DATE: Wednesday, August 27, 1997            TAG: 9708270124

SECTION: DAILY BREAK             PAGE: E1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column 

SOURCE: Larry Bonko 

                                            LENGTH:  101 lines

LOCAL WRITER OWES A BIG THANK-YOU TO OPRAH WINFREY

AS 29-YEAR-OLD SHERI Reynolds settles into her teaching job at Old Dominion U. this week, 300,000 copies of her latest work, ``A Gracious Plenty,'' are on the way to book stores.

That's some first printing.

Thank you, Oprah Winfrey.

Seven publishers bid on ``A Gracious Plenty.''

Thank you again, Oprah.

Harmony Books, a division of Crown Publishers, won the bidding for ``A Gracious Plenty.'' The advance from Harmony - in the neighborhood of $200,000 - gave Reynolds the money to buy a fine old house in Norfolk with high ceilings and a large front porch.

Thank you once again, Oprah.

Lovely Oprah. Dear Oprah. Book-loving Oprah. Where would Sheri Reynolds be without you?

Maxed out on her credit cards, wondering if she would ever have another book published. That's where.

A few months ago, Winfrey chose Reynolds' second novel, ``The Rapture of Canaan,'' to be the Oprah Book Club selection. Since ``The Oprah Winfrey Show'' is seen weekdays by 15 million to 20 million viewers in the United States, and in countries from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, Winfrey's endorsement practically guarantees the book will be a best seller. (WVEC airs it weekdays at 4 p.m.)

After appearing on ``Oprah'' for less then 15 minutes, during which she shared dinner with Winfrey, Reynolds went from unknown novelist to a writer with a paperback that was No. 1 on the best-seller list. After ``Oprah,'' her publisher, Berkley, rushed another million copies of ``The Rapture of Canaan'' into print, according to USA Today.

``A turn of fate,'' said Reynolds of Winfrey's decision to talk up ``The Rapture of Canaan,'' which is about a young girl growing up in a rigid religious community. That is not unlike Reynolds' early life.

About the time that Winfrey picked up a copy of ``The Rapture of Canaan,'' and decided it would be a good read for her viewers, Reynolds was living in Richmond, wondering where she'd find the money to have her teeth fixed.

``I thought my career was dead,'' she said. ``Last summer, I was living off my credit cards.

``I was looking at bankruptcy.''

Before Winfrey, ``The Rapture of Canaan'' had not sold well. The publishers decided that the $30,000 advance given to Reynolds was all they would invest in her writing.

They rejected her new manuscript, ``A Gracious Plenty.''

``They kicked me out,'' she said.

Then came the ``Oprah'' show.

The young author who was nearly broke, and wondering if she'd ever see another of her books in print when she sat down to dine with Winfrey, became the darling of the book business overnight. Large publishing houses bid on her work.

Two big names in TV who have companies that produce movies - Lorne Michaels of ``Saturday Night Live'' and Jennie Garth of ``Beverly Hills 90210'' - have options to turn her first two novels, ``Bitterroot Landing'' and ``The Rapture of Canaan,'' into TV films.

She has been on a 20-city, cross-country tour to promote ``A Gracious Plenty.'' Life is good. Life is great for Sheri Reynolds. Thank you again, Oprah Winfrey.

And boo to you, Berkley, for giving up on Reynolds. How ironic, and how bittersweet, to have that publisher bid on the manuscript it had rejected after Reynolds appeared with Winfrey.

At Berkley, they are probably kicking themselves for turning down ``A Gracious Plenty,'' which is about a loner named Finch Nobles - badly burned in childhood - who tends to a cemetery in a small Southern town. She hears voices from the dead. Good book.

Reynolds, who says there is a fourth novel ``marinating'' inside of her, quickly pulls the reader into the pages. ``When I go to be with the dead, it's a partial reunion with no way to really touch them except in my mind.''

She writes, said Reynolds, as if in a coma, receiving messages from somewhere. Who knows where? ``I slip into a state,'' she said.

But not lately. While the ``threads and images'' of another novel pop into her head at times, she is too busy with the book tour, too busy preparing to teach writing and literature at Old Dominion U., to sit down and write novel No. 4.

When she writes, she does it longhand, filling notebooks before going to the word processor. ``I wrote `Canaan' in a month. But it had been marinating for years,'' Reynolds told Winfrey on TV.

It was about a year ago that Winfrey began her monthly book club, elevating unknown authors such as Reynolds and Jacquelyn Mitchard to publishing superstars while introducing the works of established writers (Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou) to viewers who don't read anything heavier than TV Guide.

``The most exciting thing in my television experience is getting people into book stores, getting them to experience the written word,'' Winfrey said - the written word of 29-year old Sheri Reynolds of Norfolk.

On these summer nights, as she sits on the porch of the house that ``A Gracious Plenty'' bought for her, listen closely to what Reynolds is whispering. I swear, it sounds like, ``Thank you, Oprah Winfrey. . . . for everything.'' ILLUSTRATION: COURTESY SHERI REYNOLDS

Sheri Reynolds...

JOSHUA SHELDON

Sheri Reynolds' writing career took off after Oprah Winfrey's on-air

praise. KEYWORDS: INTERVIEW

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu