Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein, interview and review

Today author Elizabeth Wein is visiting our book review club to chat about her brilliant new novel, Rose Under Fire, the companion book to Code Name Verity. CNV topped my list of best books of 2012 and won the Printz Honor award for young adult fiction. I expect her latest will be another crossover success with readers of all ages. Elizabeth Wein's lyrical prose soars and hits all of its targets.

Fans of CNV will be pleased to hear that Rose Under Fire features another World War II girl pilot and some old friends: Maddie, Jamie and the morally ambiguous Anna Engel. Although I'd advise reading CNV first for backstory, Rose Under Fire is a stand alone book with literary weight of its own. The story is broader in historical scope and also darker. Read with a box of tissues.

Summary: Rose Justice graduated early from high school in the USA so she could help the war effort in the UK. Raised on her father's airstrip, she is already an accomplished pilot, but women are given domestic air transport duty. Her British uncle pulls strings to get her assigned to a trans-channel flight. A jubilant Rose wings the Eiffel Tower in recently freed France. On the flight home, she vanishes. Rose's story of her time in a women's concentration camp is told in survivor flashbacks interlaced with poetry.

The former Ravensbrück Concentration Camp in Germany, photo by Elizabeth Wein.

Ravensbrück is a grim setting, but the defiant will of the prisoners and their camaraderie make for an uplifting story. My favorite was Irina, the Russian fighter pilot, who crafts model planes out of junk. There were so many strong female characters. However, the horrors of concentration camp life were not glossed over. Rose is beaten, hungry and cold, but she brings hope to her fellow prisoners by exchanging poetry for bread. Like the poetic mouse in Leo Lionni's Frederick's Fables, Rose shares recollections of happier times: good food, bright nail polish and a charming boyfriend. Through Rose, history is humanized. We feel her pain and share her dreams.

"Hope - you think of hope as a bright thing, a strong thing, sustaining. But it's not. It's the opposite. It's simply this: lumps of stale bread stuck down your shirt."

Rose's suffering is put in perspective when she befriends the teenaged girls and women in her cell. The Poles were used as experimental "Rabbits" by Nazi doctors. These rebellious Rabbits are anything but meek victims. They smuggle out messages to the world, but people can't believe such atrocities are true. Although the characters were fictional, they were based on real people and on survivor accounts.

Thanks to Elizabeth, a new generation will learn about the Polish Rabbits. Rose Under Fire was released in the UK this summer and will be available in the USA on September 10th, 2013. I'd highly recommend this book to mature teens and to adults. It would make for meaningful book group and classroom discussions.

I have a personal interest in this period of history. My great grandfather, Arthur Lamport, helped 750 Jews escape Nazi Germany and set them up on farms in the Dominican Republic. You can read about this true story in Tropical Zion by Allen Wells (2009).

Going back a bit further in history, my British grandfather-in-law, Colin Laurence, was a World War I fighter pilot. He was shot down while trying to bomb a German U-Boat base and was imprisoned in Holtzminden. Despite his head injury, Colin and his fellow prisoners tunneled out, were recaptured and then escaped a second time. This week those brave men (now deceased) are being honored in Germany. We named our first child after our family heroes.

Reviewer's Disclaimer: My father gave me a copy of Tropical Zion. Author/Professor Allen Wells teaches at Bowdoin College with my husband. I received a free digital galley of Rose Under Fire from Netgalley. Photos supplied by Elizabeth Wein and reproduced with her permission.

My Interview of Elizabeth Wein

Author Elizabeth Wein by David Ho

Sarah: What made you decide to focus on the Polish experimental “rabbits” of Ravensbrück? 

Elizabeth: I didn’t know about the “Rabbits” myself until I started reading survivor accounts, and when I discovered that their rebellion took place during the time when Rose was going to be at Ravensbrück, I knew that it was their story I wanted to tell. I’d wanted to write about Ravensbrück partly because it was a way for me to cameo several different women’s wartime roles from all over Europe: arrested university professor, terrorist Girl Scout, Soviet combat pilot. But when I found out about the Rabbits, I knew that this story was going to provide the framework for a real plot, not just a series of incidents.

Were there really terrorist girl scouts like Roz'a in Poland?

Yes. I so wish I had a greater knowledge of the Polish language, culture and history so I could write a in-depth story about them. There was a clandestine Girl Scout organization in Ravensbrueck, and they were responsible for saving some of the administrative records there when the Nazis began to destroy the evidence. Here are a few references to the amazing stories of the Polish Girl (and Boy) Scouts in World War II:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_Ranks

http://www.zhpgkh.org/international/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=40&Itemid=35

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravensbr%C3%BCck_concentration_camp#Life_in_the_camp 

Why did you tell the story via an American survivor’s flashbacks?

I used an American voice to tell this story because I wanted to drive home how ordinary so many of these people were—how like us. I think that often gets lost in historical accounts. There were in fact a few Americans at Ravensbrück, though not many; I’ve got some information about them on my website, here.

As for the flashbacks, no survivor accounts are told “in real time.” I wanted this to sound like an authentic survivor account. I was also very impressed with Wanda Poltawska's And I Am Afraid of My Dreams, which she initially wrote in three weeks after the war was over, not long after her return home from Ravensbrueck. A friend had suggested that if she wrote down her experiences it might help her to get through her PTSD. That's where I got the idea for how Rose's story should be told.

Elizabeth Wein at Rose's age living in England. Photo by Katherine Kirkpatrick.

"Time cannot break the bird's wing from the bird.
Bird and wing together
Go down, one feather.
No thing that ever flew, not the lark, not you,
Can die as others do."

-Edna St. Vincent Millay quoted in ROSE UNDER FIRE

The narrative voice was convincingly authentic, and the dialogue sounded true to both the time period and the various nationalities of your characters. You're an American living in the Scotland. Do you share Rose’s Pennsylvania Dutch (ie. German American) background?  

