book to arrive like it was a passport to somewhere glamorous and far away. That longing never really left me; it just learned to travel.

These days I write from Tyler, Texas. You might think a Texas desk would pull me away from a book set on the Amalfi Coast, but it does the opposite. Distance is good for a writer — the sun-drenched places get brighter when you describe them from somewhere quieter. The New England reserve and the Texas warmth both ended up in Pessa, which is more or less how she operates too.