Exclusive Interview with Rachel Hauck

WoF: Tell us a little about yourself. You haven't always worked as a writer, have you?

RACHEL: No, I haven't. I worked in the corporate world for 17 years. I was a software trainer back in the days when nobody knew what a PC was. (I don't want to say too much more―that will date me.) I ended up being a project manager and managing all the people who went on the road.

That opportunity gave me one of my heart's desires, which was to travel. Sometimes you don't know that you have a stupid heart's desire until you get into it, then you go "What the heck?" I really did want to travel, I loved it, but once I got into it . . . it's different when you travel for work. I was gone 70% of the time. In hindsight it was a really great place to be because a lot of times it was just me and God. It was a very hard but really good time in my life.

From there I started migrating towards writing because that was something I always wanted to do. I woke up one day and said, "Well, you better start trying or it's going to be too late."

WoF: How do you begin a book? Are you a plotter/planner or more of a seat-of-your-pants writer?

RACHEL: I'm what they would call "both." I definitely come up with an idea. Like with Caroline, I originally wanted to have a cooking show host who couldn't cook. (I'm writing that book now, actually.) I try to think about what kind of character, what kind of story am I going to tell? Can I describe the story to you in a single sentence or two? "Low-country girl inherits a broken-down café" was my idea.

I normally come up with a broad-range story idea. Then I start thinking about who's the character who's going to carry this idea. What is going to be her journey? I kind of plot the beginning, the opening thing that launches her on her journey. For Caroline it was that she found out she owned this café. Then I had to figure out what's going to be her dark moment in the midst of this. What's going to cause her to face her own values and choose? Then I come up with some kind of happily-ever-after ending or some kind of ending that fits the story. I have to have what I call the three large stepping stones: what's my launch, what's my big middle (my dark moment),  and then what's my happy ending. Once I get those in place I kind of have a feel for the story and I can start putting the pieces in between.

WoF: We'd love to plop in a booth at the Frogmore Café and order the special. It's so much more than the setting of the book—it's really a character in itself, isn't it?

RACHEL: Definitely. When we have characters in our lives, they force us to recognize things about ourselves. They force us to make decisions that we may not normally make. The Café definitely did that for Caroline. It forced her to make decisions and look at her life in a way she had never looked at it before.

WoF: Many of us can relate to Caroline's constant struggle of trying to do what's best for ourselves while also doing what's best for others. Do you have any advice to share for those in that situation?

RACHEL: I actually had to interview somebody who struggled with that because—I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing—that's not an issue with me. I definitely want to help people, but I have learned to say no.

What they have to learn is how do I use my gift while also saying "no" and putting up boundaries? For some people that's going to come naturally. Once you start to say no, I think you get in the rhythm of it. My advice would be either learn how to do it on your own or invite people you trust into your life who will remind you it's OK to say no sometimes and not overextend yourself. I think Hazel was that character for Caroline; she was always saying, "Hey, sometimes you've got to look out for you."

WoF: Given today's moral climate, it was fairly daring of you to address Caroline's struggle over whether or not to let J.D. "sleep over." Was that a difficult subject to tackle?

RACHEL: It must have been because I didn't tackle it in the first pass! After I submitted the book and got input from my editors, I realized I was not broaching that subject. As Caroline was a new Christian and obviously an adult woman with someone who was being passionate about her, it just didn't seem real to me that she would not be tempted. That's OK, to be tempted, it's what we do with the temptation that is ultimately what we are accountable for before God.

That is actually my favorite scene. I loved how it came out, how she handled it. Once I went there, it was not difficult at all. I felt it was the right place to go with her, to have a genuine character. There are so many women who struggle with this, especially in today's moral climate where Caroline had two friends, one saying "Don't do it, you'll regret it." and the other one saying "Hey, you're an adult woman. Live your life." So I actually was very relieved when I went there; it felt that I reached a depth of the book that I hadn't gotten to before.
 
WoF: "Operation Wedding Day" is quite the battle plan for finding a mate. Did you come up with that yourself or do you know someone who actually put it into action?

RACHEL: I just made it up! I was like, what can this crazy girl do? I figured that Elle was the comic relief in this book and she seems so over the top and that seemed like a completely over the top thing for someone to do. Elle was the perfect person to carry it off. In some ways, that's what you want in a character. You want them to be a little larger than life, where you're going, oooh, I would never do that but that's so funny! Or I wish I could do that.

WoF: When the book ends, we don't necessarily get the feeling Caroline's story is over. Will we see more of her in the future?

RACHEL: You see her in Love Starts with Elle, her story kind of ties up there. [My new book] is also set back in Beaufort, so we're going to see more of Caroline through Joy's eyes.

SPOILER ALERT! NEXT PARAGRAPH REVEALS ENDING.

I have had people say, "I love the ending because it wasn't typical" and I've had people say "What happens?" I felt like if she married Mitch, she never would have gone out to find what God had for her. I felt like the ending was right for Caroline. It wasn't right for a standard romance novel, but it didn't seem right for her to say yes to Mitch. I originally had her say yes and they were going to get married, and I thought, no, Caroline really needs to discover God and life on her own, without this man beside her who has really done her wrong over the years. It didn't feel right to have her get married and stay in Beaufort.

SPOILER OVER—IT'S SAFE TO READ FROM HERE DOWN.

WoF: So what you're working on next is Dining With Joy?

RACHEL: Yes. It's about the cooking show host who can't cook. It's really going to be fun. It's going to be set in Beaufort, South Carolina. So again, her friends are going to be—although I haven't introduced her yet—Elle and Caroline, so she'll be part of that pack. I've tried over the years to figure out how to weave in Beaufort's film industry. Forrest Gump was filmed there, Prince of Tides was filmed there, a Dennis Quaid/Julia Roberts movie was filmed there. I thought it would be fun to have a cooking show filmed there.

WoF: Is it easier to set a story in a real town?

RACHEL: That's a good question. It can be easy because you already have street names and places. You don't have to be a city planner. You can do some fictionalized things―obviously, there's no Frogmore Café on that corner, there's a house there―but when Beaufortians read it they're going to know if I've done my homework or not.

If you're making up a city, you are mimicking something and you have to create all of the restaurants, all of the businesses, all of the streets. You have to create your own visual on top of the visual you're creating for the characters. It can be a little bit tiresome, but then you can do whatever you want. But even a fictional town has to have the feel of a town set in that state. So if I made up a small town in South Carolina on the water, it would have to have the same feel.

WoF: Is there anything else you'd like to tell our readers?

RACHEL: I always like to remind people that God has a destiny for them. I think a lot of people don't feel completely in the place God has for them. It's a subtle theme in most of my books: God has a destiny for you. Be confident that He desires it more for you than you do for yourself.

And you're never too old. Our church secretary read Caroline and said, "At the end I set a timer and allowed myself to feel sorry for myself for 15 minutes." I'm like, "Why?!" She said, "Because I realized I had missed opportunities." I said to her, "Esther, you're not dead yet, you're only fifty-something." God always has something for you. Be confident in that. You can be Caroline at some stage in your life no matter if you're 20 or if you're 50. There's still something God has for you.