Mohr Library Hosts Author Ann Hood

Writer Ann Hood of Providence, author of the best-sellers The Knitting Circle and The Red Thread, gave a reading and met with about a dozen patrons at on Jan. 10.

Hood described her journey back to writing after the death of her five-year-old daughter, Grace, in 2005, which became the basis for the fictional Knitting Circle.

For about two years, she said, "there was such a long time where I could barely put my pants on — I couldn't have helped others."

A published author since 1987, Hood explained that Grace's death left her unable to write at first. In time, though, she was able to return to her craft.

"One of the real lessons of grief and loss is that there's no rule book for it, and everybody's journey is different," Hood said, recalling how the mother of one of Grace's classmates called her and explained that her daughter had recently died. "I said, 'Come over right now,' and that was the first step in being able to reach out to someone else. If that call had come even a month before, I don't know that I would have had the emotional reserve to do it."

And while she also wrote a memoir about her experience losing her child, Hood infused The Knitting Circle with several fictional elements — like the disintegration of main character Mary Baxter's marriage.

"The secret is — and I think most writers will say the same thing — is that you're not telling your story, you're not reporting facts," Hood explained. "You're trying to find the emotional truth of the situation, and to do that, you have to peel away the layers of yourself, and that means starting with 'what if?'"

After going through the process of imagining circumstances for Mary — including her participation in a knitting circle — Hood said "I had fiction, but at the heart of it was a story of coping with loss, and in order to see it objectively, you have to take those steps back."

Hood also took a few minutes to read an excerpt from her 2010 novel, The Red Thread, in which main character Maya Lange opens an adoption agency in China — another example where Hood built a fictional story on her own experience, as she and her husband adopted their daughter, Annabelle, from China in 2005.

Told from the perspective of the six families who adopt — and the six Chinese women who must give up their daughters for adoption in spite of the cultural and legal barriers in their country — The Red Thread has a raw, you-are-there tone and focus that provides striking insights (from an American perspective) into the Chinese "one child" policy.

Hood's visit also included news about the future — the movie option for The Knitting Circle was recently picked up, and the first in a series of historical fiction books called The Treasure Chest got a positive review in the New York Times Review — though since the review won't be published until this weekend, Hood told the group she couldn't say more about it.

After the reading, Hood answered questions from the group and signed several books for attendees.

Kevin Broccoli, the library's fiction specialist, said Hood's visit is an example of the programs he hopes to continue with other authors.

"I would live to get more [authors] in — it is something we're going to strive for and do more and more," explained Broccoli, who performs with Hood's son at Second Story Theater, and has had some of his manuscripts read by Hood. "We were lucky enough this time for everything to line up — she's very, very gracious to come in and do this for us."