Linda M. Castellitto

Publishing phenom Jessica Khoury has had a busy couple of years: In 2010, she graduated from college and got married. In 2011, she wrote a book (in about a month) that was snapped up by Penguin’s Razorbill imprint. This year, she finished revising the book, appeared at book and library conventions and traveled to the jungle for the first time.

On September 4, Origin—a thought-provoking YA novel with a fascinating premise—debuts with an impressive 250,000-copy first printing. And that’s not all: The 22-year-old Khoury is already writing her second novel for Penguin, and she has embarked on the publisher’s Breathless Reads tour.

But while the past two years have been a veritable whirlwind, Khoury wants to emphasize—especially to aspiring authors—that, as easy or speedy as her timeline might appear, writing and publishing a book takes significant time and effort.

“It’s important to know it’s a long process. You can write a book in a month, but it takes months and months to get it ready to go out into the world,” Khoury says in an interview from her home in Georgia. “Some people may say this just happened overnight, but it didn’t . . . and I have a great team of supporters who worked with me."

Origin isn’t the first book Khoury created. After being homeschooled, she entered Toccoa Falls College, a Christian school in her small north Georgia hometown, and began working on a high-fantasy trilogy. (Khoury says she has loved fantasy since “my dad forced me to read Lord of the Rings in elementary school.”) She was in the midst of querying agents and publishers about that book when the idea for Origin struck during a walk in the woods near her home—and that, as they say, was that.

"You can't get a more universal theme than mortality. We all think about it, and we all have to make our own decisions about what it means."

At the heart of the novel is a 17-year-old girl named Pia. She’s been genetically engineered to be perfect—and to be Person No. 1 in the immortal race a group of scientists has been secretly and feverishly working to create in their hidden compound, Little Cam.

This coming-of-age story is rife with romance, suspense and danger, plus musings on nature vs. nurture, the notion (and possibility) of immortality and archetypal mad-scientists-vs.-noble-savages, all set against the lush backdrop of the Amazon jungle.

The scientists are the only people Pia knows. They praise her superiority even as they groom her to carry on their work and strive to keep her ignorant of the outside world.

But, like any good coming-of-age tale, the time comes when Pia is offered a glimpse into a different sort of future, and she rebels—though the consequences are far more dramatic, even deadly, than typical teenage turbulence.

Pia begins to question her own viewpoints, and her very existence, when she sneaks away from the compound and encounters Eio, a handsome young man who lives in a nearby village. As she gets to know Eio and his tribe, she is shocked to realize the world is much bigger than she’d realized—and perhaps the goings-on (and people) at Little Cam are not what they seem.

Khoury describes the jungle’s flora and fauna, its colors and scents, in colorful detail. That’s no small accomplishment, considering she had never been to the jungle when she wrote Origin. “The jungle has always fascinated me. When I had the original idea, I knew the jungle had to happen, I just didn’t know which; I had to do a lot of research to decide which one.”

And research she did, “probably two hours of research for every one hour of writing,” Khoury says. “The week I came up with the idea and started writing, I made my husband drive me to Barnes & Noble and we bought coffee-table books, folklore anthologies and video documentaries; Wikipedia was perpetually open. I learned a lot as I wrote, and I tried to research every little detail so it would be real to the readers.”

The novel’s exploration of the possible consequences of immortality wasn’t something the author needed to research. “It has always been of weight with me because of my faith and religion,” Khoury says. “You can’t get a more universal theme than mortality. We all think about it, and we all have to make our own decisions about what it means. Pia struggles with that.” (It’s fun to note, too, that, not unlike Eve biting that fateful apple, Pia eats fruit-flavored Skittles shortly before her first escape from Little Cam—something Khoury says, “I didn’t even think about!”)

The weight of others’ expectations is also something Khoury’s felt, and explores through her protagonist. “For me, I’m still kind of coming from Pia’s angle and dealing with the expectations of people,” she says. “When I have kids, I’ll be looking at it from the other angle. I do that a little bit now with my four younger sisters [she has a younger brother, too]. I think, I don’t agree, but I support you, and nothing’s gonna change how I love you.”

Speaking of love, Khoury says her husband and family are very excited about her becoming a full-fledged author (not least her Syrian grandfather, whose last name she is using in tribute to him).

“My family has been waiting for this as long as I have,” she says. “I’ve been telling them I was going to be an author since I was four years old. They’re my biggest cheerleaders.”

They’ll have lots to yell about in the coming months, for sure. And of course, there’s Khoury’s next book, which may be a companion to Origin, maybe not: “Anything could happen down the road,” she says. A fitting outlook for a newly minted author.

Children's & YA, Middle Grade

Children's & YA Middle Grade

Jacqueline Kelly

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Jacqueline Kelly has had a mole, a badger, a rat and a toad in her head for 50 years. But not to worry—it wasn’t due to anything frightening or medically improbable. Rather, the four are the charming protagonists of The Wind in the Willows, one of Kelly’s lifelong favorite books.

Kelly, a 2010 Newbery Honoree for her first book, The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate, told BookPage in an interview from her Austin, Texas, home that she was eight years old when she first turned the pages of Kenneth Grahame’s classic tale (which was first published in England in 1908). “I was in bed with the flu, and [the book] immediately transported me to the riverbank,” she says. “I loved everything about it, and reread it over the years. The characters never went away.”

And now, she’s set them free in Return to the Willows, a charming sequel that’s faithful to the original book while adding creative touches of her own.

Some might suggest that Kelly’s got a lot of moxie for writing a sequel to a beloved classic—and adding new characters, to boot—but, she says, “It didn’t occur to me that people would think that. I’m just being a worshipful fan of the original, my favorite book when I was a child.” She is aware there are other sequels out there, and says, “When I started writing, I didn’t know about them, and was rather dismayed when I learned they existed. I made the decision I wasn’t going to read them. . . . I still haven’t.”

When she began to write her sequel, Kelly says it was because she “felt compelled to do it. The characters were being insistent!” Judging from the hilarious and heartwarming result, Kelly (and those characters) made the right decision. Return to the Willows is an engaging, imagination-stimulating read for longtime fans and first-time visitors to the River, Wild Wood and Toad Hall.

"I'm just being a worshipful fan of the original, my favorite book when I was a child."

The author’s adoration shines through in the book’s tone and rhythm; reading Grahame’s book, then Kelly’s, does feel like a continuation, rather than a re-interpretation. She attributes that to the sounds and words of her youth: “My childhood was in Canada, and kids there read more British-based literature than kids in the States do, so I heard that sort of language and tone at an early age. Plus, my family is from New Zealand. . . . It’s easy for me to hear an English accent in my head while I’m writing.”

For American readers who might be puzzled by phrases like “bib and tucker” or words like “tittle” (that’s “best clothing” and “little bit,” respectively), Kelly included footnotes. “I wrestled with it,” she recalls. “Do I keep the British terms? If I convert to American terms, wouldn’t the text look very strange? So I thought I could deal with it by using footnotes, and try to make them entertaining.”

And of course, as a devotee of the book (and author—she’s a member of the Kenneth Grahame Society), she carefully considered things like new technology and those new characters. “I did contemplate—for about two seconds!—giving them computers and cell phones. But I just couldn’t see it. I’m too old-fashioned to see these characters texting each other,” she says.

Kelly decided that new additions would serve the story well, so readers will meet Matilda, a lovely and clever rat, and young Humphrey, the intelligent (and adorable) nephew of Toad. “I thought Matilda needed to be added for contemporary girl readers,” Kelly says, “and Humphrey would be a good foil for Toad, who’s not so smart.”

Speaking of the irresponsible yet irresistible Toad, readers needn’t fret: He’s just as wacky and daring here as he was in Grahame’s original. In Kelly’s story, his new mode of delightful destruction is a hot-air balloon (which is, of course, not unrelated to his own propensity for gassing on). He also sustains a head injury that transforms him into a genius with a seat at Trinity College in Cambridge, where his smarts (and Kelly’s sly humor) know seemingly no bounds. He does the Sunday Times crossword in pen; publishes a scientific paper called “Jam Side Down: A Discourse on the Physics of Falling Toast”; and casually memorizes the score to Gilbert & Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore . . . which comes in handy when he serves as a virtuoso last-minute replacement for the female lead.

