YORKTON — Former Yorkton resident Pattie Janzen is continuing with her latest novel series.
Janzen, who pens a column that appears regularly in The Marketplace, is about to release You are Artemus, which is the sequel to You are Amadeus and the second book in a trilogy. She describes the upcoming book as literary fiction that is meant to make people think about current issues.
“It’s about a blind woman who lives beside a man who is mysterious and has a thick wall up,” Janzen said in an interview with SaskToday. “It’s a lot more than that, but that’s the basic main characters.”
Janzen said the book also delves into such themes as the unconditional love of God and temptation, as the blind woman, Charlotte, uses her singing abilities to express her faith.
“The biggest message is that He will see you through the temptation and help you to the other side, and there’s a big parallel in the second book about promiscuous living versus the marriage covenant and the details of each. It’s a very different book than I’ve written before.”
Key characters from You are Amadeus also show up in the second novel. There are many characters, and Janzen said the Artemus novel is like a family drama with many perspectives on the issues. There are people who are spiritually challenged and others with physical issues, and they are human beings who make mistakes, but are ultimately forgiven, because as Janzen says, “that is what God offers us”.
When she first started working on Amadeus, she didn’t know the story would grow into three. But by the time she was finished the first novel she knew she needed more than one novel.
“I seriously start with one idea and write. I pray a lot, and I write,” said Janzen.
When she started writing the Charlotte character, Janzen spent a day with a blindfold so she could understand Charlotte’s perspective. She showered, ate and walked around blindfolded. It was a really hard experience, she said.
She recalls a man called her last summer, before she finished the Amadeus book. The man was blinded after battling cancer, and he asked her a lot about writing. Since that time, Janzen has been helping him put his story together, and he has been a great source of information about blindness.
“His road has been tough, but he is willing to share anything about [blindness] … and he’s been an encouragement to me more than I’ve been to him. When he read Amadeus, he phoned me, actually, and he said ‘Pattie, you know what it’s like to be blind,’” said Janzen.
Janzen, who has a background as a health-care worker, wrote a trilogy during the COVID-19 pandemic about a nurse. She believes this latest trilogy is “more controversial” than her first one, so people had many opinions.
“Many of the readers that I talked have said this is so thought provoking, that ‘I had never thought of this or this’, which is great to hear, and we don’t all agree on everything, but that’s OK,” she said. "We can talk about it.
“I think it’s opened some doors. And Artemus is different, because it touches on things that are a little more risqué with people that are Christians. I’m pretty black and white about that and up front, that it might be a more difficult novel to read, but it sends a strong message.”
Janzen is continuing to work on the third book in the series. It’s still pretty raw, she said, and it probably won’t be out until next spring.
You are Artemus will be available on Amazon on Oct. 7. The e-book will be on Kobo for preorder. Janzen said it will be available for wider release than Amadeus, as Janzen said she continues to learn about self-publishing.
The official launch and book signing will be at E.K.K Handmade Store and Gift Shop Oct. 11 at 1 p.m.
