For novelist Barbara Josselsohn, the idea for The Paper House began with a small shop in Southold and grew into a story about memory, loss, family, home and the enduring power of a handwritten letter.
Josselsohn, a summer North Fork resident and author of contemporary and historical fiction, wrote The Paper House, her 10th novel, which was published Sept. 2 by Bookouture, a Hachette imprint. The book blends historical elements with magical realism and unfolds across two timelines.
The fictional Paper House is a stationery shop where generations of island residents come not only for paper, pens and other writing supplies but also to write letters to people they have lost or to those they never had the chance to say goodbye to. At the center of the story is Kayla, who inherits the shop from her great-aunt Tilly. Kayla spent a transformative summer there at 16, but after a traumatic event, she never returned.
Years later, she is drawn back when police contact her after discovering what appear to be bloodstains in the shop’s attic. Her return forces her to confront the summer she has tried to leave behind and to investigate what happened to Tilly. A cache of letters ultimately helps Kayla uncover secrets about her great-aunt and the attic.
Tilly’s story goes back further. After a difficult childhood, she joins the Women’s Army Corps during World War II and volunteers at a hospital near London, helping wounded soldiers write letters home. Her experiences inspire her to open the Paper House when she returns.
“It’s about rediscovering yourself, redefining yourself and finding out through letters who you really are and who you want to be,” Josselsohn says.
While the novel’s fictional island is largely based on Shelter Island, Josselsohn drew heavily on the North Fork for its atmosphere, businesses and sense of history. The inspiration began at Arni Paperie (54127 Main Road, Southold, 631-566-1037), where Josselsohn became fascinated by owner Melinda Morris’ collection of stationery, notebooks, journals, pens and other paper goods. She began imagining the shop as something more: a place where people could sit down and put difficult thoughts, memories and feelings on paper.
Josselsohn is a Long Island native who grew up in Syosset and now lives in Westchester. She finds returning to Long Island for the summers like coming home. She has increasingly incorporated Long Island settings and influences into her fiction while also exploring the area’s history and folklore.
“I’ve gotten into a pattern in the last few years where I think I’ve been looking for stories on Long Island because I find it so rich, and for me [it evokes] so many feelings,” Josselsohn says.
Those interests converge in The Paper House, particularly through its themes of home, grief, love, forgiveness, consequences and self-discovery. Her work repeatedly examines what it means to find home, what can and cannot be repaired, and how people reconcile themselves to choices they cannot change.
Letter writing is perhaps the novel’s central thread. For Josselsohn, old family correspondence has shown that handwritten words can preserve personality, emotion, and history in ways modern digital communication often fails to. The book’s emphasis on letters has also carried over into her work outside the novel, inspiring letter-writing workshops.
That includes an upcoming event at the very shop that helped spark the story. On Oct. 11, Josselsohn will return to Arni Paperie for a meet-the-author and book-signing event, with a letter-writing workshop planned for the afternoon. The event runs from 2 to 4 p.m., with the writing workshop taking place around 3 p.m.; the event is free. The shop will also carry the book.
