Katie Wainwright added to her growing collection of published books, this time drawing inspiration from her time spent on the Tangipahoa Parish Council.

Her newest book, “Pohainake Parish,” made its debut at the book signing located at the campus bookstore Thursday, March 26 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. 

“It’s a story of a divorced woman with two children who gets elected to the parish council; it’s her and four men. It’s during the ‘good ol’ boy’ period, so she’s kind of ostracized because she’s the only woman on the council. They have to build a jail, get a sanitary landfill, pave the roads, but they don’t have any money because they’re bankrupt. They have to find a way to tax people or do something to get money to do all this work that they are under federal mandate to do,” said Wainwright. 

Since the book took place during the ‘90s, Wainwright wanted to especially draw attention to what it was like to be a woman in a man’s world during that time by making her main character female.

“I made her a woman because I wanted to highlight the bias against women during that time,” said Wainwright. “I thought she would be an interesting character to have in that situation.”

Although Wainwright did not publish until after her retirement, she officially began writing at the age of 15 and it has been her hobby ever since. By the time she started to publish, she already had a trunk-full of her writings. She continues to use her past writings as prompts for her books, having already published four.

Wainwright draws inspiration from the experiences in her life and couples them with her own inner workings. 

“I was part of the council, and it was quite an eye-opening experience,” said Wainwright. “This is a nugget of truth enhanced by a lot of imagination. Some of the occurrences are exaggerated or made funny.”

Kathy Pittman, a friend and fellow alumnus of Wainwright, helped out with the book signing. 

“I enjoyed the book very much because it had a love story to it and a lot of history about the parish,” said Pittman. “I recognized a lot of the trials and tribulations the parish went through when it was almost bankrupt, so a lot of those things were very similar to how it once was.” 

Wainwright’s books cover a wide range of subjects, each reflecting a particular moment in her life. 

“People like the experiences in my books,” said Wainwright. “People like different things. My children like my first book the best, ‘Cuba on My Mind,’ because it was where I was born and raised. I think the guys like ‘Secuestro’ best because it’s about a kidnapping up in the mountains. It’s not so feminine. My real-estate friends like ‘The Azaleas’ because it’s about a plantation. So everybody has their favorite.”

To learn more about Wainwright and her novels, visit katiewainwright.com.

Katie Wainwright, a Southeastern alumna, returned to campus to read from her new book,
“Pohainake Parish,” in the campus bookstore. The Lion’s Roar / Megan Simon