Caroline Starr Rose, Author of MAY B, Talks Laura Ingalls Wilder and A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN

 Today’s guest post is from Caroline Starr Rose, author of MAY B, which hit stores January 10th, 2012. Here’s a little more about the book: 

I’ve known it since last night:
It’s been too long to expect them to return.
Something’s happened.

May is helping out on a neighbor’s Kansas prairie homestead—just until Christmas, says Pa. She wants to contribute, but it’s hard to be separated from her family by 15 long, unfamiliar miles. Then the unthinkable happens: May is abandoned. Trapped in a tiny snow-covered sod house, isolated from family and neighbors, May must prepare for the oncoming winter. While fighting to survive, May’s memories of her struggles with reading at school come back to haunt her. But she’s determined to find her way home again. Caroline Starr Rose’s fast-paced novel, written in beautiful and riveting verse, gives readers a strong new heroine to love.

Today, Caroline writers about her favorite female character in literature, and where she got the inspiration for her fantastic main character, May Betterly. 

Also, can we all take a second to admire that cover? Beautiful! Now, without further ado, here’s Caroline: 

I have a lot of favorite heroines. Anyone know there’s a character out there that would have made a great friend, if she’d been real? That’s how I feel about Francie Nolan from A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. We would have swapped books and talked about school, but mainly, I think, we would have sat comfortably together in companionable silence because we’d get each other that way.

As far as a heroine who influenced my own protagonist, May Betterly, I have to go with Laura Ingalls Wilder. I grew up reading the Little House books and used Laura’s life as my touchstone — Laura did this or experienced that, knew this or was unfamiliar with that. I’d talk about her so often, that my mother was sure I was talking about someone in my class.

When I decided to write a middle-grade novel set on the frontier, I knew she’d be strong, like Laura.

May Betterly lives on the Kansas frontier and longs to someday be a teacher. Unfortunately, she finds school a challenge and isn’t always supported there (May is dyslexic, and while modern-day readers will be familiar with her struggles, May — and those around her — don’t understand). She’s pulled from school and hired out to a newly married couple from the East. The marriage is fragile, and when the unhappy bride runs off, her husband leaves to bring her home. They never return. May is left stranded for months, with dwindling food and winter coming on.

In writing May B., I was curious how someone writes about solitude (answer: do not try this at home — it’s hard!). I also wanted to examine the idea of worth and what conclusions a child might draw about herself from the opinions of others. I knew, going in, that May was strong, was smart, was resourceful. But she didn’t know this. Trapped in a sod house all alone, she is able to face who she is and what she is truly capable of.

Even though she’s not real, I’m proud to know May Betterly (and I think Franice would have loved her, too).

Learn more about Caroline and MAY B here.

Girl Adventurers I Love: Merida, from Disney/Pixar’s BRAVE

Okay, so I realize that this movie hasn’t actually come out yet, but I can’t help it. I’m in love.

From the ponies to the crazy curly red hair, to the amahzing Scottish setting, to the bows and freaking arrows (!) I can’t think of anything that could get me more excited about Disney/Pixar’s BRAVE.

Oh, yeah. Except for maybe this trailer.

Adventuring princess? Sign. Me. Up.

BRAVE hits theaters June 22nd, but in the mean time you can learn more about it here.

Huntley Fitzpatrick’s Favorite Heroines

Today on the blog I’m happy announce that we have a wonderful guest post from Huntley Fitzpatrick, author of the forthcoming MY LIFE NEXT DOOR. I asked Huntley to tell me a little more about how female heroines shaped her life and here’s what she came up with: 

I was a shy kid.  I had a circle of friends in which I felt comfortable, a warm family, but in crowds I tended to try to disappear. My social philosophy was sort of like my dodgeball philosophy…I’d stand so far to the side that no one would notice me and throw a ball in my direction.

This is a safe way to live, but it doesn’t get you out in the world, or through a lot of the challenges that come your way.

So, by the time I was ten, I’d come up with another strategy….books…

I’d find brave, feisty heroines I loved, and when I found myself in an situation where I felt shy, I’d imagine what they would do. And then I’d do it.

This works amazingly well. You just need to suit the heroine to the situation.