Ha ha, you’ve found me out! Yes, I drew very much on my own background—and my grandmother’s—for creating Rose. It is really the first time I’ve ever done this. Not only did I use the Pennsylvania Dutch background as a cultural reference point, but I actually set Rose’s hometown in my grandmother’s hometown—Mt. Jericho is Lebanon, PA, and Conewago Grove is Mount Gretna. I also have a specific airfield in mind for Justice Field—Reigle Field in Campbelltown, where I got my American pilot’s license. It is still family owned and first opened as a civilian airfield in the early 1940s.

How did you research the other characters for authentic voice?

As for the other characters, it felt kind of cheesy to try to give them accents. So instead I had Rose make the excuse of “I’m going to write it the way I remember it, not the way she said it.” One of my linguistic tricks is simply to construct correct English sentences for non-native English-speaking characters using the syntax of their own language. It’s not too difficult for me to do this in French or German, but I’m not a Polish speaker. One thing I learned about the Polish language is that there’s no definite article. So I tried to avoid my Polish characters using definite articles when they’re speaking. With Irina, the Russian character, I just kept her statements very short and tried to limit her nouns and verbs—not because she’s Russian, but because she’s communicating with Rose in a language that neither of them speaks very well (French).

The flying sequences in your books take the reader along for an exhilarating ride. What motivated you to get a pilot’s license? 

My husband had a pilot’s license when I met him. We did a lot of our courting on trips to exotic (?) places in small planes (the Kenyan coast, the Isles of Scilly, Kalamazoo). One of our dreams—still a dream—was to fly across the U.S.A. But we figured we’d both need to be able to fly for such an epic journey. I used the advance from my second book, A Coalition of Lions, to pay for my flight training!

Elizabeth Wein with her flight instructor Montse Mas Arcos and a friend by a Piper Warrior (PA-28).

Did you fly your narrative routes? 

Most of my own flight experience has been in Scotland, so Maddie’s flight to Scotland was definitely based on that, but most of my “small plane” experience over Southern England and the English Channel has been as a passenger.

For big “narrative routes” like Maddie’s flight to France and Rose’s flight to Germany, I plotted the routes on a map—as though I were planning to fly them myself. I “flew” Rose’s flight to Germany via Google Earth, which is where I got the idea of having her first see Ravensbrück from the air—I “virtually” saw it for the first time the same way. Maddie’s experience of being shot at in the air, and her difficulties in controlling the Lysander afterward, were based on real Moon Squadron incidents described in We Landed by Moonlight by Hugh Verity.

For more about how I researched some of the flight scenes in Rose Under Fire, take a look at my website here.

Your books are beautifully written. Can you describe your writing and editing process? 

For both these books, I’ve had a few extremely loyal beta readers, but I don’t generally ask them for in-depth criticism. They help me with continuity and pacing more than anything else. (A couple of them read CNV in serial form as I was writing it, over a period of seven months. If you think reading it in book form is harrowing, imagine having to wait a couple of weeks for the next chapter! One friend said she felt like Anna Engel, impatiently rapping her nails against the table and snatching up each finished page before the ink has time to dry.)

Were any of your beta readers teenagers?

My daughter Sara was a beta reader at 14 (she's now 16) - she handed the ms. around to several friends in her class who were already fans of Code Name Verity.  She's one of those who connected more easily with Rose Under Fire than with Code Name Verity, and prefers it. It's one of only two books that have made her cry - the other is Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson, so I feel like I'm in excellent company!

What roles do your agent and your editor play in revision?

My agent (Ginger Clark) is not an editorial agent but she does occasionally give me broad suggestions. Most of the revision is done with the UK and US editors.

UK Cover

Other than the covers, are there differences between the British and American editions of your books?

There are slight differences between the US and UK versions, but I’ve had total control over that (I’m bilingual in English and English!) Rose Under Fire was put together by the same team as Code Name Verity.

As a writer, I know how an author lives in the world she/he is creating for months or years. Emotionally, how did you cope?

With Code Name Verity, very badly! I was an emotional wreck the whole time I was writing it and for three weeks after I’d finished. With Rose Under Fire, it was more subtle; I kept ruining everyday objects and foods and items of clothing by referring to them in the book. So now I can’t see a red bathing suit without wanting to weep, or wear stripes (I can’t abide stripes any more), or see the brand name Siemens (which is everywhere! On CCTV cameras on our street! On my grandmother’s hearing aid!) without shuddering. It’s like having a mild form of PTSD. It really is.

Incidentally, I did a bit of poking around on the Siemens website when I was trying to find out more information about their factory at Ravensbrück, and I was very impressed with their company history. They do an excellent, honest job of not glossing over the ugly part of the story while still maintaining pride in their present company.

What’s the best writing advice you received?

“Don’t get it right, get it written.” That’s James Thurber, but I first heard it from my friend and erstwhile writing partner Elizabeth Tyler, whose father used to say it.

Will you write about flying again? Can you share something about your next book?

I will and I am! But I don’t feel I can talk too much about my next book because it’s so unfinished and is subject to major changes. It’s set in Ethiopia in 1935 and there will be flying in it.

Your first young adult series was set in Ethiopia too; what drew you to that location?

What initially drew me to Ethiopia was that my aunt and uncle were in the Peace Corps there from 1968 to 1970, so I had a family connection. My uncle was the one who first told me about the ancient Ethiopian kingdom of Aksum, which is the setting for four of my previous books. I love the idea of revisiting this setting in a more recent era, but it's extremely challenging.

Fascinating! I can't wait to read your next book.

Thanks so much for your tremendous support and interest in my books—it’s a delight to be able to share some of the inside secrets behind their creation!

Best, Elizabeth

Thanks for joining us, Elizabeth, and best of luck on your international book tour!

