Flying Starts
Six first-time authors and artists talk about their fall '03 debuts
by Staff -- Publishers Weekly, 12/22/2003
Christopher Paolini
Publishers always hope for a new author to create a buzz, but few could imagine the level and intensity of attention that 20-year-old Christopher Paolini has generated. He began work on his debut novel Eragon (Knopf, Aug.), the first in a planned trilogy, when he was only 15 years old; when it was finished, his family had the book printed by on-demand printer Lightning Source.
It was a rare self-publishing success story—not only did the book gain a cult following and attract a major publishing house, but the first edition itself has become a collector's item, with mint copies fetching upward of $300 at online auctions.
Knopf signed up the title and published it in hardcover earlier this season; Eragon debuted at #3 on the New York Times bestseller list, which was followed by an appearance on the Today show. According to Paolini, it's been a whirlwind ever since.
"There wasn't a lot of publicity leading up to the publication of the book, because they weren't sure if it was really going to do anything," he says. "But it has gotten pretty insane. There have been a huge amount of interviews." He recently finished a 16-city tour for Knopf, and is going back out on the road in February to do 10 more cities—that is, after he gets back from a month in Britain for the U.K. release of the book.
"I'm still trying to get used to it—but I'm not sure if I really want to get used to it, because there's no guarantee it will last," he says. "It's been an extraordinary experience. Readers have fallen in love with the book, thousands of people are reading it—I really can't ask for more as an author."
While Paolini acknowledges that the Harry Potter books have opened the field for YA fantasy novelists, he can honestly say that they didn't influence Eragon at all. "I actually didn't read the Potter books until the fourth one came out, and by then I had already written Eragon," he recalls. "Of course, once I started, I devoured them. What Rowling has done is really wonderful."
So which authors did play a role in shaping him? While Tolkien was an influence on Paolini, he was not the biggest—he lists his three most influential authors as Anne McCaffrey, Ursula K. LeGuin, and Raymond Feist. He enjoyed Tolkien, but says that Feist's novel Magician made a particularly strong impact on him.
Paolini, who was home-schooled, received his high school degree at age 15. That left him with the time he needed to work on the book. But there's another side to that coin: while most teenage boys were worried about who to ask to the prom, Paolini was thinking about print runs and publicity junkets.
"I wouldn't have changed it," he says. "Something a lot of people don't realize is that in order to write a book, you have to have time. When I graduated from high school, I had time to just write. I think I had a wonderful childhood—my parents put a lot of work into my sister and me, and it's all turned out for the best so far."
Eragon, an enormous tome in its own right, is only one-third of the story—and Paolini says he is about halfway finished with Book Two. "I'm very happy to be working on it," he says. "By the end of this year, I will have been working on or talking about Eragon for five years. I mean, five years—that's a quarter of my entire life!" he says with a laugh. "I think it's going to be a lot better than Book One, because I learned so much about editing that I get to put to use. I think technically I'm a lot stronger now." —James Bickers
Lisa Yee
"It all came from a two-word joke," Lisa Yee says of her first middle-grade novel, Millicent Min, Girl Genius (Scholastic/Levine, Oct.). And ever since the book's release, young readers (and reviewers, too) have been enjoying Yee's sense of humor. "I was thinking about the term 'child psychologist' and how funny it was," Yee explains. "Initially I thought I would write a book about a child who was actually a psychologist—and I did that, but it has since evolved into Millicent Min."
Eleven-year-old Millicent is a profoundly gifted child who has skipped so far ahead academically that she is about to enter her senior year of high school while her contemporaries will be going into sixth grade. Though she loves the intellectual challenges of her situation, Millicent lacks for friends and social skills, believing that writing Latin quips in a classmate's yearbook is the height of cool and that her grandmother and her books are all the companionship she needs. But one eventful summer—the time frame of the book—changes everything.
For Yee, it was the confluence of luck, quick thinking and a little white lie that led to her recent career changes. "I've been a professional writer ever since I left college," she says, having done writing work in advertising and television after graduating from the University of Southern California in 1981. But longing to express herself in a more creative way, Yee embarked on a personal goal to write a children's book. Her first attempt landed in the slush pile at Knopf Books for Young Readers back in the mid-1990s, where it was seen by then-Knopf editor Arthur Levine. "Arthur pulled my book out of the slush pile," Yee says, with a hint of disbelief in her voice. "I now know that it was pretty much a miracle."
"Arthur wrote me and said something like, 'This isn't quite it, but if you do something else, I'd like to see it,' " the author recalls. "I told him—well, I wouldn't exactly call it a lie—that I had this idea," she said with a slight laugh. "I mentioned that if he was interested, I would send him three chapters and, if he liked those, I'd send the rest of the book. He asked me for the entire book, and there was no rest of the book—I hadn't written it yet!"