There are river excursions, giant explosions, swimming lessons and an all-out animal-on-animal war, too; adventures, friendships, dramatic plots and all sorts of excitement abound (not to mention references ranging from Austen to Shakespeare to a certain Disneyland ride). The striking realism of certain events was aided by consultations with Kelly’s husband, who attended Cambridge and has connections there—and with the explosives experts who work in the federal building in Austin where Kelly practices medicine part-time.

That’s right: Kelly went to medical school, then law school (she no longer practices), and then began to write when she was in her mid-40s. “I always wanted to be a writer, from the very beginning, and I took these long divagations along the way,” she says. “I’m very grateful now . . . this is how I want to spend my time.”

Thanks to Kelly, readers certainly will enjoy spending their time catching up on old friends and meeting new ones along the riverbank. Clint Young’s illustrations add much to the experience; his artwork is masterfully done, with detail, depth and plenty of emotion. Return to the Willows will inspire us to respect nature, be kind to our friends, be open to change, embrace hilarity . . . and perhaps take another, closer look at any furry or amphibious creatures we encounter.

Children's & YA, Middle Grade

Children's & YA Middle Grade

Clare Vanderpool

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

In both of Clare Vanderpool’s artfully written novels, the young protagonists’ fathers yank them out of the lives they’ve known and deposit them in unfamiliar surroundings, where they must make sense of the past and find their way in a strange new present.

But while Abilene (the main character in the 2011 Newbery Medal winner Moon Over Manifest) and 13-year-old Jack Baker of Navigating Early both narrate richly layered tales that explore memory, loss, discovery and redemption, their stories are in fact quite different.

Vanderpool says in an interview from her home in Wichita, Kansas, “Abilene has never lived in one place or been grounded in a community, and that’s what she’s sent to.” By contrast, “Jack was comfortable and grounded, and now he’s at the edge of the country without any bearings.”

Indeed, when Kansas-boy Jack sees the ocean for the first time, he throws up. A bumpy cargo-plane ride to the Maine coast contributed to his stomach upset, but his disorientation also stems from emotional upheaval: World War II has just ended, Jack’s mother has recently died, and his father has brought him east to attend a boys’ boarding school near his military post in Portsmouth. Although Jack can appreciate the salty air, the ocean waves are forbidding and the multi-hued sand reminds him of his beloved mother, who was like “sand that clings to your body, leaving its impression on your skin to remind you of where you’ve been and where you come from.”

Even as he grieves the loss of his mother and his home, Jack begins to explore his new surroundings, goes out for the crew team and becomes friends with a boy named Early Auden. Early is an intelligent, eccentric sort: He’s obsessed with the Appalachian brown bear and timber rattlesnake, plays Billie Holliday only when it rains, and he has excellent water-sports skills, too.

That bundle of attributes make Early irresistibly intriguing to Jack, and as the boys grow closer, Early reveals something even more fascinating: The numbers of pi have colors, and he can read in the numbers a dramatic and exciting story that’s going to help him find that brown bear—and his brother, a soldier who was lost in the war.

Jack listens to each installment of the adventures of Pi (the hero of Early’s tale), but is skeptical about the story, let alone the possibility of finding bear or brother. Even so, he joins Early on his quest: The two explore on land and sea along the Appalachian Trail, and encounter a range of unusual people with their own stories—some scary, some poignant, all of them mysteriously similar to the people and places in the tale of Pi’s journey.

Navigating Early is a complex story, to be sure, and it’s all the more satisfying for its poetic language and intimation that not everything has a logical explanation. Vanderpool herself is quite comfortable with the latter notion. “Jack’s mom introduces that idea to him . . . the way our paths cross, our lives intersect and collide,” she says. “They’re all things I’ve experienced in my own life. I know this story pushes magical realism just a tad, but I’m okay with that because, in my own life, there are amazing things that happen, coincidences and connections you would never expect.”

The novel’s exploration of the ways in which physical places can shape our emotions is also a theme that’s been central to Vanderpool’s experience. “That absolutely comes from me,” she says. “I’ve traveled a lot, and have lived in the same neighborhood my whole life, which I love. It’s very much part of my makeup.” She adds with a laugh, “When I was dating my husband, I joked with him and said, ‘Where you go, I go! Pick any house on these four streets.’” And so he did: They and their four children live in a house two blocks from Vanderpool’s childhood home.

Having her mother nearby is something Vanderpool enjoys, not least because the idea for Navigating Early was touched off by her mother’s description of a vivid dream about a young man who was an exceptionally talented pianist. “That got me thinking,” she says. “I thought it would be interesting to write about a younger character with some type of savant ability.”

She began to do research about savants, and about pi, which, she says, “is the be-all, end-all for people that are into [math]. . . . It has a magical, mystical quality.” A trip to Maine helped solidify the landscape in her mind. And then, Vanderpool says, Early made himself known: “At a certain point,” she explains, “you let go of the inspiration and research and the characters take over. . . . It might sound strange because they’re characters you’re making up, but it’s the only way I can describe it. You give them a chance to tell you who they are.”

Fortunately, Vanderpool was listening. In doing so, she has created a memorable story that is by turns poignant, funny and exciting—and reminds us not to rule out the possibility that there might be a bit of magic in our everyday lives.

But while Abilene…

Fiction

Fiction

Edward Kelsey Moore

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Entering midlife is often associated with trying something new, from skydiving to a new hair color to the ever-popular sports car. For debut novelist Edward Kelsey Moore—already an accomplished professional cellist and college professor—writing was that something new.

“I didn’t complete my first short story until after I turned 40,” Moore (who is now 52) tells BookPage from his home in Chicago, where he lives with his longtime partner. “It was one of those midlife things. I thought, I’m not going to be happy until I write. I wanted to all along, but had another creative outlet I really loved and focused on. Finally, I just said . . . I’ll enter the local NPR station’s yearly short-story contest, write one story, and that will fix the urge.”

But despite years of experience on stage and in a classroom, Moore wasn’t quite ready to put his writing out in front of people, and he let the deadline pass. Then came a twist of (or gentle nudge from) fate: He was hired by the NPR station, WBEZ, to play in a string quartet during the awards event for the very same short-story competition. “I was sitting there playing Mozart and being reminded that I chickened out,” Moore recalls. Sufficiently chastened, he entered the contest the following year—and won.

“That was the start of it all,” he says. Several more published short stories followed, and then, a novel: The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, published this month by Knopf. Moore says working with Knopf has been “a lovely surprise . . . and I have a lovely agent! What a wonderful position to be in.”

It’s a vantage point that’s enhanced by the passage of time: “When I was 25 or 30, I couldn’t have enjoyed this the way I am now. I would’ve been so self-conscious. But you get to a certain point where you can say, this is just good—you don’t have to qualify it or put any weirdness into it.”

That’s true of his cello playing, too, Moore says. “I was probably a better technician 25 years ago, but I didn’t allow myself to relax or take any sort of risks. . . . Now I have a lot more freedom emotionally, and knowledge the world won’t end if I make mistakes. Certainly if I’d set out to be a writer first, it would’ve brought the same anxiety. I took a long, long road to adulthood.”

The author’s current, more expansive approach to life inhabits every person and encounter—some quotidian, some dramatic, some madcap—in The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, set in fictional Plainview, Indiana, from the 1960s to the 2000s.

Via the 40-year friendship of Odette, Clarice and Barbara Jean (nicknamed “the Supremes” in their teens), Moore makes a convincing case for being open enough to take emotional risks, whether befriending people who see the world differently, speaking your mind even if it’s scary or daring to fall in love.

“I wanted to write about women who were like the women I knew, who were smart and interesting and not foolish.”

He also does an excellent job giving voice to a sizable array of characters, most of whom are women. Moore says he didn’t set out to write in the female voice and didn’t even realize it might be seen as unusual. “It wasn’t until Knopf bought the novel that anyone mentioned it. I simply never thought about it,” he says.

“Maybe if I weren’t a black man or a gay man I wouldn’t feel this way, but I spent a fair amount of my youth trying to get away from the notion that anybody should look at the world a certain way. I think once you let go of that, it becomes a lot easier to empathize with people and see there’s really not that much difference between what someone feels . . . whether it’s a person with 10 times as much money or another set of genitalia.”

