INSPIRATION FOR DEAR HANK WILLIAMS Part Three

When my heart is breaking, please don't play me an upbeat tune. I want Hank Williams. No one can make me feel like they understand my pain like him. Before I started writing DEAR HANK WILLIAMS, I knew my main character, Tate, would experience some heartbreak, but I didn't know what exactly. That's kind of how writing in the early stages of a story goes for me. While driving down I-20, heading toward my grandfather's home, I only knew this--Tate's mother was going to be a Goree Girl (a singing group made up of women prisoners) and that she would live in a house across from a cemetery.

On that road trip I listened to songs from the Louisiana Hayride. The music stirred with my thoughts about what could possibly happen to Tate P. Ellerbee. Somehow I thought the Louisiana Hayride might play a part. When Williams' Lovesick Blues came on, an idea for my story was starting to form. Tate was going to choose Hank Williams for her pen-pal. The letters would unfold her story.

What I didn't realize then, but learned later, through research, was that Hank Williams became famous during his time in Louisiana. Paralleling Tate's story with Williams' climb to national recognition, gave me a timeframe for my book. Not to mention, that his songs fit with Tate's own life soundtrack. At one point she writes in a letter to him, "I guess that's how we're different. I can't sing because my heart is breaking and you sing because yours is." 

THE INSPIRATION FOR DEAR HANK WILLIAMS Part Two

Cemeteries have never been eerie places to me. As a child, I loved going on cemetery walks with my grandfather. He knew everyone or about everyone buried there. Each headstone meant a story. So in an odd way, cemeteries represented life more than death.

A few years ago I visited my grandparents' graves in Butter Cemetery.  When I was leaving, I looked up across the road at Pat Tarpley's house and wondered, What would it be like to live across from a cemetery? 

Driving away, I knew one day I'd learn the answer to that question. What I didn't realize then was that answer would merge with the Goree Girls and help form Tate P. Ellerbee's story. There was one more important seed of inspiration that would help sprout this tale. His name was Mr. Hank Williams. I'll tell you about that next week.

THE INSPIRATION FOR DEAR HANK WILLIAMS Part One

Most people would probably assume the original inspiration for a book called Dear Hank Williams would be tied to country music. And they'd be right, but the first seed for my story wasn't the famous singer/songwriter from Alabama. Even though I was a Hank Williams fan, I didn't think of the role he would play in the book until much later. The country music angle came from the Goree All-Girl String Band.

In 2003, I read an article by Skip Hollandsworth in Texas Monthly Magazine. "O Sister Where Art Thou?" told the story of a group of women prisoners from Goree Prison Unit in Huntsville Texas who formed a band. They sang at the prison rodeo and at the warden's home. Their radio performances caused their fan base to grow. Even so, most of the women didn't pursue a musical career after they did their time. 

After reading Hollandsworth's article, I filed it away, hoping some story would surface one day. Right off, I thought it would be interesting to write about a character with a mother who becomes a Goree Girl, but that's just a situation. I didn't have a story until two other bits of inspiration joined in and gave me what would eventually become Dear Hank Williams. I'll tell you about one of those in my next post.