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@Barrie Summy

The Last Nude by Ellis Avery: review and interview

Set in 1920’s Paris, The Last Nude by Ellis Avery imagines the relationship between the real artist Tamara de Lempicka and her model, Rafaela. The author is a professor of creative writing at Columbia University, and she translates images to the printed page with literary finesse. Her approach to writing, however, is more lyrical and sensual than scholarly. You can almost taste her words.

 “I felt like a gardenia blossom as I drifted home, fragrant and bruisable. All the familiar things in my neighborhood seemed new again: the glass-domed arcades. The odor of honey cakes stealing toward me from the Pâtisserie Fouquet. The sharp chemical scent prickling out of Galerie Vollard: huile de lin, Tarmara had said. Térébenthine.” 

The main narrator is Rafaela, a teenaged girl who fled from New York City to Paris to avoid an arranged marriage. After trading her body to survive, Rafaela becomes Tamara’s model and lover, but her troubles are far from over. Collectors covet the paintings and the women behind them. Tamara has her own agenda and plays her many lovers, male and female, like chess pieces. At the Shakespeare Bookstore, Rafaela encounters liberated lesbians and a mysterious man, Ansom Hall. They inspire her to be more than a pawn.

Tamara narrates the final chapters in an extended epilogue (part two). This unconventional narrative structure with its jump in voice, time and setting was jarring, but it made sense. An iconoclastic approach to art is true to the spirit of the book. The Last Nude will surprise you. This creative historical novel will be released tomorrow (January 5, 2012) in the USA.

My Interview of Ellis Avery

Ellis Avery by Matthew Powell

Sarah: Your first novel, The Teahouse Fire, was set in late 19th century Kyoto and focused on Japanese tea ceremony. What led you to 1920s Paris and art? 

Ellis: While working on The Teahouse Fire, I happened to see the Tamara de Lempicka show at the Royal Academy in London. I was riveted by the luminous glamour and erotic force of her 1927 painting Beautiful Rafaela, and all the more so by the caption for the painting: the painter met the model in a public park in Paris in 1927 and propositioned her on the spot. She drove her back to the studio; the girl became her model and her lover, and their brief relationship yielded six paintings. This story fascinated and distracted me, and for a couple of days I found myself traveling in my mind to 1920s Paris instead of 1880s Kyoto. I’ll come back to this, I promised myself, and I did.

Beautiful Rafeala by Tamara de Lempicka (from the NPR website)

How did you research the art and setting for The Last Nude?

If the story of how Tamara met Rafaela wasn’t compelling enough on its own, along with de Lempicka’s biographies, including an excellent one by Laura Claridge, I also studied her catalogue raisonné: imagine my surprise when I discovered that the very last painting de Lempicka was working on when she died was a copy of her own 1927 Beautiful Rafaela. Fifty-three years later, that girl was on her mind. So my novel is the story of Tamara and Rafaela’s 1927 affair from the model’s point of view, and the story of Tamara’s last day alive in 1980, spent painting that copy of Beautiful Rafaela.

In addition to the reading and study I did on de Lempicka and art history, I revisited the interwar literary history I studied at the American University in Paris when I was sixteen, and I lived in Paris for three months in 2008 while working on the first draft of this book.

I also spent time studying in Paris at sixteen and have returned over the years, and you have captured the bohemian flavor of this most enchanting city. As an artist myself, I was impressed by how well you conveyed the act of painting from both the painter's and the model's perspective. How did you gain such insight?

I modeled for two paintings in my twenties, so I drew from experience on that front, but I also took a figure painting class while working on The Last Nude, so I would know what the experience was like from the other side of the brush: how it felt to look at a model for hours on end.

Was your Rafaela a real person or a fictional character? 

That Tamara met a girl named Rafaela in the Bois du Bouglogne in 1927 is documented in her daughter’s memoir, and Rafaela’s phone number turns up in Tamara’s address book. That said, the rest of the biographical Rafaela’s story is unknown. As for “my” Rafaela—the Italian-American who escapes an arranged marriage in order to run away to Paris—I made her up from scratch.

Why did you choose to narrate the bulk of this story from Rafaela's voice instead of Tamara’s voice? 

I narrated the novel from Rafaela’s point of view because Tamara’s point of view has already been amply documented and richly imagined by her biographers and cataloguers. While I’m immensely grateful to those scholars, I’d be bored if I simply stuck to dramatizing the research of others.

What led to the unusual structure of this book? 

I wrote the entire book from Rafaela’s point of view before I realized that I needed to tell the story from Tamara’s point of view, too: her voice snuck up on me, and then it surprised me with its passion and its uncompromising force, and once I started writing from her point of view, I couldn’t stop.

Rafaela’s friend Anson Hall reminded me of a gentler Hemingway: the manuscripts lost by his wife and the Spanish Civil War. Did you borrow and bend history? 

Yes, I did. Anson is a counterfactual Hemingway: he’s the person Hemingway would have turned out to have become if he had never gotten over the loss of all his manuscripts in 1922. Anson was Hemingway’s paternal grandfather’s first name; Hall was his maternal grandfather’s last name.

How do you create a balance between history and fiction when writing historical fiction?

I hew as closely as I can to historical materials, except when they get in the way of telling a good story.

How do you create a voice that is true to the time period?

I read as much fiction written during the time period in which my novel is set as possible, and I keep the OED by my side as I work so that I can check when the word I want to write began being used the way I want to use it. 

What is the best piece of writing advice you have received?

In terms of writing habits: read as much as you can and try to write something, however small, every day.

In terms of professionalization: read Poets and Writers magazine.

In terms of fiction writing: ask yourself, what does my character want? What stands in the way of my character getting what he or she wants? Does my character get what he or she wants in the end or not? If you can answer these three questions, you know your story.

Can you tell us about your next novel?

It’s set in frontier-era Florida. I’m tempted to go the Marilynne Robinson route and use one relationship, one small story, as a way to access a whole world, but I’m also tempted by David Mitchell’s More is More aesthetic. We’ll see!