Similarly, Moore says, “I wasn’t trying to make the book specific to a black experience, or anything other than who I thought these women were. When I first wrote it, they weren’t even all black—I didn’t think that was the most important thing about them, by any means.”

“That whole ‘strong black woman’ thing brings in a bunch of stereotypes I didn’t want to write about; it tends to conjure up this sassy, smart-talking TV reality-show woman,” he says of the trope that some find offensive. “It was very important to me that I not contribute to what I feel is often a popular culture that demeans women in general and black women in particular. I wanted to write about women who were like the women I knew, who were smart and interesting and not foolish.”

Moore has been lucky to know women like the Supremes. Odette enjoys her food, speaks her mind and is the de facto leader of the trio. Clarice leans toward superficial, but her friends draw out her inner empathy. And preternaturally beautiful Barbara Jean survived a difficult childhood and now struggles with new sorrow and long-held regret. The centerpiece of the novel is one year in the lives of the three friends, but flashbacks told from various points of view reveal mileposts along the women’s journeys, both individual and intertwined.

There’s also plenty of hilarity in The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, whether in the guise of a faux psychic; an astoundingly hypocritical church deacon; a series of unfortunate events at an elaborate wedding; or a vegetarian dog (the only one in southern Indiana).

Throughout, everyone circles back to Earl’s, where Moore conjures up the events, sounds and scents of the diner with writerly ease. His charming, skillful evocation of the small-town life of Plainview and its cleverly crafted history will make readers curious about (or nostalgic for) Indiana, where Moore grew up and regularly visits.

Soon, though, he’ll be visiting other countries on an international book tour, where he’ll get practice stepping into the spotlight without his cello. “I was surprised at the feeling of nakedness in writing fiction. Every weird little thing coming out of your imagination, you have to own up to it. As a [cello] performer, you can blame Beethoven or the instrument; they serve as a shield.”

Ultimately, though, Moore says, “People are going to tell me what kind of book I’ve written, and that’s the way it should be. I wrote what I wanted to write, and what others think about it, what it means to them, is up to them.” Spoken like a true adult—and an author.

“I didn’t complete my first short story until…

Children's & YA, YA, YA Fiction

Children's & YA YA Fiction YA

Mary E. Pearson

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

A survey of Mary E. Pearson’s seven novels to date reveals an interesting trend. Namely, all of her protagonists are the same age: 17.

“That’s true! You’re the only one who’s noticed that and asked about it,” Pearson says in a call from her home in Carlsbad, California. “I just like that age. . . . You’re as old as you can be as a teenager and not considered an adult.”

Plus, she explains, “It might sound weird, but I feel like I had all of my adult sensibilities at 17, my world outlook. Hopefully I’ll always continue to change, and I have been changing, but I do feel like I was pretty much aware of the world then. I think the decisions we make at that age are adult decisions, and they last us a lifetime.”

That’s certainly true of Locke Jenkins, the 17-year-old at the heart of Fox Forever, the third and final installment of Pearson’s Jenna Fox Chronicles.

Readers first became aware of Locke in the first book, The Adoration of Jenna Fox, as one in a tight-knit trio of teens: Jenna, Locke and Kara. In that first volume, Jenna told her story, an astonishing, often disturbing tale—one in which her friends seemingly disappeared under tragic circumstances.

In book two, The Fox Inheritance, Locke recounted what had happened to him and Kara: Like Jenna, their minds were kept alive after a terrible car accident, their only physical form a couple of cubes sitting on a shelf. But unlike Jenna, who awoke after a year, Locke’s and Kara’s minds were kept in a terrifying limbo for 260 years. As they travel to a reunion with Jenna, the two must face a new reality: They’re 17, but also 277—and while their existence arguably represents a triumph of science, it’s also illegal.

Now, in Fox Forever, it’s time for Locke to strike out on his own. He wants to return to Boston, where he’s from, and search for any traces of his family. At Jenna’s urging, he’s adjusting to life as a young man who in many ways is the 17-year-old he appears to be, yet has endured things that have aged him well beyond most people. And most urgently, he needs to repay the help, or Favor, extended to him by an underground resistance group known as the Network . . . an endeavor that will be much more complicated than he anticipates.

The near-future world Pearson has created is carefully constructed and vividly depicted, from the Network to the intricate transportation system to the memorable Bots, who are programmed to be loyal but dare to have their own dreams, too.

Says Pearson, “I grew up watching ‘Star Trek’ and ‘Lost in Space,’ so the idea of something that is really like a robot but has much more humanity to it—this story gave me a chance to explore that. I’m always interested in exploring what makes us human, the differences between humans, is one person more human than another. . . .”

She adds, “Another thing I liked exploring, probably more than anything, is our relationships and how they feed and nurture us. [For some of the characters], there’s probably not any actual genetic connection after so many generations, but now they still need somebody to feel connected to this world. . . . I have to say, I cried like a baby when [certain key characters] met. I like it when a scene makes me cry—this was one of those instances where I felt like I was outside of myself and really watching it happen.”

Pearson also raises questions about science and technology, and whether the benefits of scientific advances outweigh the repercussions. It makes for a heady read, because it leads to larger questions about the effects our choices can have—not just now, but also rippling ahead through time in ways we can’t even imagine.

“I always love how science says one thing, and then a few years later, it’s ‘Maybe this is possible after all,’” Pearson says. “Science is kind of an art, too. There’s always something being discovered and unfolding, and that’s what makes it exciting.”

Pearson also enjoys writing about the near-ish future—just a few hundred years ahead—because some of the things she describes aren’t really that unlikely. “I did a lot of research, like with the colonization of Mars. Scientists are predicting it, and we’re already landing things on Mars, so it’s not so far-fetched that we’ll have people out there by then,” she says. But just in case, she’s glad that the futuristic setting means “No one can ever tell me if I was right or wrong!”

Clearly, her enthusiasm for scientific inquiry has struck a chord, to judge by all the letters she receives from science teachers. “A lot of them are using the Fox series as the literature in their science classrooms, which I think is pretty cool,” she says. “I do love exploring gray areas. The books don’t give answers, I hope, they just raise questions, and I think that’s why they’re using them.”

Pearson is certain, though, that regardless of technology or time period, “there are some things that never change, the things that truly matter.” That notion is physically embodied by the locations Pearson chose for Fox Forever, which begins in California and moves to Boston, where Locke returns for the bulk of the book’s goings-on involving the Network, numerous Bots, political intrigue and new friends and enemies. “It’s a fun thing in a futuristic book to have that old history. In The Adoration of Jenna Fox, the mission . . . in California terms, that’s old, a few hundred years. And that’s one of the things we always try to hold onto—our heritage. Since Boston is the birthplace of our country, it was a great place to have so much of Fox Forever take place.”

Bringing such a complex, thought-provoking, action-packed trilogy to a close was no small task, not least because Pearson initially had no intention of writing a series. In fact, she says, “There was a point in my life when I said I’d never write a series! I always wanted to try something new and challenging, but I realized that, after writing all different kinds of books, writing a series was a challenge.”

Pearson’s experience taking a story through three books and two narrators will smooth the way for her next endeavor: another series, The Remnant Trilogy. Although she can’t share too much about the series, she did reveal that it “explores various histories and how they contradict each other. . . . There’s definitely a romance, too, and it appears to take place in medieval times.”

If the Jenna Fox Chronicles are any indication, the new trilogy is sure to benefit from Pearson’s facility for world-building and character development, not to mention a willingness to embrace her own penchant for the far-out. And yes, for the 17-year-old protagonist—this time, a princess.

After all, she says, “People sometimes think of teenagers as some other kind of being, but they’re adults, just young ones. And ages are arbitrary. . . . Age doesn’t necessarily make you the more wise or knowledgeable person.” Wisely said.

A survey of Mary E. Pearson’s seven novels to date reveals an interesting trend. Namely, all of her protagonists are the same age: 17.

“That’s true! You’re the only one who’s noticed that and asked about it,” Pearson says in a call from her home in…

Children's & YA, YA, YA Fiction

Children's & YA YA Fiction YA

Sara Zarr

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

It’s safe to say that readers of all ages would benefit from pondering the big-picture questions Sara Zarr explores in The Lucy Variations: Are you obligated to “use” your talent, or is it all right to simply enjoy it? And what do you do when someone you love makes decisions you abhor?

