Read Short Excerpts from the Texas Panhandle — Once Upon A Time in the Texas Panhandle

My novels are about pain—pain as an obstacle to love. But here is the paradox: While it is true that pain is an obstacle to love, love is the only true remedy for pain.

My stories include many kinds of pain: physical as well as emotional; grief from loss of loved ones as well as self-hatred for causing grief by killing the loved ones of others; depression from PTSD as well as despair from alcoholism; and more. All of these pains are obstacles to love—obstacles to finding love, to falling in love, to staying in love and to giving love. But in each case, the only true remedy to the obstacle is love, which is paradoxical.

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Jan 15
Jan 15 Creating Fictional Towns For Your Books

Sara Stratton

being an author

For the novels in my series, Once Upon a Time in the Texas Panhandle, I invented a town named “Mackenzie,” after Col. Ranald S. Mackenzie. In retrospect, I think a better name would have been “Leetown,” after Gen. Robert E. Lee. Underlying my stories is the idea that in the decades after the American Civil War, bands of ex-Confederate soldiers and their families established new towns across the Texas Panhandle that would continue the values and ideals of the “Old South” and the “Southern Way of Life.”

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Jan 10
Jan 10 What Year Brings Back a Certain Memory For You? For Me, It's 1955

Sara Stratton

being an author

For many people, a particular year or series of years is always in the back of their minds. For me, the year 1955 always affects me. That was the year when my father died in a plane crash into the Sandia Mountains outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico.

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Jan 8
Jan 8 What is the C.S.A?

Sara Stratton

In my novels, I explore the ways in which the symbols and memories of the Old South have influenced me—to this day. How do I see people as a result of growing up when and where I did? How do I interpret American history? How to I see people who are not white like I am? Where do I stand on the issue of removing Confederate flags and Confederate statues from public places?

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Jan 6
Jan 6 WHY DO MY STORIES ALWAYS HAVE A HAPPY ENDING?

Sara Stratton

love story

My stories always have a happy ending. Why is that? Actually, they not only have a happy ending, but they always end, “and they lived happily ever after.” That is, there is no doubt that nothing will happen that will keep the two people in the romance from staying together the rest of their lives … and in love—no matter what!

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Jan 3
Jan 3 REMEMBER THE ALAMO/THE SOUTH SHALL RISE AGAIN

Sara Stratton

being an author

My novels come from my experience growing up in the Texas Panhandle in the 1940s, 50s, and early 60s. This was during and after World War II, during and after the Korean War, before the Civil Rights Movement, and before Vietnam.

When I was growing up, there were two underlying cultural influences in Texas: the Alamo and Appomattox—the memory of the War with Mexico, and the memory of the War Between the States (the American Civil War).