The Inspiration for The Mermaid Chair

The idea for The Mermaid Chair began one day quite unexpectedly. While talking with a friend about her trip to Cornwall, England, she casually mentioned that she’d seen a “mermaid chair” in a small church. She described it as a chair with a mermaid carved on its side which had been in the church for centuries though the reason seemed to be a mystery. Something about this riveted me. I knew right then and there that I would write a novel and it would be called The Mermaid Chair. I didn’t have a clue what it would be about– no characters, no story, nothing- only that the novel would contain this chair and the chair would be in a church.

I went around for a while after that with the image of a mermaid chair vividly planted in my mind: not like the actual chair in the Cornish church, rather a chair whose arms were formed by the carved bodies of two winged mermaids. It seems that most of my work starts that way- with a single compelling image with which my imagination begins to play in earnest. Then gradually the image begins to attract bits and pieces of story. It becomes something like a sprouting seed.