Yee finished the manuscript in good time and Levine, who had since moved to Scholastic, was enthusiastic, noting, "We can work on it together" in another letter to Yee.
However, Yee's initial burst of activity in the children's book arena was temporarily put on hold when she faced more demands in her family life. "I was having another baby [a son who is now six; her daughter is 11] and my husband and I had started a creative services company, so things were crazy," recalls Yee. "I didn't write anything for a year."
Finally, it was Yee's attendance at a Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators conference that got Millicent Min back on track. "Everyone was discussing what various kinds of rejections mean. I quickly realized how special it was that I had received a personal letter from an editor. That's when everything changed for me. I apologized to Arthur and got to work on the book."
As Millicent inched toward publication, Yee was surprised at the whole process. "You have romantic images of writing something in a garret and then, poof, it's a book," she says. "It took me by surprise how collaborative it was. Arthur and [associate editor] Cheryl Klein really helped me shape the book—and they were polite about it! In advertising they often say, 'Do this, do that' rather than 'Have you ever considered this?' "
It looks as though Yee will be enjoying the courteous collaboration a while longer, too. She recently completed the first draft of a companion book to Millicent Min, which stars one of the characters in the book, Stanford Wong, and is scheduled for spring 2005.
For now, she's happy enjoying being a new children's book author. She has done signings at her children's schools as well as her own junior high alma mater in southern California, and will be facilitating an online seminar for gifted children who have completed an analysis of the book.
"For so long, this had been a dream," Yee says. "It wasn't until I saw the galleys that it was real. When Listening Library bought the audio rights, that was another eye-opener. It was more and better than I could have imagined. All along the way, I had visions of this being like one of those reality shows where someone would appear and say, 'The joke's on you, we're not going to publish your book.' "
Happily, it's Yee who's having the last laugh. —Shannon Maughan
John Holyfield
After graduating from high school, John Holyfield decided on a graphic design major at Howard University, because it had been drummed into his head for so long that being a graphic artist was the only way he could make money as an artist. While in college, working at an art supply store, he brought in some sketches he had done to show to the other employees at the shop. They were so impressed with his work, they suggested he send it out. As luck would have it, one of the recipients wanted to publish his images as lithographic prints. Holyfield has been painting ever since.
Having worked as a professional artist, creating and selling his oil paintings and lithographs of those images for the past 12 years, Holyfield welcomed the opportunity to work on his first book for children. "The idea to illustrate a children's book had always been in the back of my head," he says. "I've always wanted to illustrate books with story lines my two sons would like."
According to Holyfield, Ethel Footman Smothers, author of The Hard-Times Jar (FSG/Foster, Aug.) sought him out to illustrate her manuscript. "She had seen my prints and thought the imagery fit in with her story," he says. "I really liked the story and we took it from there."
Holyfield worked with editor Frances Foster on the picture book, through a process he calls "relatively painless." "She gave me free reign to do what I wanted to do," he says. "Even with early sketches, she could see that I captured what she and the author both wanted."
Holyfield says he was inspired early on as a child by the work of Norman Rockwell and Ernie Barnes. "Rockwell's work is very narrative," he says. "You can just let your imagination go with his pieces." As for Barnes, the illustrator remembers watching the television sitcom Good Times as a youngster and being drawn to the closing image of a mural of all the characters; "I saw Ernie Barnes's name as the credits rolled," he recalls, "and saw that he was the artist who painted the mural. I think my style is a lot like his. I didn't set out to copy his style; it all came about subconsciously."
Holyfield describes his own style as having an old, southern feel to it. "I've been at signings where people come in and look at me, then look over me, trying to find the artist who did the paintings. They are looking for someone much older than myself. They don't believe it's me." While in his artwork he focuses on the African-American experience with themes of family, music and spirituality, Holyfield finds that all races enjoy his work.
For The Hard-Times Jar, Holyfield painted on canvas with acrylics; he says he deliberately did not paint features on characters who aren't the center of attention on the page, because "they are the supporting cast. I wanted Emma, the main character, to be the focus," he says.
He admits that he wasn't sure how critics and readers would see the book. "I've come to know how people will react to my paintings, but I had no idea how this book would be received. So far I've had a few reviews and everything has been favorable. It's really nice to see that. [The whole experience] has been a real treat."