I'm a big fan of David Mitchell's too, and I think you've done a fine job of balancing historical context, character and story in both of your books.  I'm looking forward to reading more of your work. Thanks, Ellis, for joining us for the Book Review Club, and good luck with your third novel! 

Disclosure: I first connected with the author through her excellent first novel, The Teahouse Fire.  By coincidence, we share the same agent, Jean V. Naggar of JVNLA. After learning that Ellis was researching her second novel in Paris and focusing on art, I asked to review it. The publisher sent me the ARC on the author’s request. The photos of France were taken by me in 2007.

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What Can't Wait by Ashley Hope Pérez

We often hear about how low-income kids fail at school, especially in minority communities. In What Can(t) Wait Ashley Hope Pérez describes the challenges from a gifted student’s perspective. Despite the gritty material, this moving debut novel still manages to be filled with hope, which is in fact the author's middle name.

Encouraged by her calculus teacher, Marisa dreams of going to college in Austin, Texas to become an engineer. Her barely educated parents, who left Mexico for Houston, have a different dream. They expect Marisa to cook, to look after her niece and to help support the family by working a minimum wage job. School comes a distant second to family. Marisa’s boyfriend is supportive, but his expectations weigh on her too. She struggles to please everyone at once but cracks under the pressure. Just when Marisa wants to give up, she finds encouragement from her niece, who is still young enough to think anything is possible.

What Can(t) Wait reads like a suspense story with high stakes even though what Marisa wants is what more privileged teens take for granted. Despite all the hardships, Marisa never whines and the book is not preachy. I would strongly recommend this well crafted novel to older teens and to adults. It's a must read for teachers. Sexually graphic material, including a near rape, makes it upper young adult fiction. What Can(t) Wait is not an easy read, but it’s well worth reading. I can’t stop thinking about it. Marisa and her issues feel so real.

My Interview of Ashley Hope Pérez

Sarah: You served in Teach for America Corps in a neighborhood similar to the one depicted in your novel. What did you teach? How did that experience inform your writing?

Ashley: I taught high school English in Houston. I’ve said this many times, but there would be no novel without my students. Many were reluctant to read or write when they first came to my class, so winning them over was a big challenge. Once I sold them on the power of reading and writing for success in life and for pleasure, though, they were unstoppable.

Read more about my students in this Diversity in YA guest post. 

How did that experience as a teacher compare with your high school years as teenager?

Believe it or not, I actually dropped out of high school after my sophomore year. Of course, I dropped out to go to college, but still...read my dropout story here. The fact remains that I didn’t feel like I fit in at all. I’m pretty sure that I didn’t! I had friends who were very kind (and somewhat protective of me), but I always felt like we were speaking different languages. In retrospect, I see that I probably seemed relatively well adjusted from the outside. I still felt lonely and out of place on the inside, though. Most people don’t realize that I’m shy, but I am.  (Photo at right of Ashley at the same age as Marisa.)

What changes in our educational system would you make to help students like Marisa?

Set high expectations for student achievement and catch gaps early. The majority of my high school seniors were reading well below grade level, many of them on a fifth- to sixth-grade level. How did this happen? There are many factors, but (since I’ve also taught at the elementary level), I know first hand that students who start behind—particularly when they come from disadvantaged backgrounds—usually stay behind. It’s easy to make excuses for students based on their circumstances, but this is no favor to them. What they need are teachers and programs that are up to the challenge of helping them fill in gaps that will only widen with time.

Ashley Hope Pérez with her son.

How do you balance the competing demands of academic and creative writing with family life?

I’m just now taking my qualifying exams for my PhD in Comparative Literature, which is the last step before the dissertation.  I read and work with literatures in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and English. For my exams, I have focused on the novel in all of these language traditions, but I have an especially strong interest in twentieth-century literature in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the U.S. (especially Latino/a lit). You can read about the books I teach in a course on Caribbean women writers in this post for Color Online.

I find that I tend to work best by focusing on academic work for a while (with a chunk of writing every day still for my creative work.) For example, during the past months, I have set a very small goal of 15 minutes daily for my creative writing. But by the time this interview goes up, I’ll have finished my exams, and I’ll be working full-time on the revision of my second novel, The Knife and the Butterfly, with a short block of time reserved every day for free-writing toward my dissertation idea.

As for family: my son and husband are so cool (and they are best buds) that I’m always happy to be with them! We work really hard to have playtime together every day no matter how busy we are.

How does the writing experience differ in your 2 fields?

While I find that the kind of writing I do is very different writing for teens versus writing for my colleagues, my process is pretty similar in both cases. I do a lot of zero drafting. A zero draft is “throw-away” writing in notebooks, on notecards, and on sticky notes. All of this is before I officially “begin”—I’m just trying to find my way in to the topic, to find the interesting material or the “story” (the best scholarly writing, in my opinion, also tells a story—a story of interpretation).

What is the best writing advice you received?

Oh, I’ve gotten so much good advice! But I suppose the two most important bits are:

(1) Write with whatever time you have; don’t let yourself say that it’s not enough to get something done. If you are focused, you can get a lot done even in 10 or 15 minutes.

(2) Write the book (or story or poem or essay) that YOU can write. The more I write, the more I realize what an amazing accomplishment it is to finish (much less publish) anything.

Ashley Hope Pérez with former student Rey Mejía (he's also in the student photo above.)

Congratulations on your 2-book debut deal with Carolrhoda Books. Can you give us a sneak preview of your next novel?

Sure! The Knife and the Butterfly was inspired in part by an actual event in Houston. I used a series of articles from the Houston Chronicle while teaching a freshman English summer school class, and the students got so into the story that I decided I had to use it. The novel follows two teenagers through the aftermath of a deadly gang fight. Lexi is from a working class background and hangs around a gang for protection and for a sense of herself. Azael is a romantic drifter essentially orphaned by his mom’s death and his father’s deportation to El Salvador. Their lives get mixed up in a way that neither one of them wanted but that neither one can escape, either.

Thanks, Ashley, for joining us! Your next book sounds very intriguing too. 

Reviewer's Disclosure: I bought this book after reading a terrific review on Reading in Color. All photos were supplied by the author and reproduced with her permission. The (t) in the title is not a typo. Think mathematical function and literary perentheses.

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Head Games by Keri Mikulski: review, interview and sporty girl books

photo of author Keri Mikulski by Justin Mikulski, her husband

Title IX of the Education Amendment of 1972 banned the exclusion of students from programs or activities on the basis of gender in American schools. This progressive law has allowed girls’ teams to flourish at public high schools. Nonetheless, most teenaged sports books are written for boys, even though nearly as many girls play sports. It's time to address the lacuna.

In 2007 Razorbill (Penguin) started publishing the Pretty Tough series about girls who play sports. Liz Tigelaar wrote the first two novels about soccer and football. Young adult author Keri Mikulski has picked up the ball for the next four books in the series. If the name sounds familiar, it’s because Keri is a member of our book review club. Her publisher sent me an ARC to review on my request.

Head Games by Keri Mikulski is a sweet basketball romance. Taylor is a six-foot-tall (and still growing!) freshman. Her phenomenal basketball skills have earned her the center position on the girls varsity basketball team. However, her height is “a serious boyfriend handicap” off court. Playing Seven Minutes in the Closet, Taylor is humiliated when a shorter boy chooses to watch the clock on his phone instead of kissing her.

Only the boys basketball center is tall enough to look her in the eye, but unfortunately gorgeous Zach is dating her teammate Kylie. Team dynamics are shattered when Zach dumps Kylie and starts shooting hoops with Taylor. Adding to the stress, Taylor’s best friend needs her to play fashion model for a designer competition. A self-described “people pleaser” and klutz, Taylor has to learn how to be more assertive and self-confident off the court.

“No one has ever called me ‘hot’ before. Except maybe my mom when I’m sick.”

The romantic shenanigans were amusing, but I was a bit bothered by how romance ruined the girls’ game but not the boys’ game. Still, in the context of this story, it made sense, and the main character certainly took sports seriously. Taylor is a sweetheart who would make a fine role model for tween girls.

Head Games is a quick and easy read, but you had better know your Gossip Girl and teen pop culture to get all the references. Facebook takes a lot of court time too. This fun and engaging novel would appeal to reluctant readers and to sporty girls ages 10-14 years. Even a non-basketball player like me (I’m 5 foot 3 inches) could understand the plays and appreciate the drama. Keri Mikulski is on top of her game. Head Games will be released tomorrow on January 6th, 2011 in the USA. Congratulations, Keri!

From Keri's Bio Page:

"From as far back as I can remember, I’ve always loved sports and books. However, as a teen and tween, I fell out of love with reading. For years I never picked up books for pleasure because I couldn’t relate to the main characters. They weren’t like me. They didn’t play sports.

"Then, decades later, I witnessed many of my sporty middle school students also morph into reluctant readers. As soon as I began writing professionally, I set out to write the books to reach this audience. And here I am – living my dream."

My Interview of Keri Mikulski

Keri Mikulski (center) in her high school yearbook

Sarah: how did you end up taking over the Pretty Tough series from another author?

Keri: About three years ago, I began writing web articles for the Pretty Tough website. While writing for Pretty Tough, the brand read Screwball, asked me if I had written any other sporty books, and requested to read my work in progress. At the time, I was working on FULL COURT PRESS (which is now Head Games). I sent Pretty Tough FULL COURT PRESS and they loved it! Immediately, Pretty Tough asked me if I would be interested in writing novels for the brand. Since I absolutely adored the first two novels (written by the amazing Liz Tigelaar, executive producer of Life Interrupted), I accepted the offer and we began the process of attempting to sell the series again with Head Games through my agent.

Has this constrained your writing?

Not at all! ☺ I LOVE writing sporty books and I was honored to continue the series after Liz did such an excellent job with the first two novels. Since it’s been four years since the first two books were published (the original characters sadly graduated from Beachwood Academy), the only two elements that stayed the same are the setting and one character.

How did you research the California setting and the techno-savvy habits of contemporary teenagers?

I emerged myself in California. I viewed, read, and studied everything I could get my hands on about Los Angeles. I connected with friends who live in California, spent a lot of time on the phone with Pretty Tough asking detailed questions, and I’m on my way to Los Angeles this spring. ☺

Since I’m a teacher, I spend a TON of time with teens and tweens. I have a front row seat to their technology habits. Technology has drastically changed the way teens and tweens communicate with each other and I find the subject both fascinating and scary.

The photo booth picture is of my best friend (right) and me at the same age as my protagonist.

Ha! Classic.  Were you a teen athlete like your protagonist?

Yes! I LOVE sports. I played basketball, softball, and soccer, earned ten varsity letters as a senior, and served as captain to all three sports.  In the photo below I'm #40, grabbing the rebound during my junior year (from my yearbook.)

How tall are you?

I’m five foot eight inches tall. ☺

Are you still involved with sports now?

When I’m not writing or on deadline, I love, love, love to play sports. When I can, I participate in adult soccer and softball leagues, but my favorite sporty times are with my daughter and hubby.

How do you balance career and family?

Basically, I live by this rule. When I’m with my daughter, I’m with my daughter. When I’m teaching, I’m teaching. When I’m writing, I’m writing. I try to write around her schedule – write at night and in the morning.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve received?

Actually, there are two pieces of advice I consistently refer to. A well-known author once told me, "You can only control your writing." In other words, you can’t control your sales, publicity, and/or the publishing business. And another fabulous author told me to "Write Because You Have To." I love this piece of advice because it reminds me everyday that without writing I’m not balanced. ☺

Can you give us a sneak preview of the next three books in the Pretty Tough series? 

Absolutely! I’m super excited about the series. ☺ Each Pretty Tough book will follow a different athlete from Beachwood High School. The next book, Stealing Bases follows the ‘mean girl’ and softball superstar in Head Games, Kylie Collins. But, after writing the book, I love her now! ☺

Here’s the back cover of Stealing Bases:

Reformed mean girl Kylie Collins desperately wants to put the craziness of basketball season behind her and concentrate on her lifelong dream – being recruited for Division One softball. She also wants to move on from her cheater ex, Zachary Murphy, which isn’t exactly easy when Kylie’s living in his backyard guesthouse with her father after her parent’s divorce.

But when Kylie arrives at her first softball practice of the season she comes face-to-face with her worst nightmare – Amber McDonald, the best pitcher in the state.

Now, Kylie’s forced to warm the bench as Amber wows crowds again and again. With all the drama happening out on the softball diamond, Kylie finds herself drawn back to her bad habits – sabotaging people and hanging out with a certain Zachary Murphy.

I’m currently writing Book 5. All I can divulge at this point is that it’s about a lifeguard. ☺

When are the other books due out?

Stealing Bases will hit bookstores on July 7, 2011. Book 5 and 6 will hit bookstores in 2012.

Thanks for having me, Sarah! ☺ Happy New Year!

Thanks, Keri, I'm looking forward to Stealing Bases.

Book Blog Watch: I’m not the only blogger who has noticed the dearth of sporty books for girls. Steph Su Reads included athletes in her list of “What’s Missing in YA Lit?” Reading in Color called for a protagonist “To be Young, Athletic and a PoC.”  She goes on to list several sporty books featuring People of Color, beyond African Americans playing basketball.

Blog readers, do you have any book recommendations about teenaged girls playing sports? My work in progress, A MATCH FOR EVE, is about an American softball player who goes to England to play cricket. I could also do with some cricket book (boy or girl) recommendations.

Happy New Year!

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Interview with Kate Egan, editor of The Hunger Games trilogy

Today I’m taking you behind the scenes of The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins, this year’s “It” series in young adult (YA) fiction. The trilogy's editor, Kate Egan, happens to live around the corner from me. She came to my house for coffee to share the publishing story behind this #1 New York Times bestseller series, which has been popular with adults too.

The premise draws on both pop culture and the Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur: a despotic ruler selects children from every district to fight to the death. The sole survivor brings back a bounty of food to his or her district. The battle is staged in a nightmare world of mutant hazards and broadcast live as entertainment, the ultimate reality TV. Needless to say, this gory spectacle foments, rather than subdues, rebellion in the districts.

When her younger sister is selected to be a contestant, Katniss volunteers to take her place. Katniss is a skilled archer who has been poaching wild game to feed her family. She is paired with a boy, Peeta, who once saved her from starvation. Katniss owes Peeta her life, but only one contestant is allowed to survive. Peeta loves Katniss, but she also has feelings for her hunting partner, Gale. This love triangle frames a coming-of-age story set in a war zone.

Although the first two books The Hunger Games (2008) and Catching Fire (2009) were more entertaining and better paced, Mockingjay (released last August 2010) has greater philosophical depth and moral ambiguity. The regime is corrupt and evil, but are the revolutionaries any better? In this not-so-distant future, television has become the most effective weapon of war. Despite the violence, this series does not glorify war, rather the opposite. The cost of war is paid by all participants, win or lose.

This dystopian trilogy reminded me more of George Orwell’s 1984 and Animal Farm than of books written for teenagers. If you've never read YA, try these. My daughter found the first book too scary at age eleven but returned to the books at age thirteen and really enjoyed them. I loved them too. All three books were hard to put down and impossible to forget. After finishing, I had many questions. Kate Egan had the answers.

photo of Kate Egan by Sarah Laurence

My Interview of Kate Egan

Sarah: how did you first connect with the author Suzanne Collins?

Kate: while working for Scholastic in NYC, I acquired and edited Suzanne’s first book, Gregor The Overlander. It became a five book series. The Underland Chronicles is about a boy who falls through a hole in his laundry room into a world hidden under New York, populated by giant rats and cockroaches and other creatures you might expect to find beneath the city.

Sort of like a modern Alice in Wonderland?

Exactly. The Underland Chronicles is meant for a younger audience but shares a similar central theme with The Hunger Games series.

What is that central theme?

Suzanne’s main interest is “what is a just war?” She’s especially concerned about the effects of war on a person.

What first attracted you to her writing?

The un-put-down-able quality to her writing. Suzanne started her career as a screenwriter. She wrote the adorable Little Bear television program on Nick Junior, among many other shows. She knows how to move a story and how to hold a kid’s attention, although Little Bear and her novels are extremely different in tone.

What was the inspiration for The Hunger Games trilogy?

Suzanne was flipping back and forth between the Iraq War coverage and Survivor on TV when she got the idea for The Hunger Games. Suzanne always writes her books in 3 parts with 9 chapters each so a trilogy was natural. She had the whole story in her head from the start.

When did you first hear about The Hunger Games?

Four years ago I was doing the final edits on the last Gregor book, when my second child was born. It was a month before I was ready to get back to editing. Suzanne used that time to write the proposal for The Hunger Games trilogy. The original proposal had the fight to the death and the intriguing character of Katniss. I realized that this was going to be the biggest book I’d ever worked on.

Why do you think The Hunger Games series has been so successful?

When I started working in publishing in the mid 1990’s, young adult fiction was all but dead. Scholastic, the publisher of The Hunger Games, barely published YA back then. There was no dedicated space for teen fiction in the bookstores. In the past ten years, the publishing pendulum has swung towards YA, even garnering an adult crossover audience. The Hunger Games was impossible to put down, and Katniss was a great character. Suzanne is a terrific storyteller.

Given that Scholastic’s headquarters are in NYC, why did you move to Maine?

My husband worked for the New York City government, and one of the terms of his employment was that we had to live within the city limits. We were living in a basement apartment in Brooklyn Heights. Our daughter’s crib was in the hall! In 2003 my husband was offered the job of running the State Ethics Commission in Augusta. In six weeks we bought a car and a house and moved to Maine.