For bravery and doing what needed to be done regardless of the consequences, I’d summon up a character: Caddie Woodlawn, the feisty tomboy from the unforgettable books by Carol Ryrie Brink.

Caddie was a red-headed tomboy who lived in Wisconsin in the 1860’s. She refused to be a girl, preferring instead to hang out with her brothers, endlessly topping them in their adventures. She was sassy, fearless, and forever in trouble.   She had a relish for life I found so inspiring. No matter how dire the situation, she came out ahead, triumphant, learning a bit, but still irreverent and intrepid.

Here’s a quote: “How far I’ve come! I’m the same girl and yet not the same. I wonder if it’s always like that? Folks keep growing from one person into another all their lives, and life is just a lot of everyday adventures. Well, whatever life is, I like it.”

When I ran into trouble, I’d think of Caddie, and remember whatever was happening was just another adventure.

Then, in situations where I had to just get through something extremely difficult, I’d think of Sara Crewe, the heroine of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s A LITTLE PRINCESS.

The title sounds cute, but the story is not. Sara starts out as the Girl Who Has Everything, then loses it all, her beloved father, her fortune, her status as the Popular Girl, her closet full of beautiful clothes, and most of her friends.

She not only survives this, she triumphs, and becomes a truer princess in hard times than she was in good times.

Most kids have a year or two where they just don’t fit. My two were seventh and eighth grade. I’d moved to a new school, gotten glasses, gained weight….the other kids in my grade, all of whom were probably struggling themselves, saw a weak spot and went for it. My locker got destroyed on a daily basis, pictures torn down, school books ripped, kids made comments when I walked down the hall. Going to school was torture.

Sara Crewe saved me.  Here’s the quote I never forgot.  “Somehow, something always happens just before things get to the very worst. It is as if Magic did it. If I could only just remember that always. The worse thing never quite comes.”

If you haven’t read Frances Hodgson Burnett or Carol Ryrie Brink, go find them. My book, MY LIFE NEXT DOOR, was actually inspired by another Frances Hodgson Burnett book, THE SECRET GARDEN. If you look closely, you’ll see why…the girl in my book is pampered and protected, and then she meets a boy who can charm animals, and has to keep the whole thing secret. My whole story started with wondering what would happen when Mary and Dickon grew up.

My advice to you comes from another wonderful childhood book, Roald Dahl’s MATILDA.

“Books taught Matilda the lesson good books teach: You are not alone.”

Learn more about Huntley here, and make sure to pick up a copy of her book MY LIFE NEXT DOOR this June!

My Favorite Girl Adventurers: Harriet the Spy

Harriet M. Welsh from Louise Fitzhugh’s classic HARRIET THE SPY, is one of my favorite girl characters in all of literature. Armed with only a notebook, she sets out to discover the darkest secrets of her own neighborhood. Along the way she causes a little bit of trouble…

I think I hold Harriet so close to my heart because, like me, she’s a writer. Even when I was young, I loved the idea that you could take on the world with a pen and a piece of paper. More importantly, perhaps, she taught me that words can cut deeper than any knife, and that even the best of spies need to be careful about how they handle the things that they discover.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

In honor of the big V-day, I present to you a field of beautiful flowers…

Okay, so maybe roses are the traditional Valentine’s Day blossom, but Lyssa, the main character in ZIP loves anything and everything yellow. In fact, she’d see a big field of yellow flowers like this as a very good sign.

So there you are. A lucky field of flowers to brighten your day.

Love,

Ellie

A.J. Hartley from DARWEN ARKWRIGHT AND THE PEREGRINE PACT

Our first guest post is from the wonderful A.J. Hartley, whose book DARWEN ARKWRIGHT AND THE PEREGRINE PACT hit stores last October. Here’s a little about Darwen:  

Eleven-year-old Darwen Arkwright has spent his whole life in a tiny town in England. So when he is forced to move to Atlanta, Georgia, to live with his aunt, he knows things will be different – but what he finds there is beyond even his wildest imaginings!

Darwen discovers an enchanting world through the old mirror hanging in his closet – a world that holds as many dangers as it does wonders. Scrobblers on motorbikes with nets big enough to fit a human boy. Gnashers with no eyes, but monstrous mouths full of teeth. Flittercrakes with bat-like bodies and the faces of men. Along with his new friends Rich and Alexandra, Darwen becomes entangled in an adventure and a mystery that involves the safety of his entire school. They soon realize that the creatures are after something in our world – something that only human children possess.

