Author Interview: James D Witmer
... on The Big Old Garden series that was inspired by Havenwood!
“Whether I'm drinking tea and journaling, watching birds, or working, time in the garden soothes my mind and feeds my imagination.
Sometimes it works directly, when I see plants or wildlife doing something that has to be shared in story.
Other times it's personal and indirect…”
🌿 James D. Witmer, on how gardening feeds his creativity
Stories inspired by Havenwood
It is a joy today to share with you all a bit more about our family life at Havenwood, and in particular how it has spilled out on to the pages of a delightful series of books for readers young and old who love a good nature tale.
is a children's author whose books include A Year in the Big Old Garden, Beside the Pond, The Strange New Dog, and A Nose for Trouble, and serves as managing editor for StoryWarren.com. He is also my beloved husband of 22 years, and my creative and practical partner in the work of building of our one-acre garden.As a boy, James kind of wanted to be Batman, but he would have settled for being a detective, a ranch-town sheriff, or a deep-woods park ranger. This is probably due to his love of outdoor adventure stories by Wilson Rawls, Jim Kjelgaard, and Louis L’Amour (and many others), and it eventually led him to a BA in English literature.
James counts reading, bird-watching, and, as you may have guessed, gardening as his hobbies.
I’m very pleased to have James here today to talk about how gardening feeds his creativity, which animals he has written into our garden via his stories, and which stories come next in his Big Old Garden series.
Welcome, James!
Julie: Tell us a bit about you, where you live, what you write and do
James: I live in a big old house, in a big old garden, an hour south of the Great Lake Erie, and an hour north of where the three great rivers converge in Pittsburgh. I am very lucky to live there with my brilliant wife (that’s you), three terrific teenagers, and a pet rabbit.
I work in online marketing to pay the bills, and I write juvenile fiction because I can't NOT write stories. So far I've written two mystery stories about a family with as many pets as people (Allen Family Mysteries), and two Big Old Garden books, about the lives and adventures of backyard wildlife.
Julie: What inspired you to write your first Big Old Garden stories?
James: The first story, "The Happiest Gray Squirrel," came about when our children were much younger (and smaller). We were in the family van together, waiting for something or other, without books or audio-books. Out of necessity, I decided to try really old-fashioned entertainment and made up a rough version of the story on the spot. My childhood imagination was well mulched with Aesop's Fables, Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit stories, and Thornton Burgess' wildlife stories. Our own garden was small, young, and already well-populated with birds and squirrels, so that was the seed from which The Big Old Garden stories sprouted.
Julie: How does gardening impact your creative storytelling?
James: Given the seemingly-endless demands of life, gardening is the best excuse for spending extended time in the garden! Whether I'm drinking tea and journaling, watching birds, or working, time in the garden soothes my mind and feeds my imagination. Sometimes it works directly, when I see plants or wildlife doing something that has to be shared in story. Other times it's personal and indirect.
I solved my latest case of writer's block by putting on ear protection and walking behind the mower back and forth across our rectangular lawn for an hour or so. Mulling over a story while surrounded by beauty and engaged in simple, repetitive movement is a very different experience from powering through by main force. There is a time for both approaches, I think, but I felt energized when I was done mowing, my brain brimming with possibilities.
Julie: Which parts of gardening at Havenwood do you most enjoy?
James: I'm not ashamed to say that I love jobs where I get to use power tools--and if I'm learning to use a new power tool, so much the better. But I think my favorite job is weeding the Long Border.
This is partly because I love the concept of the Long Border, where much of the planting is inspired by the native damp prairie preserved a few miles from our house, at the Jennings Environmental Center. This habitat has a distinctive, wild-yet-familiar texture that I really enjoy.
The other reason is probably that the border is really... well, long. Once I've decided that my Saturday will be spent in the Long Border, I don't have to make any other decisions--that's what I'll be doing all day. I can be alone with my thoughts, or with an audiobook, for hours.
Julie: Which characters do you enjoy most in your nature stories?
James: I really enjoy animals with strong and recognizable personalities. Chipmunks, for example, are universally dramatic, neurotic, kleptomaniacs. It makes them hilarious to me. And Catbirds behave like jazz musicians from detective fiction, with irrepressible musical improvisation when they're performing, and unrelenting sass when they're not.
Julie: Tell us about a time when you wrote an animal character that suddenly appeared at Havenwood?
James: The first time was when I was compiling the stories that would become A Year in the Big Old Garden. I needed one more story to complete the book, so I wrote about a Red-breasted Nuthatch, which we had never seen in our garden. We have always seen the larger White-breasted nuthatches, but I was smitten by some photographs of their smaller cousins, so that's what I used. To my amazement, it was only a matter of weeks before we saw a Red-breasted Nuthatch at our feeder!
The next book was Beside the Pond, and I couldn't resist adding a raccoon hunting frogs and paddling his hands in the water. Sure enough, it wasn't long before we were visited by our first raccoon, and he was very badly behaved: climbing onto our porch roofs and scratching at windows, climbing partway down our chimney, and tearing down the bird feeders to sample the sunflower seeds. We were relieved when he stopped coming around so often.
I sometimes think what fun it would be to write a story in which a black bear wanders through the Big Old Garden, but you said I'm not allowed.
Julie: Do you have a new book in the works?
James: I do! The working title is Busy in the Sun, and I'm challenging myself to tell stories about the wildlife we see in the sunny parts of the garden away from the bird feeders: like hummingbirds, meadow voles, and even honey bees. I'm spending as much of my writing time reading and learning as I am typing, and that's really fun.
I'm also taking the opportunity to imaginatively explore how a garden's diversity of plants supports a greater diversity of wildlife, and how that brings so many animal characters into contact with each other.
Starting in September, I will release one first-draft chapter of Busy in the Sun here on Substack each month.
Julie: Where can we find out more about you and your writing?
James: I am on Substack as , and on Instagram. You can find my books on my website, JamesDWitmer.com, and on Amazon and Audible.
Thanks so much for asking me to do this interview. It's an honor to share this space with you and the other amazing gardeners you've interviewed!
Thanks for joining us, James!
Have a listen to the first story, The Happiest Grey Squirrel, here on Substack:
The first two books in The Big Old Garden series are available now in paperback and kindle on Amazon, but also in wonderful audiobooks by a Shakespearean actor, Jimmy Kiefer! Book three will be pre-released on
this year in preparation for publication in 2025.A Year in the Big Old Garden in paperback & on audiobook
Beside the Pond in paperback & on audiobook
Do you have someone in your life who would enjoy the Big Old Garden series? Love to hear!
Other author interviews on JWG:
*Amazon Affiliate links are included in this newsletter. I make a few cents per recommendation, each of which I hope will be helpful to you!
What fun to hear a word from James—like seeing your garden from a different perspective! Thanks for introducing me to his work, I had no idea what a gifted match you two are.
I have A Year in the Big Old Garden on my wishlist! I love books like that and think what James is doing is wonderful!