How did you manage to keep working as an editor after the move?

I switched to working freelance for several publishing companies, mostly for Feiwel and Friends, an imprint of Macmillan. I kept 3 of my old authors from Scholastic, too. I work in the mornings when both kids are in school, during naptime and late at night.

How did you hold onto Suzanne Collins as your author?

When Suzanne’s agent sold The Hunger Games trilogy to Scholastic, it was agreed that I would remain her editor. We’ve been together for eight books now.

What are Suzanne Collins’s strengths and weaknesses as a writer, and how do you help her as an editor?

Storytelling is Suzanne’s strength. As an editor, I help her develop the characters. For example, I asked her for more of the Peeta-Katniss-Gale love triangle. Suzanne was more focused on the war story. We’ve learned to trust each other. Sometimes Suzanne thinks it’s obvious where she is going, but I tell her I don’t see it. When I need help following, it’s a sign that the manuscript needs some shoring up.

What has happened in the wake of The Hunger Games?

Suzanne wrote the screenplay for the movie of The Hunger Games, which will be produced by Nina Jacobson at Lionsgate Productions. They are in talks with Gary Ross, who directed Pleasantville and Seabiscuit. Suzanne is also busy with the Mockingjay launch and approving licensing products, like a Hunger Games board game.

Is Suzanne Collins working on a new novel?

I think she is starting to think about it, but that’s all I know right now.

I’m struck by how much The Hunger Games has appealed to adult readers as well as to teens. What marks a book as young adult as opposed to adult fiction?

I'd say that there has to be a teenaged protagonist. They are coming-of-age stories. The ending does not have to be happy, but there must be hope. A window is left open.

Thank you, Kate!

Reviewer’s Disclaimer: I bought all three books myself when they were first released. Kate Egan and I were introduced by our neighbor Charlotte Agell, author of another dystopian novel for teens, Shift. This interview was our first meeting. We met up more recently for a walk to enjoy the fall foliage. That first shot is from my front yard, and Kate is standing in my back yard. All photos were taken by me.

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Note: Please do not contact me to reach Kate Egan. I am unable to forward e-mails.

The Indigo Notebook and The Ruby Notebook by Laura Resau: review and interview

My teenaged daughter and I agree: Laura Resau might very well be our favorite young adult author. Her lyrical prose, multi-aged characters and exotic settings would appeal to many adults as well as to teens. This globe-trotting author trained as an anthropologist, adding cultural depth to her stories.

The Notebook series follows Zeeta and her hippy mother, Layla, as they move to a new country every year by whim. Zeeta keeps a different colored journal for every country. The Indigo Notebook is set in Ecuador (photo at left) and The Ruby Notebook is set in Southern France (photo below.) Zeeta’s love interest in both books is Wendell, who was adopted from Ecuador and raised by Americans. He’s an artist with visions that come true. Like Isabelle Allende, Laura Resau weaves the magical elements into the narrative seamlessly, creating mystical realism.

Most young adult novels ignore the parents, but the most compelling character in the series is Zeeta’s mother, Layla, who seeks sacred waters, quotes Rumi (a 13th century Persian philosopher) and has flings with clowns. She’s a free spirit who treats her daughter like a sister, leaving Zeeta to worry about practical issues like saving money. Layla is a wonderful parent in other ways, encouraging her daughter to embrace life and non-materialistic values. All Zeeta knows of her father is that he had dark skin and made love to her American mother on a moonlit beach in Greece.

Nonetheless, The Notebook series is suitable for tween as well as teen readers and bridges the gap between middle grade and edgier young adult fiction. If anything, The Indigo Notebook is too innocent. I have only one tiny criticism about The Ruby Notebook: homing pigeons do not send two-way messages. The books should be read in sequence and are both wonderful. Even the covers are gorgeous. My daughter and I are not alone in our praise for Laura Resau's writing. Kirkus Reviews gave The Ruby Notebooka a starred review.

My 13-year-old Daughter's Review:

Laura Resau writes with such rich language and detailed description of character, place and actions, but still manages to be fast-paced and not at all boring. I fell in love with The Indigo Notebook when I started reading it. It is set up perfectly, and I was instantly intrigued by the character, Zeeta, who travels the world with her Rumi-quoting, capricious mother, Layla, whom I also love. It is most likely because I haven’t visited Ecuador- or in fact South America- that made me also very interested by the small village, Otavalo (photo at left), in which the book is set.

I really like Zeeta’s voice. It sounds like she has wisdom because of all the places she has been and yet still sounds like a teenager, but an intelligent, exotic one. I especially liked how she described her surroundings and wrote them all in her notebook, along with asking questions to people about hopes and dreams, then writing those down too.

The story line was very fresh and interesting, and was really fun to read. As for the love-interest portion, I thought it was good, and I liked it. However I thought it could have been a bit more…romantic? Most of the time it just seemed like they were good friends even when they were “boyfriend and girlfriend.”

The Ruby Notebook, the sequel, was spectacular as well! I thought it would be hard to live up to the first one, which I loved, but this one was amazing too! It had unexpected twists and turns, friendship, lovely characters, romance, and a very interesting plot. Once again I loved the setting, however not as much as the first one in Ecuador. The Ruby Notebook is set in Southern France, and Zeeta describes it beautifully, however since I have been to France, it wasn’t quite as intriguing or exciting as Ecuador to me.

minor spoiler alert for this paragraph:
My only other criticism of The Ruby Notebook would be that by the end when lots of exciting events were taking place, it was slightly disappointing to see that nothing much really happened after all the built-up suspense. Also, I slightly predicted a couple things that were true in the end. However, despite those minor flaws, this book was amazing, and very intriguing and fun to read. I can’t wait to read the next book in the series!

