To Stokes County, her family
and friends, Arminda B. Roddy’s first novel, “Maya’s Mountain: Where God Stands
Up”, is a love letter six years in the making.
Her mantra, in writing and life is
“when you want to do something, you will do it,” which comes from her father
coaching her in athletics in her adolescence. This mantra drives Roddy, so when
the thought “I want to write a book” struck her, she decided she would do it.
“I waited for the idea to come to
me and when it did, I started writing. I never forced anything… When I was
ready to do it, I did it.”
Inspirations strikes at all times
for Roddy, she says “when a moment (of inspiration) would hit me a lot of times
I was sitting in that class (the creative writing class she teaches) and able
to sit down and type it up real quick” or “find a napkin somewhere” to write
her ideas down, if she did not have her own notes handy, while “painting the
bathroom.”
Roddy is having her first-ever
meet-and-greet, book-signing event this Sunday from 3-5 pm at The Arts Place in
Danbury. She will also read excerpts from the book.
Roddy, known by most as Mindy,
describes her time as a student at Appalachian State University to be “where I
went to become an artist, as well as a teacher but it was there I found my
artistic value.”
A self-declared homebody, Roddy
says that going away for college was difficult, but she found a “home away from
home” at Appalachian.
“When I got to college, I was no
longer an athlete. So here I am, determining my identity ‘who am I here?’ and
it gave me an opportunity to endeavor more in the arts.”
The experiences and bonds she
forged helped to influence aspects of “Maya’s Mountain: Where God Stands Up.”
Many great authors preach to “write
what you know,” and Roddy’s novel emulates that statement. She writes her
family into this novel. “Maya is me; Jackson is my husband, Annie and Greg are
my parents. I tried to ultimately embody their characters as they are; my
siblings are mentioned. I don’t spend a lot of time with them, but ultimately I
hope this is going to be a series.”
Remembering the excitement of
holding her novel for the first time, she said “the moment you hold that book
in your hand and you see your name on it, it is the most surreal thing you will
ever feel in your life. It didn’t really hit me that it was real until about
two or three weeks after I had it my hand.”
Readers will see there are biblical
themes throughout. “Maya’s Mountain” is meant to reflect Roddy’s spiritual
journey and her enduring faith through her life thus far. On an even deeper
level, “Maya’s Mountain” is meant to have similarities to the biblical story of
Noah and his ark, “specifically the story of the dove and the olive branches.”
Roddy describes her book as being
“very much focused on the idea of authenticity, like hey, we all have
imperfections, we all have things about us that are not, not good, we have
things about us that are great. Let’s just be human, and love and live
together.”
Her book has been well received
thus far, giving rise to Roddy’s plans for a sequel. “The next one will be
about Annie, which is my mom.” She made sure to add, “I’m invested now in
getting them out there but making them quality” and that it will not take six
years for her fans to wait for the sequel.
It is also notable that the pictures within Roddy’s book are all personal.
Several of them were taken by Roddy, who dabbles in photography, while a few of
them are family pictures from her lifetime. Her favorite picture in the book is
one of her grandpa and sisters pictured inside of the church that is displayed
on the front cover.
Roddy is also planning, short-term,
to put out a “coffee table poetry book to feature my photography and original
poetry.”
In a small town it is well known
that connections are easily forged. Finding her publisher, King-based DW Beam,
is no exception. Her mother, Nancy, being the “middle woman” to originate
contact with her daughter’s future publisher all because she was bragging about
her writing.
“I emailed them just on a whim kind
of hoping something would come out of it but not really expecting it to. So,
you have to take opportunities that seem out of the way.”
The thankfulness Roddy continually
expressed is best summed here: “This community, not just King, but Stokes
County, means a lot to me. They’ve raised me up so that I love people, I want
to take you in and give you a hug and give you something to eat. They’ve always
been so wonderful and given so much to me. I wanted the people of Stokes County
and my family to know how much I feel blessed by their presence in my life.”
Gabrielle
Troutman is the summer intern for The Stokes News.