Thanks to a family that pushes her toward achievement to the exclusion of all else, at age 13 piano prodigy Lucy Beck-Moreau found herself at a crossroads: She could keep buying into the compete-at-all-costs ethos, or just . . . quit. No more competition, no more pressure, no more piano. But after so many years of playing, a life devoid of piano isn’t one she can sustain.

That’s where Zarr introduces us to Lucy: She’s 16 now, a pariah in her own home with plenty of free time to explore her San Francisco hometown, make non-pianist friends and contemplate a future that’s no longer preordained. It’s a revelation to Lucy that there are options beyond the ones she’s been spoon-fed. Flashbacks to her 13th year reveal the circumstances that led her to quit, and in Zarr’s skillful hands, Lucy’s growing awareness becomes a delicious inevitability, as well as an object lesson for readers who aren’t quite comfortable living a life of supposed-tos but don’t know how to make changes.

Zarr herself grew up in a musical family; her parents were both accomplished musicians, and Zarr played clarinet through high school. But her parents never pushed her toward a career in music. In a phone call from Salt Lake City, where she lives with her husband and pet parakeet, she explains, “Lucy’s family couldn’t be more different from mine in that way. My mom was not ambitious, though she is extremely smart and talented. My late father lost his career as a musician and college professor because of his drinking. . . . There was a lot of pain around that. And my mom was just trying to survive. No one pressured me to do anything, and there was never any talk about what I wanted to do when I grew up.”

For a teenage piano prodigy, there is joy when the music stops.

Fortunately for fans of her work—four previous novels, including her debut, 2007 National Book Award finalist Story of a Girl—Zarr found her way to the writing career she believes she was meant to have. Now, with The Lucy Variations, Zarr says she wanted to try new things.

“It was a very different experience to write about a family so driven by tangible success and appearances. Usually I write close-to-middle-class or struggling-middle-class kinds of stories,” she explains. Creating characters with different concerns was a challenge the author welcomed. Also on Zarr’s to-do list: creating a story “about a relationship between a teen girl and an older man that wasn’t about abuse.” She’s done so with Lucy and Will, the charismatic young piano teacher who’s hired to teach Lucy’s younger brother Gus. Will, with his unapologetic appreciation of the beauty in life, becomes a catalyst for Lucy’s new outlook.

Zarr is aware that Lucy and Will’s relationship might make some readers uncomfortable, but she knows from experience that such friendships can be wonderful. “When I was a teen, I got involved in community theater and had a life in the world of adults in my own way. I felt like, I have a place in this world, people like me and respect me, expect me to do a good job, and treat me like an equal. That was really great for me, because I didn’t feel accepted and respected with my peers in that way.”

She adds, “Obviously there’s a line where it is something terrible, and people should be concerned, but there’s a whole range of appropriate behavior and gray area. . . . There is so much fear around it, and I don’t think it’s necessary.”

Ultimately, facing fear in its many forms is at the heart of The Lucy Variations. Because of Lucy’s crisis-induced life changes, her family and friends experience uncertainty, too. Some of them are unwilling to stray from their expected paths; after all, change and choices can be scary, especially when the people around you want to maintain the status quo.

Not unlike her protagonist, the author says she’s thinking about a change in her life. “This is my midlife crisis disguised in this book about Lucy,” Zarr says with a laugh. “I’m definitely at the point of burnout. . . . I intentionally got to the point where I don’t have any pending things that I owe anyone, and I’ll be in that space for a while before I do whatever I’m going to do next.”

Before her hiatus began, Zarr did co-write a novel with Tara Altebrando: Roomies, due out in the fall. “It felt super-easy and fun—it was a complete delight,” she says. And despite her plans to take some time off, Zarr also feels that her writerly life so far has been delightful: “My whole career has been a big surprise—I’m really grateful. . . . It’s a great place to be.” Her readers certainly hope it’s a place she’ll return to when the time is right.

Children's & YA, Middle Grade

Children's & YA Middle Grade

Maile Meloy

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Maile Meloy’s middle grade books mix adventure with historical fiction, scientific curiosity and a hefty dose of thrilling, mysterious magic. They also feature extensive artwork that helps to tell the story, so Meloy’s fans won’t be surprised to learn that she considers herself a visual thinker.

In fact, Meloy says in a call from her Los Angeles home, it was her habit of using clip art to organize chapters that sparked the idea for publishing the books as illustrated novels. Her middle grade debut, The Apothecary, came about after two screenwriter friends told her their idea for “a movie about a magical apothecary, set during the Cold War.” They eventually decided it should be done as a novel first, with Meloy as the writer. “They provided a beginning and some general ideas. It was fantastic to have that push. . . . And part of the reason why I used art to organize it was because they’re such visual thinkers, too. Over time, it became a great way to make sure I had the right focus, so I’d make sure I had a title and image to go with each chapter.”

The illustrations in her books certainly enhance the story, such as when she wants to “build suspense, or illustrate a samovar or Samoyed dog.” Ian Schoenherr’s artwork is detailed and vibrant, achieving whimsy without being cutesy. Even better, his line work evokes depth and darkness when something scary or sad looms, and it’s just plain fun to turn a page and encounter, say, giant frogs’ eyes calmly contemplating the reader.

The magic in her books, of course, lends itself well to fantastical artwork, and it also provides her characters with the adventure of their lives. After the events of The Apothecary, Janie, Benjamin and Pip have been scattered to the far corners of the world at the beginning of The Apprentices. The year is 1954, two years since they’ve all been together. They’re all dealing with often exciting, sometimes disturbing new realities: Janie has returned to America, where she’s diving into the intellectual challenges at a New England boarding school . . . but a jealous roommate and her sinister father just might upend everything. Benjamin and his father are working together in the midst of war in the Vietnam jungle, and Pip is swanning about Europe enjoying his new TV-star status.

Despite their geographical separation (and lots of hazy memories), they find new, strange ways to communicate and eventually start making their way back to each other as they become embroiled in a race against time to maintain world peace (and perhaps foil a few bad guys along the way). Readers will pick up some fascinating historical information, too, and they’ll be intrigued to encounter kids who sometimes know more than adults, scientists who believe in magic and birds that might not be just birds.

Meloy, who has also published four books for adults, all critically lauded, says she didn’t have to make a concerted effort to change her writing for younger readers. “I did say to myself at one point, I have the Invasion of Nanking in a children’s book—what am I doing?” she says with a laugh. “But I feel like kids do deal with big issues, so that was really the only thing where I decided to tone down the description a bit.” She explains that Janie, who narrates the books, “is writing as an adult, and everything is how she experienced it at 14, so that determined the register, and she can explain things she knows now but didn’t know at 14. Plus, she’s an intelligent kid.”

This isn’t the first time Meloy has worked on stories for children. After graduating from Harvard in the mid-1990s, she moved out to L.A. and worked in what she describes as a “funny little corner of Disney, where they did direct-to-DVD animation of things like sequels to big movies, and fairy-tale-based projects. It was great storytelling training . . . really smart people telling universal stories about love and loss and home.”

Considering her successful career thus far, it’s safe to say she took that training to heart. The Apothecary and The Apprentices have at their heart a group of characters that readers care deeply about, judging by the wonderful letters Meloy’s young fans send her. She says, “You don’t get that when writing books for adults. You don’t get letters with illustrations in the margins, or pleas for a sequel. So that’s really fun.”

Meloy also loves that the covers for both books are gender neutral. “When writing novels for grown-ups, I’d get a cover design and say that no guy will ever pick up this book, and they’d say men don’t read novels. It made me so sad,”she recalls. “With these books, they’re told by a girl, boys have a major part in it, they’re adventures. . . . I’ve really found a lot of the kids that connect to it are boys.” Mother-daughter book groups are particular fans, too.

Boys, girls, young, old: If readers loved The Apothecary, they’ll be thrilled to get their hands on The Apprentices—and to learn that Meloy is now writing a third book about Janie and her cohorts. We can’t share too many details, but she did reveal that Book 3 begins soon after Book 2, and there will be plenty of magic. Let the anticipation begin!

Children's & YA, Middle Grade

Children's & YA Middle Grade

Kirkpatrick Hill

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Fiction writers are often exasperated by questions from readers who want to know whether their books’ characters and events are based on real life. Not so with Kirkpatrick Hill.

Instead, she told BookPage in an interview from her Fairbanks, Alaska, home, “Everything in the book is pretty much true. Think of me as a Grandma Moses type: I’m just recapturing things.”

In her eighth novel for young readers, Bo at Ballard Creek, Hill sends us back to the 1920s, to a post-gold rush town called Ballard Creek that sits on the Koyukuk River. She herself lived at a mining camp as a child in the 1940s—she comes from a family of mining engineers—and says she was “just like Bo.”

Readers who grew up in suburbs or cities—really, anywhere that doesn’t have Alaska’s snow and ice and bouts of 24-hour daylight—may find it hard to picture living in a 1920s mining town intertwined with an Eskimo village, a place where everyone has a broom on the front stoop (it’s rude not to sweep snow off your boots before you go inside); kids are told not to run in the woods because a bear might chase them; and only one resident has ever laid eyes on an airplane.

But thanks to Hill’s vivid writing (and her palpable fondness for her home state), plus LeUyen Pham’s artful, adorable illustrations, the places and people of Bo’s world soon feel familiar. Especially because, despite being set in a seemingly exotic place, Hill’s story encompasses universal themes—like the fact that families don’t require members to be blood relations.

Bo’s own family is described in the first chapter: “Bo had two fathers and no mothers, and after she got the fathers, she got a brother, too. But not in the usual way.”

It’s a promising, tantalizing start, and Hill has crafted an entertaining and interesting backstory: Bo’s fathers both came to Alaska in the gold rush of 1897, in search of work and a way to get some distance from sadness. Arvid, a Swede, had recently lost his mother, and Jack, an African American, was grieving the death of his fiancée. The two big, strong men became friends and workmates, and when Bo’s mother (a “good-time girl” known as Mean Millie) thrust her baby at them and demanded they take her to a local orphanage, Arvid and Jack couldn’t bear to leave her there. So they took her home and, with help from their miner and Eskimo neighbors, they became Bo’s family.

Hill says the blend of races and cultures in Bo at Ballard Creek jives with her own experiences, as does Bo’s unofficial adoption. She says, “It happened a lot. It was a ubiquitous thing, not just men of course. . . . And also, within the Indian culture, it was very common for people to give up their kids. Kids would live right in the same village with their natural parents and have two sets of relatives. And you see, Jack and Arvid had no legal claim to Bo at all, because they never would’ve had to.”

It’s fascinating stuff, not least because it’s true. That’s very important to Hill, who says her urge to commit Alaska—and its singular history, dramatic terrain and diverse people—to the printed page was prompted by years of frustration with the way the state was depicted in books and other media. As a mother of six, and during her 30-plus years as an elementary school teacher, Hill encountered many ill-informed books about her state. “I would read Alaska books to my children, and they were all totally bogus because the authors weren’t from Alaska. And Jack London . . . it was as bogus as you could get!” So, she decided she’d write about Alaska herself.

Her first book, Toughboy and Sister, was published in 1990, when Hill was in her early 50s (if you’re wondering, Grandma Moses began painting in her 70s). She explains, “I’d gotten seriously broke and needed a new life plan, so I thought, ‘Well, I’ll just send this off and get some money.’ I had no clue how anything worked at all!” Then, she says, “By the sheerest good luck, it fell into the right hands. A dear, lovely person got it out of the slush pile and wrote me a letter. . . . It never should’ve happened. You just don’t do things like that!”

But Hill did, and it worked—and she’s been writing ever since. While her protagonists are a range of ages, and her time periods are both historic and contemporary, all of her books are set in her beloved home state and make real the traditions and trials, foods and fun experienced by the people who have lived there, from sliding down a riverbank, to making ice cream out of decidedly non-dairy ingredients, to hearing the click-clacks of a telegraph machine.

Like all of Hill’s novels, Bo at Ballard Creek is a fine mix of happiness and hard truths, reverence for history and excitement about innovation. It’s enough to make readers want to visit Alaska to see it for themselves. Though perhaps, for those who are winter-precipitation-averse, you might want to check the forecast first: When she spoke with BookPage in May, Hill realized that day was her “last ticket for the ice pool. . . . I guessed on days the ice would go out. But the weather’s gone mad, and we’re still experiencing winter when normally there would be leaves on the trees. I’m looking out my window at snow, deep snow.”

Fiction writers are often exasperated by questions from readers who want to know whether their books’ characters and events are based on real life. Not so with Kirkpatrick Hill.

Instead, she told BookPage in an interview from her Fairbanks, Alaska, home, “Everything in the book is…

Children's & YA, Middle Grade

Children's & YA Middle Grade

Holly Goldberg Sloan

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Some people have lucky numbers; others have lucky stars. Holly Goldberg Sloan credits her career change, and her subsequent success as an author of children’s books, to something a little different: a lucky shrimp.

Alas, said shellfish wasn’t so felicitous for Sloan’s husband. But for her, it touched off a life-changing transition from screenwriter (numerous feature films, including Angels in the Outfield) to author (2011’s I’ll Be There, and now Counting by 7s).

In a phone call from her Santa Monica, California, home, Sloan told BookPage the story of how her first book came to be: “My friend asked us to go on a trip, and didn’t give a lot of specifics. It turned out we went to a vegetarian yoga resort, which was totally cool with me, but my husband isn’t a vegetarian and doesn’t do yoga. The first night, I asked if they had meat or protein of any kind. They were able to get a limited amount of shrimp, so he ordered that.”

Then, gastrointestinal disaster struck—and between her husband being out of commission for a week and the resort’s no-Internet-or-TV policy, Sloan found she had some time to kill. “It was really serendipitous,” she says. “If I hadn’t gone on a crazy vacation in Mexico, where I was on my own and my husband was in a stone hut, sick . . . I wouldn’t have had so much time on my hands, and started writing a book.”

Fortunately, Sloan’s husband was not harmed during the writing of her brilliant second book, Counting by 7s, which draws readers into the singular world of eccentric 12-year-old Willow Chance.

Sloan has created a story where the line between youth and adulthood moves back and forth.

Willow applies her prodigious intelligence to her hobbies: a thriving and varied backyard garden, and the diagnosis of medical conditions. “I am particularly drawn to skin disorders,” Willow explains with a seriousness that is at once amusing and endearing, “which I photograph only if the subject (and one of my parents) isn’t looking.” She also counts by sevens to establish a soothing sense of order. “It’s an escape technique,” Willow says.

But when her parents, with whom she has a loving relationship, are killed in a car accident, Willow’s pain cannot be organized or soothed away. Even worse, the policemen who gave her the terrible news are asking about next of kin—and she has none, save a grandmother with dementia.

Then a lie spoken out of compassion—a new friend, Mai, tells the police her family has known Willow’s for a long time, and can thus take her in—offers a temporary reprieve. It also segues into a memorable story of kindness among friends and strangers, the dangers and rewards of taking risks, and ultimately an exploration of the meaning of family.

Sloan’s gift for storytelling is evident: Her characters are sometimes kooky, but not too; trust is earned and happiness tentatively blooms, but not so quickly as to seem unlikely; and Willow’s sorrow isn’t smoothed over, but rather recognized as an addition to her new, unpredictable existence.

If anything might seem improbable to readers, Sloan says, it’s probably Willow’s preternatural poise and smarts. “I know that some people will read the book and think it’s not possible, that Willow seems to have superhuman powers,” she says. “But they just haven’t been around a kid like that. If you’ve been around highly gifted kids, some of them do seem to have superpowers, and corresponding confidence. Those kids spend more time with adults . . . but because they’re more comfortable with adults, they become outcasts in their own peer group.”

Sloan says she’s “always been interested in those kinds of kids,” not least because she was sometimes one of them, which she drew on when creating this story. For example, during one year in elementary school, she left her classroom twice weekly to visit a nearby college campus, where “the psychology department was conducting an experiment rewarding gifted children.” Sloan says, “It was so strange, and it made me feel like an outsider.” In Counting by 7s, Willow leaves class for regular visits with her school’s counselor, Dell Duke—something that further sets her apart from her peers, too.

In addition, Sloan’s father’s job as a consultant to the Peace Corps meant her family had a new address every few years, so she was the new kid in class many times. “I had a peripatetic childhood that in many ways informs who I am today, and influences my writing because I very much identify with outsiders,” she says.