Our Interview of Laura Resau

author photo by Ian Schneider

Are you more like Layla or Zeeta? 
(Photo at left of Laura at Zeeta's age, sixteen.)

These were fun characters to write because in a way they represent very different, conflicting parts of my personality. Like Layla, I was an ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher for many years, and like her, I felt incredibly alive and stimulated while traveling and living abroad. At one time, while living in Mexico, I considered leading a nomadic existence, switching countries every year or two. Instead, I ended up settling in Colorado, giving in to the "homebody" part of me that is more like Zeeta-- the practical part that craves a strong, stable community of friends. It was interesting for me to see this tension play out in the characters of Zeeta and Layla. That's a magical thing about writing-- you can live through your characters by letting them take a path you didn't.

What is the appeal of Rumi to you, and how did you form the character of Layla?

A few years ago, in a bookstore in the mountains, I stumbled across The Essential Rumi. His poetry and ideas resonated strongly with me, and I wished I'd been exposed to his work as a teen.  Later, as I was writing the Notebooks series, I realized that Rumi's philosophies fit beautifully with Layla's character.  She's very much into living every moment to its fullest and finding "enlightenment" in everyday things.  She takes Rumi's ideas to an extreme, in a well-meaning yet comical way.

I wanted Layla to be the kind of person you might roll your eyes at (as Zeeta does) but still adore… a person whose eccentricities just might hold some wisdom. I also hoped that my readers would become interested in reading more Rumi on their own.  (And based on the reader mail I've gotten about The Indigo Notebook, they have!)

How did your personal experiences of having an adopted brother from Korea (photo at right) and adopting your son from Guatemala shape the narrative and inform the character of Wendell?

While I was writing The Indigo Notebook, I was immersed in preparations for the adoption of my son—going to trainings, reading books, listening to panels of adoptees. I really wanted to be prepared so I could be as supportive as possible for my son in the years to come. As a child, I'd experienced many of the challenging aspects of interracial adoption with my brother (like hearing racial slurs, being told I wasn't his "real" sister, etc.).

In my reading, I learned the different interpretations, questions, and concerns that kids and teens might have about their adoptions over the years— feelings that shift as children go through different stages. I realized that my son will be curious about his birth family at some time in his life, which might result in searching for them, as Wendell does in my book.  Being an adoptive mother myself, I felt it was important to emphasize that Wendell's adoptive family is his real family, the one he belongs with, the one he was meant to be with. If I hadn't been an adoptive mother, I don't know that I would have had Wendell's adoptive parents make an appearance in the book. I also don't know if I would have made the spiritual connection between Wendell and his adoptive parents so strong and important.

You have a background in Cultural Anthropology; was the Indian mysticism in Indigo and the immortal waters and Celtic clan in Ruby based on reality or your imagination? How do you research your books?

The details of indigenous healing practices in The Indigo Notebook were based on reality. While doing research for another book (The Queen of Water) in the Ecuadorian Andes, my Quichua friends took me to visit a local healer who performed a cleansing ritual for me and a divination for my friend. The healing ceremonies described in my book are closely based on the ones I participated in (including having fireballs spit at me!) I was already familiar with these kinds of rituals, since I'd participated in similar ones in Mexico, and studied them in graduate anthropology classes. I took these real-life "mystical" elements and wove them into my fictional story.

As far as The Ruby Notebook, when I lived in southern France for a year at age twenty, I loved visiting the Celto-Liguric ruins outside of the city. I've also been long interested in Celtic mythology and mystical beliefs involving water. The Ruby Notebook contains some actual Celtic mythology and history, such as the handfasting ceremony, the Festival of Light, the instruments and outfits described, and the ancient conflicts between Celtic tribes and Romans. My imagination came up with the idea that this particular clan might have lived on through the millennia as guardians of the water.

My research process for my books always involves participant-observation, which is an anthropological term for immersing yourself in a culture by hanging out with people and helping them with everyday activities (like eating fresh baguettes…) Then I supplement my own experiences with book and Internet research (but the baguette-eating is more fun).

We appreciated the racial/cultural diversity in your books. Can you recommend other young adult novels that embrace diversity?

Thanks! Some YA authors to start with might be Mitali Perkins, Julia Alvarez, Pam Munoz Ryan, Traci Jones, Walter Dean Myers, Matt de la Pena.  If you're looking for fantasy/speculative fiction with interesting cultural settings, check out Nancy Farmer's The Eye, the Ear, the Arm (Africa) and The House of the Scorpion (Mexico.)

[Editor's note: my son and I loved The House of the Scorpion too.]

What is the best writing advice you received?

This always changes, depending on the nature of my current angst!  Lately, I've been trying to remember my friend and fellow author Laura Pritchett's advice, which she scribbled on an essay-in-progress of mine years ago.  She asked for "more heart."  Now, as I'm writing The Jade Notebook, I'm thinking how important it is to look into the hearts of each character, to infuse each and every one with tenderness and love and vulnerability and passion and yearning. This is not something you can do analytically—it's something you feel deeply, something that makes your characters come alive.

Can you give us a sneak preview of The Jade Notebook? Will there be more books (please!) in the Notebook series?

I'm so glad you're looking forward to The Jade Notebook! It will be the third and final installment of the series.  It's still a work-in-progress, but I'll tell you that it's set in a little beach town in Oaxaca, Mexico (based on Mazunte, my favorite beach town!) … and it involves sea turtles! The photo is of the cabana where I stayed during my research trip.

Thank you, Laura, we can't wait to read The Jade Notebook!

The Indigo Notebook (2009) is now available in paperback. The Ruby Notebook will be released on September 16, 2010 in the USA.

Reviewer's Disclaimer: I bought Indigo at Longfellow Books, having heard nothing about it before (the value of a good independent bookstore!) The publisher, Delacorte, sent me a free ARC of Ruby on my request and a second copy of Indigo, which my daughter claimed. Photos were taken by Laura Resau while researching her novels and reproduced with her permission.

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