While Holyfield does not currently have another book project in the works, he does say that the publication of this first book has changed his life. "It's finally validated my artistic life with my sons," he says. "They now have something to take to school with them." —Joy Bean
Clare B. Dunkle
In September 2001, Clare Dunkle, an American living in Germany, had just finished writing her first novel. She thought she'd need an agent to get it published, but she did a little sleuthing on the Internet first. The first site she checked was Henry Holt's, because back in the 1960s the house had published Dunkle's favorite books ever, Lloyd Alexander's Prydain series. Sure enough, Holt accepted unsolicited manuscripts, and although Dunkle—a former librarian—had low expectations, she sent off her manuscript. Six weeks later, editor Reka Simonsen e-mailed her to say she'd like to publish the book; this October, The Hollow Kingdom appeared—with a glowing blurb by none other than Alexander on its jacket.
Dunkle has always had an intense relationship with books. As a child she twice wrote to Lloyd Alexander, to tell him "all the things he should have done in his [Prydain] books and hadn't," she remembers, wryly. "When I would love a story," she says, "I would move in there with my own characters, and live there for a while."
Shortly after Dunkle's family moved to Germany in 2001 (her husband, a civil engineer, accepted a job with the Department of Defense at an Air Force base there), her two teenaged daughters, whom she had home-schooled for two years, entered boarding school. "Almost as soon as they were out the door," she says, "my brain took a holiday and plunged into daydream. I was thinking about monsters, and why we don't ever let them win.
"That evening I complained to my husband that I had been daydreaming, instead of doing whatever project or task I'd had in mind. He said, 'Write it down for me. I want to see it.' It was the accident of the moment—if he had asked me two weeks later, the story would have been something else entirely.
"But I was thinking then about monsters and what it says about ourselves if we only create worlds where we are supreme. In the old myths, like Persephone or the Black Bull of Norroway, the alien race very often won. I wanted to create a situation where it is morally acceptable for the monster to win, and to deal with the culture shock that ensues."
While The Hollow Kingdom stands alone, two other novels, inspired by her daughters' questions about the characters' fates, will continue the story; the second, Close Kin, is slated for October 2004. Another novel in the pipeline, By These Ten Bones, enters new territory: the medieval highlands of Scotland.
The Hollow Kingdom features more than "monsters." Opening in 19th-century England, it introduces two strong but orphaned sisters, the elder of whom, Kate, is pursued by a goblin who wants to abduct her as his bride. PW's starred review praised the storytelling for its romantic tension and suspenseful twists and turns. But the substance of the story reflects many of Dunkle's interests. "I read all the folklore I can get my hands on, and all the anthropological studies," she says. "An author can't figure out just the pretty elements of an imaginary world. You have to figure out where the food supply comes from, too."
Fantasy, she adds, is not escapism. "It is like a laboratory, a way for a writer to pinpoint what he wants to explore. In The Hollow Kingdom, for example, I can focus on what happens when an ugly old man has a relationship with a beautiful young woman. Is there a way for that to work? We find it unacceptable, because we think love depends on chemistry. But it's worth telling our teens that love depends on respect, generosity, self-sacrifice and allowing the other person room for growth.
"I don't think it's worth writing just for entertainment," Dunkle says. "If it challenges the author, it should challenge the reader, too." —Elizabeth Devereaux
Stacey Dressen-McQueen
Stacey Dressen-McQueen admits that she wasn't very brave when it first came to mailing out her artwork for people to see. "Just getting the nerve up to send stuff to people is hard," she says. She started sending some of her illustrations to children's publications and publishing houses in the late 1990s.
About a year later, a few of them were printed in Ladybug magazine, where artist agent Judy Sue Goodwin-Sturges spotted them, and contacted the artist about representing her. A couple of years after that, Goodwin-Sturges met with Melanie Kroupa, who brought on Dressen-McQueen as the illustrator for the picture book Boxes for Katje, written by Candace Fleming (FSG, Sept.).
The book, set just after World War II, tells the story of Katje, a girl living in the town of Olst, Holland. Katje, who receives boxes of gifts from a girl in America, shares them with her family and community to help them through the long, cold winter.
To research the book, Dressen-McQueen contacted a librarian in Olst, who sent her some photos from rural areas of Holland. "I had found lots of pictures of Amsterdam on my own," she says, "but I needed to see how areas outside the city looked." She was able to use her own family photos as inspiration for many of the villagers because her paternal grandmother was of Dutch heritage. She also had family quilts of her own to refer to for the clothing designs. "Many of the patterns throughout the book were inspired by two small patchwork quilts my grandmother had given me, which were made with material from the '30s and '40s," she says.
The author also has a familial connection to the book. Her mother had sent a box to Europe in 1945, where it reached a girl named Katje. The true-life story unfolded almost exactly as it does in the book, with food, clothing and tulip bulbs being shared.
The artist says she has always wanted to illustrate a children's book. She received a certificate in art from the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland, Ore.; "I've been drawing and painting since I can remember. My mom always supplied me with all sorts of material to be creative." Maira Kalman and Giselle Potter were influential to her in terms of style, Dressen-McQueen says, as well as Vivienne Flesher: "I love her use of color."