And, she adds, “You can approach that in two ways: Be Willow-esque and retreat to live in your own head, which is a great place to live on some levels, or throw yourself into the situation. Mai . . . throws herself into the world and makes as many connections as she can, while Willow does the opposite until she’s forced to do something else.”

But it’s not just Willow who must learn to behave differently; the adults in Counting by 7s have some growing and changing to do, too. For example, Dell Duke has long categorized the kids he counsels (as misfits, oddballs, geniuses, etc.), but Willow and her friends defy his descriptions. And Mai’s mother’s routines are upended, which makes her cranky—but also leaves her more open to the unexpected.

Sloan says that aspect of the book struck a chord with one of its first readers: “I gave it to a precocious 11-year-old, and she said her favorite character was [taxi driver] Juan, by far. She said she liked him because Willow made him change without even trying. And I know what she’s saying—she’s very attracted to the idea that she could be doing this in the adult world, too.”

It’s easy to imagine that readers—whether kids, adults, young-at-heart adults or precocious kids—will find themselves taken with, even inspired by, Counting by 7s. Sloan has created a story where the line between youth and adulthood moves back and forth, often more than once in a single day—and where kids and adults “have relationships that are real and go both directions,” she says. The book is a moving, often funny reminder that such relationships are worth cultivating, and that being open to new people and experiences—however strange or difficult they may seem—can lead to wonderful things.

After all, look what happened when Sloan and her husband went on that vaguely described vacation, and her husband ate that fateful, tainted crustacean! “I’m hoping that today my husband also thinks it was a lucky shrimp,” Sloan says. “But I don’t ask.”

Alas, said shellfish wasn’t so felicitous for Sloan’s husband. But for…

Children's & YA, Picture Book

Children's & YA Picture Book

Steven Kellogg

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Steven Kellogg has made a career of dreaming up stories that entertain, intrigue and delight. The author and illustrator has his name on more than 100 books and counting, from reimaginings of fairy tales to quirky animal stories such as The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash.

His new book, Snowflakes Fall, stands apart from the rest. Kellogg, who lived with his family in Sandy Hook, Connecticut, for 35 years, collaborated with his longtime friend, Newbery Medalist Patricia MacLachlan (Sarah, Plain and Tall), to create a story that pays tribute and offers hope in the wake of the December 14, 2012, mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, in which 20 students and six staff members died.

Kellogg took time out of his busy schedule to answer questions about the genesis of Snowflakes Fall, his personal connection to Sandy Hook and a new partnership with a dear friend.

What was it like to work on a book that held such emotional heft for you—and the people who will be reading it and remembering that day??

It was very important to me to be able to deal with the depression brought on by the tragedy, and I chose the voice of the picture book to deal with the sadness while gratefully celebrating my memories of the vibrant community where, for 35 years, I lived and worked and raised my family. The events of 12/14 will always be the darkest chapter in the town's history, and, while acknowledging that deep sorrow, I also wanted the illustrations to join the spirit of the uplifting, life-affirming verses Patricia wrote by depicting the joy and wonder that children who grow up in that idyllic village and its magical woodlands have experienced ever since the town was founded in the early 18th century.

"Her lyrical verses evoked my memories of children playing in the woods, fields and streams that surrounded our old farmhouse in Sandy Hook."

Have any of your other books been as personally meaningful for you??

All of the books I have written and/or illustrated are personally meaningful to me, but Snowflakes Fall is unique in that it allowed me to utilize the picture book art form to address the dark shadows cast by a tragedy in a manner that acknowledges profound sadness, but also revels in the rich diversity of life and the beautiful changes we see all around us, in growing children and the evolving seasons.

Did you and Ms. MacLachlan readily "click" regarding your respective visions for Snowflakes Fall?

Authors and illustrators rarely collaborate during the creation of a book, and that accepted custom can allow the creative process to flow more freely for both because they concentrate on their individual contributions rather than their personal relationship. Occasionally, a book benefits from a long-established friendship between the artist and author, and that was very much the case with Snowflakes Fall. The coming together of the text and images was enhanced by the freedom we felt to discuss and integrate each other's pictorial and verbal ideas, and to make suggestions we felt would help the book put across the feelings and insights we both hoped to convey.

Was the snowflake metaphor the first thing that came to mind? And the snow angels . . . I see that, at book's end, there are 20 of them spiraling up to the sky. Beautiful.

On first reading, I loved the eloquent phrases and the images in the verses Patricia wrote, and her utilization of the diversity and beauty of the simple snowflake to establish the theme of the book. I couldn't wait to combine her poetry with the paintings I was imagining. Her lyrical verses evoked my memories of children playing in the woods, fields and streams that surrounded our old farmhouse in Sandy Hook. We had very constructive discussions about ways in which the verbal and visual movement of the book could be shaped so it would achieve the effect we both envisioned. Her mention of snow angels in one of the sequences, for example, opened me to the possibility of broadening their presence to the jacket, the title page, the last spread, and to the final, wordless scene on the last endpaper where they rise from the silent moonlit playground and fly into the healing peace of the falling snow.

Do you hope your book will help children understand that artistic expression can help us when we're grieving?

My intent was to illustrate the book as a celebration of the uniqueness of children and the joy of childhood, with a concentration on the excitement of the changing seasons, and the fascinating, celebratory and occasionally very difficult stages of life as it continually evolves. My hope is that we have created a picture book that will speak about a range of emotions and reach out to people of all ages.

Most of the 100 books you've published were created when you lived in Sandy Hook. What made it such a fertile place for your imagination and your art? ?

In addition to the beautiful landscape and congenial townships, the joy of my life in Sandy Hook evolved from the discovery of a generous old farmhouse that accommodated all of our needs. . . . It had an intriguing maze of intimate nooks and crannies that were perfect for a large family with a Great Dane and a troupe of personable cats . . . and I realized the attic rooms could be combined into the perfect space for a studio that overlooked the treetops and woodland waterfall below. We loved living in that house, and it appears in the distance in one of the illustrations in the book.

Were you ever concerned about readers thinking it was "too soon" to do this book?

I felt an urgent need to express and re-channel the concerns the tragedy aroused in me, and I hoped the book's carefully composed life-affirming and consoling qualities would be felt by people who read Patricia's verses and wandered through the pages of the accompanying paintings.

Will you be touring with Ms. MacLachlan to promote Snowflakes Fall?

I'll be doing an event for the village of Sandy Hook and the Newtown community, and select appearances in addition to ones I’ve already done for booksellers in New Orleans and Providence, RI.

Random House made a donation to support Sandy Hook, and will donate new books to national literacy organization First Book, correct?

Yes, a book donation will be made to First Book and, in honor of Newtown, Connecticut, and the village of Sandy Hook, Random House Children’s Books has made a donation to the Where Angels Play Foundation in support of The Sandy Ground: Where Angels Play project. The project's goal is to build 26 playgrounds along the Hurricane Sandy-ravaged coast of New Jersey, New York and Connecticut to honor the lives of those lost at Sandy Hook Elementary.

View the book trailer for Snowflakes Fall:

Contemporary Romance, Romance

Romance Contemporary Romance

Jill Shalvis

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

It takes a certain kind of person to parlay tearful, angry-door-slamming sibling rivalry into a series of popular novels.

But Jill Shalvis is nothing if not creative, so she combined her romance-writer instincts (50 novels and counting) with her motherly concerns, and kicked off her best-selling Lucky Harbor series.

“My three daughters had just entered their teens and were fighting all the time,” Shalvis recalls. “I couldn’t imagine a happily-ever-after for them.” So she made one up. “I pitched a story about three estranged sisters who inherit their mother’s dilapidated beach inn [in a small town in Washington state]. They can’t sell the inn because it’s a mess, so they’re stuck together for the summer. They start out estranged, and end up happy.”

Shalvis says her publisher was enthusiastic about the idea right away. “Grand Central was lovely enough to say, let’s do it as a trilogy, with each sister getting her own story.” Then, “when I turned in the third manuscript, they said, this is becoming very popular, we need more.”

Thus followed three more Lucky Harbor trilogies. February will see the arrival of Book 9, Once in a Lifetime, featuring Aubrey, who’s trying to reopen her beloved late aunt’s bookstore—and check names off a list of people to whom she wants to make amends.

