Graham, Janice

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Graham, Janice

PERSONAL:

Children: Gabrielle. Education: University of Kansas, M.A.; attended the University of Southern California.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Witchita, KS.

CAREER:

Author, screenwriter. Worked as a salesperson, tour guide, and for an investment banking firm, all in Paris, France, 1972-76; worked for United Press International, Athens, Greece, 1976; on a kibbutz in Israel, 1976; as a nanny at the Australian Embassy, Paris, 1981; and as a teacher of French and English in the Wichita, KS, public school system, 1990s.

WRITINGS:

Until September (screenplay), Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc., 1984.

Firebird (novel), G.P. Putnam's Sons (New York, NY), 1998.

Sarah's Window (novel), G.P. Putnam's Sons (New York, NY), 2001.

The Tailor's Daughter (novel), St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

Janice Graham lived and worked in France, Greece, Turkey, and Israel after receiving a degree in French, then came home to the United States to study film in Los Angeles. She then returned to Paris, where she worked and concentrated on writing screenplays and traveled back and forth between Los Angeles and Paris for ten years. In 1991, Graham relocated with her young daughter to Wichita, Kansas, where five generations of her father's family had been born and raised. She taught public school there and explored the surrounding area. Her first novel, Firebird, is set in the Flint Hills, one of their favorite destinations. Graham told the BookBrowse Web site that "on these trips with my daughter, I found a depth and mystery to the region that I hadn't found anywhere else in Kansas, and I also discovered the fascinating history of Cottonwood Falls.

Graham originally wrote Firebird as a screenplay, but said that "when it was done, I realized that there was so much more there…. With Firebird I was inspired by two longings. One, to resolve the universal story of a love triangle in a way in which everyone's needs are fulfilled. And the other stems from a fear I have of what would happen to my daughter if I died. This is a fear many single parents have." Putnam bought world rights to Firebird and two more books from Graham.

In reviewing Firebird, a Publishers Weekly writer called Graham "a compelling new commercial voice" who has "an engaging narrative style." A Kirkus Reviews contributor felt that Graham "crosses lust with New Age longings in a hybrid romance." One of the main characters, Ethan Brown, is a Yale-educated, Wordsworth-loving intellectual and the only attorney in Cottonwood Falls, Kansas. Katie Ann Mackey, his girlfriend of many years, is the daughter of a cattleman who is the largest landholder in the area. Ethan, whose singular wish is to eventually expand his own holdings and ranch alongside Katie Ann's father, is caught off guard when Annette Zeldin comes to town for her mother's funeral. Annette has been living in Paris and is a sophisticated and worldly concert violinist. The two fall wildly in love, but an unplanned-for circumstance results in Ethan's marriage to Katie Ann. In an unusual plot twist, a tragic fire brings a final resolution.

Library Journal contributor Melanie C. Duncan called Firebird "a truly wonderful, heart wrenching tale that will resonate in the memory long after hearing it." A reviewer for People noted that Putnam promoted Graham as the next Nicholas Evans (author of The Horse Whisperer) and felt that Graham's one-million-dollar publishing deal "was money well spent."

In reviewing Graham's second novel, Sarah's Window, for the BookBrowser Web site, Harriet Klausner called it "a mainstream relationship drama filled with pathos, pain, and tragedy." Sarah Bryden returns to Bazaar, a tiny town in the Flint Hills, when her grandfather loses his leg in a quarry accident. The old man had continued working there to pay for Sarah's education in Paris, and now she must help care for him. Sarah works as a waitress and tutor while continuing to paint and recover from an affair and the loss of her stillborn child. History teacher Billy Moon is a comfortable suitor, but Sarah's life is forever disrupted when genius mathematician John Wilde and his wealthy wife Susan move to town. Susan has returned to care for her aging mother, John is on leave from Berkeley, and they have just adopted a son, Will, a sickly and difficult child. Sarah and John are drawn to each other, but more relevant to the story, Sarah develops a closer relationship to Will than Susan is able to manage. A number of disasters bring the story to its conclusion.

A Kirkus Reviews contributor felt the story was "well enough executed, but a victim of emotional excess." Writing for Booklist, Carolyn Kubisz remarked: "This love story is charged with emotion and filled with poetic detail." "Women readers especially will enjoy this poignant, beautifully written story," said Ellen R. Cohen in Library Journal.

Graham's next novel, The Tailor's Daughter, is set in Victorian London, and tells the story of Veda, the beautiful daughter of a fashionable tailor. Veda's charm and connections enable her to hope for a favorable husband, until an illness renders her deaf and her patroness dies under mysterious circumstances. Once recovered, Veda sets out on a new path, dressing as a fashionable gentleman and, under this cover, becoming a dresser (or stylist) for members of high society. Ellen Loughran, writing for Booklist noted what she called an "unrealistically pat resolution," but praised the book's "delicious details of high society and star-crossed love." A contributor for Kirkus Reviews wrote of Graham that "the sheer generosity of her invention, and her unfailing ability to create believable characters of every ilk, from the tepid to the grotesque, are nothing short of stunning."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, March 15, 1998, Donna Seaman, review of Firebird, p. 1179; October 15, 2001, Carolyn Kubisz, review of Sarah's Window, p. 382; September 15, 2006, Ellen Loughran, review of The Tailor's Daughter, p. 27.

Books, December 25, 1998, review of Firebird, p. 6.

Kirkus Reviews, May 15, 1998, review of Firebird, p. 678; September 1, 2001, review of Sarah's Window, p. 1234; January 1, 2006, review of The Tailor's Daughter, p. 8.

Library Journal, October 1, 1999, Melanie C. Duncan, review of Firebird, p. 149; October 1, 2001, Ellen R. Cohen, review of Sarah's Window, p. 140.

People, July 20, 1998, review of Firebird, p. 42.

Publishers Weekly, September 29, 1997, Judy Quinn, "Putnam's Hail and Farewell; House Invests $1 Mil in New Novelist Graham," p. 19; April 27, 1998, review of Firebird, p. 42; September 17, 2001, review of Sarah's Window, p. 55; August 7, 2006, review of The Tailor's Daughter, p. 34.