Sandra Cavallo Miller
Sandra Cavallo Miller is a retired academic family physician in Phoenix who has helped launch hundreds of medical students and residents into their careers. Her unlikely path to medicine includes degrees in anthropology and creative writing at the University of Illinois before attending Rush Medical College. Her essays and poetry have been published in JAMA, PULSE - Voices from the Heart of Medicine, Under the Sun, and Embark, among others, as well as a trilogy about a woman physician at the Grand Canyon Clinic on the South Rim (THE COLOR OF ROCK / WHERE LIGHT COMES AND GOES / WHAT THE RIVER SAID). WHERE NO ONE SHOULD LIVE is her fourth novel.
Are there particular films that have influenced your writing?
Mostly in the opposite way you would think. Medical films and television shows are pretty unrealistic and take place primarily in the hospital, which is only a small slice of medicine. Part of my quest is to depict everyday outpatient physicians and their challenges and rewards -- the physicians that patients are most likely to see 95% of the time. For me, that means primary care doctors, mostly family physicians.
Don't get me wrong. Those shows are highly entertaining and popular, especially the crime scenarios with a female pathologist. They're good mysteries or dramas and the science can be fascinating. It's just not what happens to most of us, patients or physicians.
All stories do need tension, developed through both plot and characters, so having a mystery or a problem to be solved is good. It's what keeps readers turning the pages. My novels all have some form of that, but they don't follow a formula.
What’s the oddest thing a reader has ever asked you?
Because I've written three novels about a woman physician at the Grand Canyon Clinic on the South Rim, readers often ask me what it was like to work there. But the fact is, I never did. Readers often assume that fiction is mostly based on personal experience, but it can also be based on others' stories. Or completely made up stories. I do know quite a few physicians, both women and men, who have worked or still work there, and it's a wild location for practicing medicine. Unimaginable tales. Surprisingly, there is not much fiction written in the setting of the canyon.
These readers also ask me about a steamy romance with a ranger, depicted in one of those novels. My response: I wish!
Not all books are for all readers… when you start a book and you just don’t like it, how long do you read until you bail?
I'll give most novels about 50 pages. If I haven't bonded with or care about a character by then, it's probably too late. Even a difficult or rather unlikable protagonist should give me some reason to root for their success fairly early.
I will quit reading much sooner, though, if the writing style rubs me wrong. If it feels awkward or clumsy or shows poor editing, I know I can't keep that up. Sometimes the writing is too flowery or too dull. I once started a novel that used the verb "was" 14 times on the first page, and I quit reading there.
What do you worry about?
As an author who began writing novels after I retired at age 65 (now 6 years ago -- yikes), I worry most about running out of time. My 4th novel about a public health physician (pre-Covid) just came out, and the 5th novel about a middle-aged burned-out physician is slated for publication next fall. It's funny and snarky and poignant, and I'm currently working on writing the sequel to that. I try to take a healthy approach to my brain and body so I can keep this up a while longer!
I'm having the best time.
What brings you great joy?
My greatest joy right now is actually writing, but I'll move past that. I love acquiring new knowledge and having new adventures, and I especially enjoy studying our incredible planet and the skies around us. If I were in college now, I'd probably go into volcanology, which utterly fascinates me. Seeing real flowing lava is tops on my bucket list. I'm always surrounded by dogs and horses, which ground me. And my incredible daughter, who I talk with most days, lights my life. I'm rather fond of my husband, too....
