NEW BOOK ON THE HORIZON - by Mary Louise Sanchez

There are so many new middle grade historical fiction novels being published. It just so happens that my book, The Wind Called My Name will be one of them on the horizon. Thank you to Jennifer Bohnhoff for giving her time slot on this blog to promote my book!

I never thought about it until I wrote this post, but the beautiful book cover, illustrated by the Pura Belpre award illustrator Raul Colon, shows my protagonist, Margarita, looking towards the horizon and what might lie ahead of her.

My book's birth is scheduled for October 30, 2018 after we had false labor pains on September 18 and October 16 because of a paper shortage. 

As a writer of historical fiction, I love the research portion of writing a book because you learn so many interesting things. Of course not all the research ends up on the final pages. I thought you might enjoy a peek into my research that did end up on the page.

Near the beginning of the book, the Sandoval family is in the eldest brother's car named Collette (named for movie star Collette Coburn) as they leave their ancestral New Mexico home and head to Wyoming to join Papa. It's 1934 and he and Alberto have been fortunate to find work on the Union Pacific railroad. They've been working for a year now, separated from the family. 

p. 8  " We continued north into Colorado, passing Trinidad, Pueblo, Colorado Springs, and Denver. the towns' names changed from Spanish to English. Sometimes we talked and sometimes we slept or sang. Alberto tried to teach us a song called "I've Been Working on the Railroad," and he sang one called "Beyond the Blue Horizon," which he said he heard on the radio." 

I remember listening to this song in my youth. Perhaps I heard it on the Lawrence Welk Show. This television show certainly enlarged my musical history knowledge.

 In my research for songs from the 1930s, I discovered this tune was made popular by Jeanette MacDonald and would have most likely still be played on the radio in 1934. The song also became popular in recent times. I played the song for our granddaughter, Emily, and asked if she had heard it since I had recently heard a new arrangement of the song on YouTube. She hadn't heard the song, but I said I was going to put the song in the story in homage to her 2018 graduation from Horizon High School. My editor, Cheryl Klein, suggested I cut the reference, but I explained that Alberto might have tried to show how savvy he was with pop culture of the times and might have sung it to his family. The reference to the song stayed in the story! 

I hope you'll listen to this beautiful new arrangement of the song which I found on YouTube, and also pick up a copy of my book and read it. I'd love to read your comments about my book on Goodreads or Amazon. 

"Beyond the Blue Horizon"