What Does the Book Want to Be? With Barbara Sibbald

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If you’ve ever wondered whether that wild, complicated story in your family could become a novel, this episode is for you.

I’m joined by award-winning author Barbara Sibbald, whose latest book, Almost English, began as a family legend, became a genealogy project, then tried to be creative nonfiction—before finally settling into the form it needed all along: a historical novel.

Barbara’s great-grandparents lived in Quetta, on the Northwest Frontier of British India (now Pakistan) between 1885 and 1912. Growing up, she’d heard half-true tales about an Indian princess and a pet elephant, but it wasn’t until her mother spent nearly two decades compiling a detailed family genealogy—and shared boxes of letters and photographs—that the real story came into focus.

In this conversation, Barbara walks us through how she turned that wealth of material into fiction, while still honouring the lives at the heart of it. We talk about:

• How her mother’s meticulous genealogy and bundles of family letters sparked the idea for Almost English
• Why the story first appeared to be creative nonfiction—and what made Barbara realize it actually had to be a novel
• The moment she understood she needed access to her characters’ inner lives, thoughts, and conversations, and why that pushed her toward fiction
• The central question that finally unlocked the book:
   How could her great-grandfather, Stephen Turner, a quarter Indian man, ever be accepted into the racist power structure of the Raj?
• How Barbara used that central question as a compass for cutting thousands of words and tightening the narrative
• The research she did into the Raj, the Durand Line, household life, women’s work, and even period undergarments (!), to bring the world to life
• Her use of real letters versus invented ones, and how both helped her build an emotionally resonant narrative

We also talk about the book’s unusual structure. In addition to the main historical storyline, Barbara includes short nonfiction pieces she calls “interstices”, where she reflects on her own search for belonging as the child of an itinerant military family—and how that parallels her great-grandparents’ experience.

That blending of historical fiction, biography, and autobiography made the book hard to categorize—and hard to sell. Barbara shares candidly about the seven drafts, nearly three years of querying, and 48 approaches to publishers before the book was finally acquired by Bayeux Arts in Canada, and then by Vishwakarma Publications in India.

If you’ve ever struggled to decide whether your story should be memoir, creative nonfiction, or a novel, you’ll find so much reassurance and practical insight in Barbara’s journey with Almost English.