By Page H. Gifford
Correspondent
Sarah Henrik (writing as Sara Read) will discuss her contemporary romance novels on Sept. 3 at 7 p.m. at the Friends of the Library monthly meeting. She is the author of Johanna Porter is Not Sorry and Principles of Emotion—novels that bring a fresh and edgy perspective to romance and feature unconventional, vulnerable female protagonists on journeys of transformation and self-discovery.
In her debut, Johanna Porter is Not Sorry, focuses on a 40-something soccer mom who faces regrets over her shelved art career and finds her life transformed by a man from her past. Principles of Emotion centers on Dr. Meg Brightwood, a mathematical genius sidelined by academia, who reclaims her work and confidence with help from a man from her past.
Henrik grew up in Washington D.C. Before Henrik began writing fiction, she earned a degree in women’s studies from the University of California-Santa Cruz.
“I tried the nine-to-five life for about a nanosecond before moving to rural Virginia, in Nelson County to become a flute-maker’s apprentice and traditional fiddle player.” During those years Henrik co-founded the Blue Ridge Irish Music School (BRIMS) which is still in operation 25 years later. In 2007, she graduated from UVA with a master’s in nursing and has been a nurse for 15 years. She worked in labor and delivery, oncology, and as a professor at PVCC. She currently works as a nurse educator in nursing professional development at UVA Health.
“While I dabbled a fair amount in college and after, I started taking writing seriously about ten years ago, and have been balancing the two careers, plus being a mom of two (21 and 18),” she said. “ I have never done a formal degree in writing, but I’ve done just about everything else I could think of to learn how to do it well.”
“Funny thing is, I never intended to write a romance. I wrote the story I wanted to write, which I knew was love-story, and I was very interested in exploring the difference between conditional and unconditional love on a person’s life, choices, and happiness,” she said. Her publisher was familiar with the advantages of marketing it to romance readers since it has many of the elements of a romance.
“I’m a very genre-agnostic reader as well as writer, and I know that real romance readers know their stuff when it comes to the genre, unlike a writer like me who is just sort of looking in from the outside,” she said. “One thing I can say is that romance is coming very much into the mainstream of literature and I celebrate that. I also celebrate that romance as a genre is embracing love in all its forms.” Henrik’s short stories have been featured in The Missouri Review, Beloit Fiction Journal, and Zone 3 Press, and she has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
