photo courtesy of Michael Goldsmith and Gerald Kyd
Jennifer Steil, author of “The Ambassador’s Wife” plans to speak at Point Park on Thurs., Aug. 27.

Jennifer Steil, the wife to a British Ambassador, found she was living in a new “weird world” which inspired her to write a fictional novel which she will be speaking about in JVH Auditorium Aug. 27 at 3 p.m.

“I was living in this really strange world where we couldn’t leave the house without bodyguards,” Steil said in a phone interview Wednesday. “We traveled in armored cars and we had hostage negotiators, Scotland Yard and British Ministers in our guest rooms.”

Point Park News Service will be hosting Steil on campus to talk about the novel, “The Ambassador’s Wife.”

Steil previously wrote the book, “The Woman Who Fell From the Sky,” which was a memoir about her time as a journalist running a newspaper in Yemen.

“I painstakingly fact checked everything. So by the time I was done with that book I was really tired of telling the truth,” Steil said. “I found myself thinking that writing fiction would be very freeing.”

The book follows the story of characters Miranda and her husband, Finn, the British Ambassador for a fictitious Arab country. After Miranda is kidnapped and held hostage, the two have to make difficult decisions that are best for both themselves and their daughter.

“Nothing in the book is black and white; including the ending, it’s all very kind of gray, very complicated; these are complex characters. I want people to feel empathy for Finn and Miranda,” Steil said.

Michael Goldsmith, who works with Steil as her publicist at Doubleday Publicity, noted how the book relates to Steil personally. 

“This particular project draws very heavily on Jennifer’s own real life experiences as a spouse of an U.N. Ambassador,” Goldsmith said in a phone interview Tuesday. 

“…There were a couple of incidents that inspired the book… When I was six and a half months pregnant, I was held hostage for an afternoon in Yemen. In the way, in which I was taken, was similar to the way my character, Miranda, is taken in the book,” Steil said.

However, the story and plot were not autobiographical. 

Steil stated, “I’m very different from Miranda. We have things in common like our passion for our work and like our passion for our daughters…clearly I knew the world in which it takes place and some of the details of that world come from my life, but the story itself is fiction.” 

Andrew Conte, the Director of the Point Park News Service and School of Communication professor, helped coordinate the event on campus. 

“When I found out [Steil] was doing this book and knowing her backstory and everything she has done as a journalist…I thought it be would a great opportunity for the students at Point Park,” Conte said in a phone interview Wednesday. 

Goldsmith shared excitement over Steil’s book.

“There is a lot to share, it is a very exciting story…the book is one the summer’s best reads, in our opinion,” Goldsmith said.

Steil said she is thrilled by the book’s good reception. 

“I feel like the book is incredibly relevant, particularly at this moment,” Steil said. “I hope the book is provocative. I want it to inspire people to think about the effect they have when they travel to cultures who are very different from their own.”

Conte encourages students to attend this event. 

“It’s a chance to meet someone who is actually out there doing it,” Conte said. “This is somebody like a lot of our students, she was sitting where they are sitting now… And I just wanted to come right out of the box and say, ‘Look, from day one start thinking about this stuff.’”

Steil said there are plans for the book to be turned into a mini-TV series, starring Anne Hathaway. 

The event will be in JVH Auditorium in Thayer Hall at 3 p.m. on Aug. 27. Students can pre-register for this event at http://ambassadorswife.eventbrite.com.

photo courtesy of Michael Goldsmith
Jennifer Steil, Author of “The Ambassador’s Wife” will have a book signing at event on Thurs., Aug. 27.