I asked A.J. who his favorite literary heroine was, and how she helped influence the female characters in his own writing. Here’s what he came up with: 

Hmmm, tricky. I’m afraid I’m living proof of the old publishing adage that girls will read books with male or female protagonists while boys only read books with male protagonists! As a boy growing up in working classEngland, reading books of any sort when there were footballs to be kicked was enough to call my masculinity into question: reading books about girls would probably have gotten me killed!

I exaggerate of course, but there’s some truth in there, and I don’t remember really reading books with strong, interesting women in them till I was at university wrestling with the literary classics: Spenser’s take-no-prisoners Bitomart, Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre who had to be locked in the red room for behaving like a wild animal, and Shakespeare’s romantic leads, Rosalind (As You Like It), Imogen (Cymbeline) and Viola (Twelfth Night). My day job as a Shakespeare professor has kept these last fresh in my head over the years, and though they are dated by modern standards they have an amazing self-possession, passion, maturity and forthrightness that I’ve always valued.

I’ve written female characters in my adult fiction—especially Deborah Miller, the gangly museum curator who is the protagonist of a couple of my mystery/thrillers—and I generally have some idea where they came from (Deborah came from seeing the brilliant Janet McTeer cross-dress as Petruchio in a production of the Taming of the Shrew at the Globe). By contrast, the girl who dominates Darwen Arkwright and the Peregrine Pact just popped onto the page fully formed and I have no idea where she came from. Alexander O’Connor (Alex), is a precocious—not to say pushy—African American Atlanta native who wears green day glow skull earrings with her school uniform, talks a mile a minute, and has the tact of a wrecking ball. If it crosses her mind, she’ll say it and she’s nothing if not honest. I have no doubt some readers find her annoying, but I think she’s brilliant: my favorite character in the book. She’s imaginative, resourceful and a force of nature in general, but the other kids find her pretty hard to take, and underneath her apparently unselfconscious sass, she’s actually pretty lonely. That makes her a perfect friend for the book’s namesake, who has brought plenty of baggage from his native England and just doesn’t fit in anywhere. They make a good team, once they’ve found things they have in common, like climbing through mirrors into impossible places and being chased by shape-shifting monsters bent on eating them. These are the things which make for lasting friendships.

But it is odd. I know exactly what Alex looks like, how she carries herself, the jut of her chin when she looks at people who are taller than her and—most of all—how she talks. I know the way she thinks, her private hopes and fears, her values, her tastes. It is like I’ve known this girl in life, and in truth I think I must have met her—or someone very like her—once somewhere, because she is so complete in my head, so absolutely real to me in ways my characters rarely are. I have no idea where or when I might have encountered whoever inspired her, though I’ve often tried to figure it out. Ah well. Such, I guess, is the mystery of the creative process!

You can learn more about A.J. Hartley and his novel, DARWEN ARKWRIGHT AND THE PEREGRINE PACT here.

My Favorite Girl Adventurers: Matilda

How is it possible not to love Matilda? Didn’t we all have that moment as children where we wished there was a way to punish the grown-ups who were mean to us?

Reading MATILDA, then, is pure wish fulfillment, made even more amazing by Roald Dahl’s signature tongue-in-cheek humor.  The only problem with this book is that, even now, I still get the urge to stare hard at an object and try to move it using only the power of my mind…

 

Girl Adventurers

I love me some girl adventurers! Middle Grade books can sometimes seem filled with boys fighting swashbuckling pirates and saving the world from evil sorcerers, so I absolutely love coming across a female character with moxie. That’s probably why my first book, Zip, is about an eleven-year-old girl who travels across the country with only her trusty scooter and a bag of homemade granola bars to keep her company. 

 

I knew I wasn’t alone in this, so I decided to ask some debut Middle Grade writers what they thought about female character–both in their own books and in those that inspired them to write in the first place. So begins a new little blog series about female adventurers. I hope you’ll stick around and see what these fabulous writers have to say! 

 

Love, 

Ellie