Her debut novel has received acclaim from across the country since it was published last year, and now While the Sun Is Above Us has been shortlisted for four Saskatchewan Book Awards.
Lampman native Melanie Schnell's tale about two women in Sudan struck a chord among readers as the characters of Adut and Sandra share a brief but profound meeting of chance amongst the backdrop of a bloody civil war.
The Mercury spoke with Schnell over the phone from her home in Regina.
She came up with the idea for the book after reading a Maclean's article in 2000 and started writing her story. Very quickly she realized it wasn't the kind of story she could write without actually seeing Sudan and learning first hand what life is like for the women in that country.
She went there in 2003 and again in 2005 to do background research for her novel.
"I went there with the sole purpose of researching for my novel," said Schnell. "I also had the bright idea of making a documentary when I was there, so the first time I went I brought a video camera in with me and it broke very soon after my arrival, so that didn't work out."
Video camera or not, she was determined to learn and speak to locals in order to bring the world and characters of her novel to life.
"It really was the gods telling me that I just was supposed to be researching for my story and nothing else," she said with a laugh.
"I'm just really grateful that people are resonating with it," she added. "When you have a story and characters come to you, and you do your very best to create this story so as best you can this idea, you just never know how people are going to respond."
She said she often hears people connect with Adut, the strong Sudanese woman.
"She is very, very strong, and I've heard from people that she stays with them long after they've closed the pages of the book," said Schnell.
She said what both men and women connect with is the story of women in war.
"It isn't a dominant part of the pop cultural narrative. We also heard about the loss of boys. We never heard about the loss of girls, even though they did exist. I think there is an acknowledgement of it being a woman's story. That hadn't really been heard from a lot."
Schnell said the premise of telling a woman's war story grew organically in the creative process.
"I wanted to hear from the women when I went there. I was very interested in the women's stories. Most of them couldn't speak English. They had been too busy running in the war for decades to be educated. The brunt of their society's responsibilities fell on them. They did much of the work."
Schnell said Sudan's women bore many children, built houses, harvested and provided food for their families. They didn't really have a lot of time for Schnell, she said, when she first arrived.
"Eventually, with time and a bit of persistence, I got to know several of them," she said, largely through the help of a translator. "But even when my translator wasn't there, I was able to communicate with them. I learned to communicate with them in different ways and grew closer to them."
She said it was because of her personal desire and interest in the lives of these women that she looked at them with such adoration and admiration.
"They were keeping their societies together, but they were also hidden. That desire of mine seeped into the book."
Schnell said she didn't realize it was the story about women in war until her thesis adviser, Lisa Moore, told her about that angle.
"I was working on it on such a deep level throughout that it's hard to step back and look at it and see these things until after people tell you, which seems strange," she said. "You can't really step back until it's published. Even months after it's published, I finally I feel like I'm able to step back a bit more from it."
Because of the success of the novel, she has had lots of conversations, and interviews, about her work. That has given her lots of time for reflection on the story and she said she learns something new with each conversation.
The 20th annual Saskatchewan Book Awards will be held April 27 and Schnell's While the Sun Is Above Us is shortlisted for the Book of the Year, Fiction Award, First Book Award and Regina Book Award.
