MISSION: Write a novel
MOMENT OF TRUTH: For Miller, of Flossmoor, poems come as naturally as breathing. They whisper to her in the car or while she’s making dinner, so her husband and three kids know not to throw away napkins, church programs, or any other scraps of paper with her scribbles on them.
Author friends of Miller’s saw potential novels in her poems, but she had doubts. Writing a book required planning, discipline. It was intimidating, where poetry was liberating. But a story idea came to her, and she had to see where it went.
BACKSTORY: Her inspiration was the helplessness and loss she felt one afternoon when her oldest daughter, then 9, disappeared for hours before turning up fine. “What if your child never returns?” wondered Miller, 43. “How do people find a way to continue living?” Those questions haunt the main character, Inez. An answer lies in the solace of a place called Schubert’s Woods, “where neither rules nor time exists.”
Miller, a real-estate lawyer and stay-at-home mom, spent 2 1/2 years writing “Schubert’s Woods.” She wrote after her other work was done and the kids were in bed. At 10 p.m., she would slip into her sunroom, light candles and turn on jazz, then sit down at her computer, emerging at 2 a.m. As she feared, writing the book wasn’t like writing poetry. “With poetry, I could say it and move on,” says Miller, winner of two Gwendolyn Brooks poetry slams. But once she got started, she had to see it through. “The people wanted me to finish telling their stories.”
OUTCOME: Miller finished “Schubert’s Woods” last summer and hired an editor, who advised her to “kill off” a lesser character. Miller hopes to see her book in a store someday but already is on to the next one.
PAYOFF: “‘Schubert’s Woods’ truly tells the story that’s in my heart.”
