Tosca Lee-Author of The Long March Home

Tosca Lee

Author

Photo Credit:  Jennifer Studanski

You really must read a book, any book by the author Tosca Lee. If I had my say, you'd read The Long March Home written by Tosca and Marcus Brotherton.  Chosen as The One Book One Nebraska selection for 2025, I also selected it as my Best of 2024.  It was a superior piece of historical fiction set during World War II's Bataan Death March, featuring three hometown friends who vow to make it back from the war alive.  It is as well-researched as it is readable! 

 

This gem of a book sparked my interest in Tosca herself.  Like I did, you could go to her  social media pages and website, but to really get a feel for the person and her work, I needed a more personal interaction. I emailed Tosca, requesting an interview with the hope that I might hear from a member of her team.  Surprisingly enough, I got a quick response from the author herself agreeing to answer my questions by email.  Wow!  Needless to say, I was thrilled and shot off a lightning quick response.🗲

Always of interest to me, is how anyone that shares a love for story-telling; authors, booksellers, bloggers, and certainly readers is how they found that love. For Tosca it was a conversation with her dad:

"I came home to visit during spring break my freshman year in college and was talking with my dad about how great novels are like roller-coasters, and how I thought it might be fun to make one for someone else to ride around on. I just blurted it out: “I think I want to write a book.” My dad changed my life that day when he offered to make me a deal: he’d pay me what I would have made that summer working as a bank teller (I was a terrible bank teller the summer before and somehow still had my job waiting for me that summer again) if I spent the next summer writing a novel, full-time. I wrote my first novel that summer about the Neolithic Stonehenge people. It’s currently in my basement with the rest of my skeletons."

What a way to inspire a young person to follow their dreams! For someone who might have expressed a similar interest to a parent, I would have expected a response along the lines of, "don't quit your day job". 🤣

Tosca's mention of her father and his role in her becoming a "paid" author, prompted me to ask if anyone else in her family was an author or created with the written word.  It's always been my dream to write a novel, but I don't know that I got that lofty idea from my father, maybe my mom. Tosca shared that she comes from a family with various writing credits:

"My father has written numerous academic books and articles throughout his long career as a professor of business management, and my mother has authored several genealogy books and a short book on how to travel with only a carry-on called Traveling Well With Less: A Woman’s Guide. (My mother is a world traveler who goes off for weeks at a time with only a little carry-on and nothing else to weigh her down.)  My sister, who is a physician, has also published papers and poetry as well."

It seems to me that there is a connection between a love of reading and writing. I find that some of my favorite authors are also prolific readers. Tosca described her mother and sisters as reading "quite a bit". She herself reads "in spurts", depending on the amount of research or book endorsements she's busy doing. One place where she and I differ, is that she enjoys audiobooks on car trips and while doing housework. I find that listening to audios puts me right to sleep. How about you all?

As for genres, there we converge with our shared love of historical fiction and thrillers. I would describe Tosca's writing, as biblical fiction (Iscariot, Havah, Sheba).  She categorizes them in the same way, but also using the "historical fiction" label. Whatever shelf you put her books on, I'm certain you'll be pulling them down for a read or even a rare re-read!

Like many successful authors, several of Tosca's books have been optioned for TV–which means it's a possibility. "How far those projects get in the process remains to be seen. But it’s always exciting when there’s some kind of progress, or I get an excuse to fly off to L.A.!" In my estimation, The Long March Home, seems a perfect candidate for the big or small screen. It is a big, shiny five star book for me. Tosca had this to say of the collaboration that resulted in this book:

"We are extremely proud of that book and I’m glad you enjoyed it. This was a book 12 years in the making, between the two of us. My friend and co-author, Marcus Brotherton, had been working on it off and on between projects for seven years when he called me up and asked if I’d be interested in writing a WWII novel set in the Pacific about the Bataan Death March with him. He was familiar with my work–had read several of my novels–and I’d endorsed Marcus’ Christy award-winning novel Feast for Thieves, and I was familiar with his bestsellers Grateful American (with actor Gary Sinise), and Voices of the Pacific. So we get on the phone, and he tells me about this project about three best friends who go off to serve in the Philippines… and the girl they left at home. I hadn't heard about the Bataan Death March. I didn't know much about the Pacific Theater in WWII. But I knew it would be an important story to share. “Let's do it,” I said. Between my own research for the project and other books I was writing, I added five years to the process. We worked on it between contracted books, not knowing if we would sell it or where, but knowing we wanted to do justice for those heroes who served. The Long March Home is fiction but everything that happens to the main characters happened to someone, as it’s all inspired by true stories. The book sold to Revell and released in 2023. Last year it 'finaled' for a Hemingway and won the International Book Award in Historical Fiction. It’s also the 2025 One Book One Nebraska (where I live), and it’s an honor to share this story with readers around my home state, so many of whom have their own family stories and legacy to share about WWII in the Pacific."

Another author I follow, Robert Dugoni, has co-written a book set during the same time period-Hold Strong. It, too, is eminently readable and a credit to the actual persons and events depicted. Tosca knows Robert, and that he had his own project in the works, but hasn't read his book yet. I've have been fortunate enough to have read them both. In my mind, they are cornerstones of historical fiction-great research and creativity put to the pages!

Finally, I wondered if Tosca were to take a “left turn” and write a completely off-genre book, did she have any ideas what that might be about?

"I’d love to do some women’s fiction, and even some humor. I’m currently entertaining some stories for young people as well, which is very different from my usual."

While we wait, how about a look at some of Tosca Lee's other work! From an Ohio farmer's daughter, to a Nebraska farmer's wife, I'm there whatever you write! Well, maybe not "Neolithic Stonehenge", but anything else. 😉