In describing her own style, the illustrator says she draws from "a naïve perspective." She loves drawing faces: "I like having a face with a lot of emotion because you can tell a lot of the story that way."
As for her experience with Kroupa, the illustrator says, "I loved working with Melanie. She's very supportive and helped direct me on how to make sure everything made sense on the page." She says that working with designer Jennifer Browne was also a treat. "She was very involved and hugely helpful in making the book what it is."
Dressen-McQueen says that the publication of the book has meant a lot to her. "After dreaming of being able to illustrate a children's book for so long, it has been so satisfying to be part of this creative process," she says. "I love doing a narrative and following a character through a whole story."
Not only a debut picture book illustrator, but also a first-time mother (with a seven-month-old baby at home in Portland), the artist sounds as if she's taking it all in stride. She has already finished illustrating a second picture book, titled The Biggest Soap, due out in September of next year, and is currently at work on a third, Little Mama Forgets by Robin Cruise, both with Kroupa at FSG. —Joy Bean
Libba Bray
Libba Bray's love of ghost stories, her view of feminism and her fascination with Victorian society's veiled obsession—sex (or more precisely, budding sexuality)—fuel her first novel, A Great and Terrible Beauty (Delacorte, Dec.). In this tale of 19th-century British teen Gemma Doyle, powerful visions link her to an ancient purgatory-like realm called the Order. At the beginning of the novel, Gemma's mother dies, and the heroine envisions just how it happened—a murder by an otherworldly being.
The author explains that the mother-daughter theme unfolds on multiple levels, "not only in terms of mother-child, but also in terms of feminism, and my own generation being the second wave of feminism." Gemma's ability to enter the realm of the Order becomes a source of power for her.
"A lot of the initial idea [for the novel] stemmed from emerging female sexuality and how threatening that is to the girls themselves and to the world at large," Bray says. "We're comfortable with women in certain roles but not comfortable with women expressing anger or fully accepting their power. The most daring question a woman can ask is, 'What do I want?' "
In a starred review, PW said, "Bray brilliantly depicts a caste system, in which girls are taught to abandon individuality in favor of their man's wishes, as a deeper and darker horror than most things that go bump in the night." The author says that these two story lines—the girls' sense of entrapment in their Victorian society and the power they feel in the Order—came together "slowly, painfully, like a kidney stone passing." Even though she had the idea for the Order, she wasn't sure how this supernatural thread would emerge. "Eventually I realized that because the girls were so powerless in this world, they needed control elsewhere," she explains. "There's so much about adolescence that feels like that; you have all of the responsibility and none of the authority."
After Gemma finds a diary in a cave near her all-girl boarding school, she discovers how to enter the realm of the Order and shares the secret with several of her classmates. Each of the girls reacts differently to the potential power of the Order. The author says she based the dynamics of the girls on her own friendships, growing up in Denton, Tex., just north of Dallas. "I had a pack of girls that I hung with. We were somewhat feral," she recalls. "They were strong bonds, but there was a certain amount of danger, because there are so many feelings that you have as teenagers."
Bray, a theater major, graduated from the University of Texas in Austin in 1988. As a playwright, she thought she needed to be in New York, so when her best friend from childhood, who had moved to Manhattan, needed a roommate, she called Bray. The author came to New York with her grandmother's punch bowl and $600 in her shoe. She landed a job in the publicity department at Penguin Putnam, where she worked for three years, and later at Spier, which specializes in advertising for the publishing business.
It was Bray's husband, Barry Goldblatt, a children's book agent, and her friend Ginee Seo, an editor at Simon & Schuster, who encouraged her to write a young adult novel. Under a pseudonym, Bray had written three books for 17th Street Books, one of which was edited by Wendy Loggia. She enjoyed working with Loggia so much that she sent her the manuscript for A Great and Terrible Beauty. Bray says Loggia "came back with brilliant comments, and I chucked two-thirds of the manuscript in the revision process."
When she's just beginning a book, she says she writes at a coffee shop in longhand. "It's a good way to keep the internal critic at bay, to write in a mad, caffeinated torrent." Beauty is the first in a trilogy, and the second book is due next June, but the author has not yet begun work on it. "I always think about what my late, great father used to say. When I told him I work best under pressure, he said, 'Darlin', you only work under pressure,'" she says, mimicking his Southern accent.
The positive response to Beauty has boosted Bray's confidence. "I had a friend who said, 'You don't have an internal critic, you have an internal sadist.' So it's helped to quiet the sadist. It's made it easier for me to answer 'What do you do?' with 'I'm a writer,' and lay claim to that." —Jennifer M. Brown