Aubrey’s uncle hires Ben to fix up the store. Ben’s been grieving the death of his wife by doing engineering jobs in dangerous places around the world. Romance isn’t on either one’s mind, but it’s not long before Aubrey’s more than a little distracted by Ben (and his low-slung tool belt), and he her. There’s an underlying threat to their connection, though: Aubrey has a secret she’s afraid to share, and Ben’s afraid to fall in love again.

The two receive well-meaning advice from family and friends, as well as suggestions posted on the Lucky Harbor Facebook page by a group of irrepressible senior citizens. That small-town scrutiny figures in all the Lucky Harbor novels.

“I grew up in Los Angeles, a very large town that’s very anonymous, but my dream was always the opposite,” Shalvis says. “[Lucky Harbor] is truly just a fantasy.”

“I grew up in Los Angeles, a very large town that’s very anonymous, but my dream was always the opposite."

Ten years ago, Shalvis’ dream came true when she and her family moved to a home outside Lake Tahoe, California. “I now live in a small town,” she says, “and it’s easy to find the humor. I’m able to pull out things that someone who’s always lived here wouldn’t think are funny, but they are to me.”

She includes herself in that category: “I always feel like a misplaced city girl. I’m always going to scream when a wolf spider shows up, or if I see a bear out by the garbage. I’m not the Pioneer Woman.”

Shalvis thinks there’s a hint of herself in the character Lucille, the chief gossip of Lucky Harbor. “She’s a little bit of how I would see myself as an old lady. I’m curious, I’m nosy,” she says with a laugh.

Shalvis has a knack for translating real-life relationships to the page.

It’s that intense curiosity—plus a knack for translating real-life relationships to the page—that makes Shalvis’ novels so engaging, whether a dialogue-heavy scene in which characters face up to their less-than-pleasant behavior, or a sex scene in which pleasure is the order of the day . . . and the night . . . and the next morning.

About those sexy bits, Shalvis says, “I try to make each sex scene important to the story and individual. Whether the experience is funny, or even anxiety-ridden, I try to keep it real.”

Also keeping things real: Shalvis’ affinity for men with carpentry skills, and the fact that her husband is a builder. Ben of Once in a Lifetime is a tribute to him, she says. “There’s always a tool belt in my books!”

While the current romance trend is the billionaire bad-boy, Shalvis says she prefers real-life men who work with their hands. “It’s more attractive, to me, to make an everyday guy become a hero versus a guy who had everything easy and doesn’t see how hard life is.”

And “there’s always a bromance,” Shalvis says. “It’s a big part of what I write. In Ben’s case, his relationships with [friends] Jack and Luke are part of who he is.”

Aubrey’s attempt to right past wrongs is a big part of who she is, and who she’s trying to become. “There are so many layers, and her huge complicated past, and some things Ben doesn’t know about,” Shalvis says. “I thought, what can I do to make the worst possible scenario?” (No spoilers here, but: It’s a doozy.)

There’s more Lucky Harbor ahead, with another trilogy starting in August. After that, the series will likely come to a close, the author says. “I want to go when readers are still happy. I don’t want to stay too long at the party.”

For the moment, fans have a lot to look forward to—and there’s always Shalvis’ active presence on her blog, Facebook and Twitter, where she alternates shirtless-hunk photos with less sexy updates.

They’re all part of Shalvis’ plan to maintain the sense of community she always longed for—and has found in her fictional hometown of Lucky Harbor and her connection with fans. “Romance readers are the best on the planet,” she says.

It takes a certain kind of person to parlay tearful, angry-door-slamming sibling rivalry into a series of popular novels.

But Jill Shalvis is nothing if not creative, so she combined her romance-writer instincts (50 novels and counting) with her motherly concerns, and kicked off her best-selling Lucky Harbor series.

Children's & YA, Middle Grade

Children's & YA Middle Grade

Margi Preus

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Before she became a Newbery Honor-winning author, Margi Preus spent 25 years as the artistic director of Duluth’s Colder by the Lake Comedy Theatre, where she wrote, produced and directed sketches, operas, plays and adaptations. So why the switch to children’s books? “I had kids!” she says with a laugh.

“Something really happened to me when my older son [now 26] discovered the magic of books at age 2 or 3. He wanted me to read him book after book, and he’d watch my lips and . . . eyes, look at the page, then back up at my face and mouth. I could see he was putting it all together, that those little squiggles on that page are making her say words that have meaning to me. This magical thing is happening to me, and a story is happening somehow. That was a big part of my inspiration, of wanting to try [writing books].”

And so she did, first with three picture books, and then historical fiction for middle grade readers: the 2011 Newbery Honor book Heart of a Samurai and 2012’s Shadow on the Mountain.

Her new book, West of the Moon, was another new writerly adventure for Preus: It’s inspired by the writings and art of her real great-great-grandmother, Linka, who came with her husband to America from Norway in 1851, but the story and its characters are not as tied to history as in her previous works. Preus spun a mere few lines of text from Linka’s diary into a magical mix of folklore, myth and adventure set in the sometimes beautiful, sometimes forbidding mid-19th-century Norwegian mountainside.

The heroine in West of the Moon is not unusual for Scandinavian folktales. "Girls can be very strong; even if a boy comes to rescue them, they tell them what to do.”

It’s the story of 13-year-old Astri, who (in today’s parlance) kicks some serious butt. She’s smart and savvy, and ably navigates strange, stressful situations even if she’s sad or scared—which is fairly often, considering her mother’s dead, her father is somewhere in America, and her aunt has just sold her to a filthy, mean goat-herder, thus separating her from her younger sister Greta.

Astri strives to maintain her safety and dignity, recalling favorite folktales and memories when she needs a mental lift, and using all her guts and wits on a daring escape-and-rescue mission that’s often as funny as it is suspenseful. And the mission continues on—ill-intentioned pursuers and bridge-trolls be damned—because Astri decides it’s time to go to America.

While many details of her ancestors’ own immigration experience informed West of the Moon, Preus says her great-great-grandmother’s brief mention of a girl she met on the ship to America revved up her imagination.

“As I read over [those lines in the diary],” she says, “I wondered . . . what kind of girl would get on a boat alone and go to America, not knowing anyone? I thought I’d see if I could figure out a story for her.”

But, she adds, this “was a bit scary for me. . . . I had so many ideas, and it was hard to settle on what should happen next. [When] writing the two earlier books based on real people . . . I couldn’t go off in a direction too far afield from what actually happened. With Astri, I just had to decide or feel how I wanted it to be.”

One important decision: Preus infused Astri with the strength and smarts typically found in Scandinavian folklore, as well as in the pages of her great-great-grandmother’s diary.

In Astri’s favorite folktale, “the girl goes three days past the end of the world to rescue a guy,” Preus explains. “That’s not an unusual heroine in Scandinavian folktales and fairy tales. Girls can be very strong; even if a boy comes to rescue them, they tell them what to do.”

She adds, “I was thinking about that, looking through the diary again. The night before [Linka] got married, she wrote . . . ‘A human being is a free and independent creature and I would recommend every woman consider it, and I insist that every maiden owes it to herself to do so.’ That is a fairy-tale heroine. . . . She kind of got in trouble as a pastor’s wife, because they were supposed to be submissive.” (At the book’s end, readers may peruse Linka’s actual drawings and a handwritten excerpt from her diary.)

Lucky for readers, Preus’ great-great-grandmother didn’t stop writing and drawing in her diary because others disapproved, and Astri wasn’t meek because dastardly people wanted her to be. That drive for independence, the belief that something better lies ahead, is an inspiration for readers of any age—and, perhaps, an impetus to read Scandinavian folktales.

For now, though, Preus has put folktales aside to work on her next book, a companion to Heart of a Samurai. “It picks up where that book left off, historically.” She’s working on it in her backyard writing house, built for her in 2009 by her younger son (artist and furniture designer Misha Kahn) and her husband, a designer and contractor.

Preus' backyard writing house, where she crafts her stories and wears fingerless gloves as needed.

