Originally published in WORD vol 15, no 2, Mar / Apr 2004.

Portrait of a writer: Trudy Morgan-Cole

Don’t be a perfectionist!” If I learned anything from my latest interviewee, Trudy Morgan-Cole, it was that. Where I waste days just getting started on an article, looking for that right first line (if such a thing exists), Trudy’s freelance rule #2 is: “Write quickly! And be able to give up ownership.”

Photograph of Trudy Morgan Cole

Trudy is the ultimate multi-tasker. A few of her accomplishments are freelance book editor for Creative Publishers (specializing in non-fiction novels), managing editor for Write On!, short story author (Tickle-Ace, Antigonish Review), and TV script writer for "Windows of Hope" on Vision TV. “I make my living by writing.” Freelancing rule #3: “Be willing to write practically anything.”

With ten books to her credit and an 11th due out next year, Trudy can trace her writing career back to childhood – a poem, published when she was nine. However, poetry is about the only form of writing she doesn’t do currently.

While working on her second masters, Trudy described herself “in a lot of ways [as] a conventional person.” Maybe, but I see a highly disciplined, energetic, very personable young woman operating at about the same speed as a whirling dervish.

When the Review and Herald Publishing Company sponsored a book-writing contest, Trudy entered All My Love, Kate. She won and Kate was published in 1986, thus establishing a relationship with the Review and Herald that has spanned across ten books, including the Best Friends series (1992-1995) and Esther: A Story of Courage (2003).

“It was an amazing experience to have a book published before you’re twenty. It affirmed me. I could say I was a writer.

“Contests are wonderful! I won my first at age 12 or 13 for an essay.” Trudy is a strong believer in competitions, having won in TickleAce (historical fiction), the Atlantic Writing Competition, the HR Percy unpublished First Novel Award, the Newfoundland Arts and Letters Competition, etc. Trudy admits to being “moderately creative.”

Yet all this is like the preparatory phase of a very amazing writer whose great love is historical fiction. Indeed, her talent and care shine through in her two latest books (the second to be published in 2005 by Penguin Books), each about a very different Esther. In Esther: A Story of Courage Trudy fills out the slim biblical narrative. The Esther that emerges from her pen is one of a wife pulled in different directions, a queen, and momentarily, a mother:

: "Late, very late that night, Xerxes the Great, King of Kings, fell asleep across
the bed of Esther, his wife...She thought he was sleeping until he turned toward
her and said, ‘I killed him with my own sword, you know. By my own hand. My
brother. It happens all the time in royal houses, but I’ve never done it before.
My own brother.’ He turned his face away, and she felt rather than saw his tears.

...Within an hour after he departed, Esther began to bleed. Ayana sent for Hutossa
the midwife, who stayed by her through that day and the night that followed, until
it was all over. …till the baby who had so briefly quickened to life was gone from
her body, gone from this world, gone to whatever gods there were." (p. 167,8)

Her second “Esther” book takes a right turn as Trudy veers from the familiar Christian world she has written about many times into the secular affairs of Esther Johnson, spotlighting the “violent relationship” between Esther and Jonathan Swift. This is also her first book to be published by a prominent publisher.

“I have really enjoyed the writing I have done and I really enjoy working in this field, but now it’s like going from a regional to a wider market. There’s a great degree of external validation that comes with a big mainstream publication. I think every writer wants a larger audience, a larger market. As a Christian writer writing for a Christian publisher, you’re somewhat limited in what you can say and who you can reach.”

Trudy had one last piece of advice before disappearing out the door. “If you’ve written a book and you want to get it published, get an agent. My book had been making the rounds for four years. I got an agent and two months later, I had a contract.”

Written by Annie Ferncase, local poet and WANL member / volunteer.

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