Linda Howard

RWA Lifetime Achievement Award-Winning Suspense Author

It's not about Sarah. It's about Rome.

Julie Trelstad

Every now and then an old book will pop into my mind. At the recent Heart of Dixie Reader's Luncheon (Kristan Higgins will be our speaker next year! So excited!) I was talking -- with someone I won't name because she hasn't given me permission -- about, of all books, Sarah's Child. I think that book is thirty years old, but people still ask me about it. It's one of those polarizing books that people either love or hate. She said she loved Rome Matthews, and again, he's very polarizing. Most people get so angry at him they can't stand it. But you know what? I'll tell you what I told her: the book wasn't about Sarah. It was about Rome. It was Rome's book from start to finish, how a strong man would handle such extreme grief. He lost his entire family, his wife and children -- all of them. That he could function at all was a testimony to his strength, and he fought through the nightmare until he reached the point where he could love again. I don't know if I could be that strong. Sarah was there because she was the one person who, because of the history she had with his family whom she had loved too, could find a chink in his armor. If I didn't write it well enough that people understood the book was Rome's book, then dang, maybe I need to re-write it.