“It’s a wonderful place. I love it!” she says. “It’s got a real wood stove, great big picture windows looking out over a frozen creek, all birch inside. . . . I’m sure if I looked hard I could see a deer in the woods behind it.” The little wooden house has become vital to Preus’ writing process, now that she’s left the comedy theater (and teaching, which she also did in previous decades) and has been transitioning to writing full-time.

But her years spent focusing on laughter have served her well, as evidenced by the bouts of humor that buoy West of the Moon and in the way she approaches her stories.

“[At the comedy theater], I didn’t write the funny stuff. I just took all these ideas everybody had, all these little scripts and pieces and improv bits, and made them into a show. I feel like writing a novel is a lot like that, with all the different themes that have to come together to make a whole story.”

While she does miss collaborating on comedy productions, “I don’t miss the ego things, which are rampant when doing theater. . . . I have very little patience for that now.” It works out nicely, then, that the woodpeckers and chickadees—and the occasional black bear—in her yard aren’t likely to bicker over personal issues. They’ll do their outdoor things; Preus will write indoors; and Astri will journey on.

Writing house photo courtesy of Preus.

Contemporary Romance, Fiction, Romance

Romance Fiction Contemporary Romance

Robyn Carr and Kristan Higgins

Interview by Linda M. Castellitto

by Linda M. Castellitto

Robyn Carr and Kristan Higgins have a strong and supportive friendship, a match made during the at-first-sight moment their eyes met across a crowded convention-center hallway.

Carr reminisces, “I saw Kristan and [fellow author] Deanna Raybourn standing next to each other, two beautiful women with all these RITA award [ribbons] on their badges, and I said, ‘Jesus, I can’t buy one of those!’ Then Kristan said, ‘Poor Robyn!’ and that was it.”

Translation for those new to romance-land: The RITA is an annual award from the Romance Writers of America (RWA) and is named after RWA’s first president, Rita Clay Estrada. Higgins, author of 12 books and counting, won in 2008 and 2010, while Carr (with nearly 50 books to date) has yet to garner a statuette. Higgins’ quip referred to the fact Carr is a number-one New York Times and USA Today best-selling author many times over . . . so, she’s not doing too badly. Higgins’ books have made those bestseller lists many times as well.

Now, back to our story: The two met for dinner soon after meeting and have been talking on the phone a couple of hours a week since then. Carr says with a laugh, “Oh god, we probably shouldn’t let it get out how much time we spend on the phone, so our editors think we’re working ourselves to death.”

“We probably shouldn’t let it get out how much time we spend on the phone, so our editors think we’re working ourselves to death.”—Robyn Carr

Of course, during much of their time on the phone, they are working. They run ideas past each other, talk through plot or character sticking points, share reader feedback both touching and wacky, and “fix the world every week,” Higgins says. “It’s a lonely, solitary job to write, and Robyn is my colleague.”

BookPage recently joined the phone fun with the two Harlequin authors dialing in from their homes in Las Vegas (Carr) and Connecticut (Higgins) to talk about the writing life, their friendship, their new books and more.

The two share a March 25 release date for Carr’s Four Friends and Higgins’ Waiting on You. Although their novels are set on different coasts (California and New York, respectively) and feature different kinds of characters (40-somethings undergoing marriage-related upheaval, and 30-something exes who haven’t left love behind), both stories deal in second chances . . . how to recognize them; decide if they should be embraced or avoided; and ultimately accept that, while things will not ever go back to the way they were, a new way of living can be wonderful, too.

Carr’s Four Friends are Gerri, Andy, Sonja and BJ, neighbors in Mill Valley, an affluent Marin County suburb of San Francisco. The women take a daily morning power-walk—save BJ, who prefers to run solo—and are very involved in each other’s daily lives. Over the course of several fateful months, the women are beset by revelations, crises and struggles that shake the foundations of their marriages, friendships and outlooks on life.

For starters, Gerri discovers that her relationship with her husband, Phil, isn’t as strong as she thought. Twice-divorced Andy despairs of ever finding a loving and stable mate. And Sonja’s dedication to New Age rituals and remedies is shaken when her husband leaves her, and nothing can make her feel better. To their surprise, it’s the usually reticent BJ who steps in and eventually becomes instrumental in getting the women on their various paths to healing.

It’s a powerful tale, one that doesn’t shy away from the tough stuff, whether it’s infidelity, mental illness, domestic violence or the indignities of menopause (not least of which are those damnable hot flashes). Of course, there’s love and sex and hope, too, presented believably and often humorously by Carr’s skilled and perceptive hand.

When asked if Four Friends represents a move away from romance toward mainstream women’s fiction (although, certainly, her multiple-bestseller status indicates her books have long been reaching a massive audience), Carr notes that she’s done women’s fiction before, “a book I really loved and believed in, that every publisher rejected and Harlequin bought, called The House on Olive Street. In a perfect world, I would do both romance and women’s fiction.”

Higgins adds, “Both of us have that crossover in our books. They’re not just about romance, but about life issues, too.” Continues Carr, “Yes, women’s fiction is about issues . . . you have more issues than you have villains. Kristen’s work crosses over, too—you have a child without a parent, other issues women have taken on and are put in charge of.”

And, says Higgins, “There’s infidelity, grief, belonging . . . women’s fiction focuses more on that than romance.” She adds, “A lot of time, I’m criticized by hardcore romance fans” for having what are seen as women’s-fiction elements in her books, but “You always have to write what you love. Writing books is so hard, I can’t imagine trying to write because I think it would sell. I write because I love the story and characters.”

“Writing books is so hard, I can’t imagine trying to write because I think it would sell. I write because I love the story and characters.”—Kristan Higgins

In Waiting on You, the third novel in Higgins’ Blue Heron series, those characters are Colleen and Lucas, former lovers who, to borrow from a movie line, just can’t seem to quit each other. Colleen and her twin brother, Connor, own a tavern in fictional Manningsport, New York. Connor’s the chef, and Colleen manages the place, pouring drinks and charming customers with equal dexterity. She’s also an ace matchmaker, who has been sticking to superficial encounters herself since getting her heart broken a decade ago.

When said heartbreaker—Lucas—returns to town to care for his ailing uncle, Colleen must admit to herself that she’s not ready to truly let him go. To complicate matters, her kooky friends—particularly the delightful Paulie—insist on continuing in their outrageous ways; Colleen’s mother persists in loudly detailing her menopausal woes; and Colleen's brother is being overly protective. It’s a fine mess, one that Higgins detangles with her trademark mix of empathy and wit.

Striking a particularly appealing and relatable balance of emotion and entertainment is something Carr and Higgins both do exceptionally well, as borne out by their devoted fans and stellar sales. That blend of feeling and fun is no small part of what keeps their fans eagerly anticipating their new releases.

Says Carr, “It’s part of romance’s job as a genre, not only to entertain, and have feelings of eroticism and desire, but also to show women what’s good for women . . . to also serve as an affirmation, and hopefully provide an intelligent, reasonable lesson that’s at some point achievable by an average person.”

Higgins agrees, adding, “In well-constructed romance, the characters become role models. There’s a reason they haven’t found what they’re searching for: They haven’t figured it out yet. During the course of the book, they tackle the issue that’s been their special problem all their lives—whether they feel unworthy, or there’s a past event with a grip they just can’t shake—and overcome it, and the relationship is the reward for self-actualization.”

As for the authors, both Carr and Higgins say that their careers—and the active, engaged romance community—are their own reward every day, whether via a productive writing session, a good review or a positive reader encounter.

Higgins, who’s been writing for 10 years to Carr’s 35, says of people excitedly recognizing her in public, “It’s so funny. I don’t think there’s a more ordinary person than me or Robyn. We’re very normal, ordinary people with this extraordinary career. . . . It’s kind of mind-blowing. I’m not used to it, and I don’t want to get used to it.”

Carr adds, “And if you’re brilliant—as Kristan and I are, obviously . . . ha!—you don’t take that for granted. I’ve seen a lot of writers achieve well-known or best-selling status and act as though they’re entitled to it and it’s their due. But remember, there are a lot of fingerprints on our books, most of all the readers’ . . . they make it all possible, and could make it impossible tomorrow.”

(Photo of Robyn Carr and Kristan Higgins courtesy of Kristan Higgins.)

Robyn Carr and Kristan Higgins have a strong and supportive friendship, a match made during the at-first-sight moment their eyes met across a crowded convention-center hallway.

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