In Nolin Creek, the water runs deep and the secrets run deeper. In the harsh landscape of a Depression-era Northern Ontario mining town, Finnish immigrant sisters Hanna and Essi Kivi scrape together a living as domestic workers, sharing a room in a disreputable boarding house owned by a protective madame.
I'm pleased to welcome author Liisa Kovala to The Writing Desk:
Tell us about your latest book?
Like Water for Weary Souls is a historical mystery set in the 1930s Depression in a Northern Ontario mining town. Two Finnish domestic workers move from their farming community to the Sudbury. When Hanna’s body is found in Nolin Creek after a spring snowstorm, the police claim it was an accident due to unstable ice. But Essi knows it was no accident and is determined to find out what really happened to her sister. She soon learns that she didn’t know Hanna as well as she though she did as secrets are uncovered and suspects accumulate. Essi is driven by a sense of loyalty, sisterhood, and justice to find out what really happened.
I was particularly interested in how well we really know one another. That question led me to consider all the characters in the novel and the dreams they have for themselves. What are they willing to do to achieve them?
What is your preferred writing routine?
I don’t have a writing routine. I’ve always been a writer who needed to fit writing into my life as a mother, teacher, and coach. Now, I’m a full-time creative, working with book coaching clients and writing my own books, along with all the administrative work, social media, and marketing that involves. Despite my more flexible schedule, I still don’t write at a particular time of day, and I don’t write every day. And yet the words come and the books get written.
A strategy that works well for me and many of my clients is mirroring. We gather together either in person or on Zoom and write together for 30-minute sprints with short breaks in-between. There is something motivating by being around other folks who are writing. It gives us permission to spend time on our writing without being disrupted by the other tasks that pull us away.
What advice do you have for new writers?
I have two pieces of advice for new writers. The first is one they’ve probably heard before, but it is essential. Read. Read great novels. Read mediocre stories. Read terrible books. Read in your genre. Read outside your genre. Read Classics. Read contemporary authors. And read like a writer. Study craft.
The second piece of advice is to start before you are ready. We’re all guilty of finding ways to distract ourselves from the work itself by doing writing adjacent activities. Of course, we do need to research, take classes, attend webinars, read craft books, but we also need to start writing. Not when we feel ready. Now. Just start.
What have you found to be the best way to raise awareness of your books?
Marketing and promotion are topics that make many authors cringe. It took me a long time to understand that I wasn’t bothering people by posting about my latest release. They would just scroll by if they weren’t interested. Now, I think differently about sharing my work. I really love connecting with readers and talking about books. When I approach promoting my books with a genuine intention, it creates relationships instead of feeling “icky.” Unfortunately, there is no one way to or right way. There is only your way.
Tell us something unexpected you discovered during your research.
While researching for Like Water for Weary Souls, I came across a book Varpu Lindstrom, a researcher who wrote Defiant Sisters: A Social History of Finnish Immigrant Women in Canada. I was surprised to find a chapter written about Sudbury in the 1930s, focussed on the kinds of activities women were engaged in at the time.
I learned that many women ran boarding houses, some were bootleggers, and others ran brothels. I decided to have my young women find lodgings in a boarding house that turns out to be a brothel run by a Finnish madame who was also a bootlegger.
What was the hardest scene you remember writing?
One of the hardest scenes to write was the death of the youngest sister Martta. It’s an unexpected and tragic moment that affects all the characters, including her older sisters Essi and Hanna, and their parents. It’s the reason Essi knows Hanna would never have crossed the frozen creek. She understood what water can do.
What are you planning to write next?
I always have several projects on the go. I have a historical novel about a Finnish war child ready for the editing stages and another about set in the socialist utopian society of Sointula in British Columbia in the drafting stages. I also have four books coming out in 2026 in the Hygge House Cozy Mystery series. Book 1, Hygge and Homicide, will be released on March 3 and Book 2, Midsummer, Marriage, and Murder will be released in April. I write the cozy mysteries under my pen name, A. L. Jensen.
Liisa Kovala
About the Author
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