EXPLORING THE BULLY

COMFORT (sequel to BLUE) has a bully.  Rob Walker is not a  huge part of the story but he manages to make Ann Fay's life with a disability extra challenging. What we don't see in COMFORT are the factors that influence Rob's mean behavior.

While writing AIM, my forthcoming prequel to BLUE, I had the opportunity to explore Rob's life. His older brother, Dudley is our window into Rob's world.  Dudley's behavior toward protagonist, Junior Bledsoe is bullying at times. And even Junior acts thoughtlessly and with a mean spirit a time or two in the story.

What Junior doesn't expect, is that he and Dudley have more in common than either of them imagined. And that explains a lot about Rob, too. As it turns out, a mean-spirit can pass right on down a family line.  Which is certainly not to say that meanness is in our genes - but that our family circumstances can make us hard.

Every bully begins life as an innocent babe.  Then something happens. Or a series of somethings. That's what I wanted to explore in AIM - when hard things happen, do they have to make us hard? Or can we choose to be positively shaped by them? Junior Bledsoe finds himself faced with these questions. 

For more on bullies and literature, check out the latest issue of Talking Story.

AIM will be released Oct. 4, 2016 but you can pre-order it now!

RESEARCH THE MIRACLE

Richard Eller and students at Catawba Valley Community College are Researching the Miracle which includes producing a video about Hickory's 1944 polio epidemic and the emergency hospital.

This week, I met with Richard to reflect on the writing of Blue and what I found compelling in this momentous event in our town's history.

Richard Eller

I was a smidgen nervous about whether I'd be articulate on camera. But Richard was so affable and quietly encouraging that it mostly felt like an enjoyable conversation. 

Richard, who believes that "history is best when you walk in its footsteps" has led students in multiple HANDS ON HISTORY projects, such as The Selma Experience below. 



Best class ever! Yay!

As it turns out, Richard is also editing a book which will examine our polio epidemic and the community's response to it from a variety of perspectives. I can't wait to read it!

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: The Birth of The March of Dimes

At a school visit the other year, a 4th grader came to me and held out his hand. In it was a dime. "This is for you," he said. "For coming to our school." So sweet and yet how could I possibly take his money?

Hello?  It was a dime.  The answer was obvious. I didn't have to keep it.  "I'll give it to the March of Dimes," I promised.  He knew what that was because his class had just read Blue and done polio related studies.  

The March of Dimes is a non-profit founded in 1938 by Franklin Roosevelt to benefit the research and treatment of polio.  Thousands of children benefited. We all did because the money went a long way toward funding vaccine research.  January 3 is its birthday.

At first they called it The National Foundation For Infantile Paralysis.  But say that three times fast and you'll realize how catchy The March of Dimes sounds.  I have a small collection of dimes on my desk - each of them sent to me by the March of Dimes in separate envelopes - peeking out through plastic windows like little eyes - begging to be acknowledged.  With them come address labels and notepads as an incentive for me to give back to the foundation.  

I could just drop the dimes into my change purse and spend them on whatever.  Except that I can't.  Like the dime in the 4th grader's hand they just feel destined.  Today's date reminds me that it's time to click on over to The March of Dimes website and make a contribution.

Nowadays, since polio is no longer a problem in the U.S.,  The March of Dimes works to eliminate birth defects and premature births.  Obviously a worthy cause - in case you're looking for ways to start your New Year out with a really great feeling.

Paperback Pair Contest: lst Winner

Remember the Paperback Pair Contest?    

(If not, see sidebar and sign up.  

There are 2 more chances to win - 

once in November and again in December.)

 

The time has come to pull a winner.   So into the little blue skillet goes a pile of names. 

One of my sweet German friends is here to visit so I asked her to do the honors. She is completely trustworthy as you can see from this face.

 Can you read that name?

The winner is Mary Stott!  Congratulations Mary!  Send an address to moyergirl at charter dot net and I will send you the Paperback Pair just as soon as I get my copies.  (I'm fairly certain that will be mid-October.)  

Danke schön, dear Emma!

NEW BOOK COVERS & OTHER GOOD STUFF

Remember these? 

Well, they're getting a new look!

And COMFORT is joining BLUE in paperback! (all this, in late September)

So, naturally, I'm celebrating!  Which means a contest, of course!  I'll give the paperback pair to one winner each month from October through December.   You or your friends may enter at any time!

Here's how you enter.

1.  Follow me. (Click on "Join This Site"  at right and follow instructions.  (If you already follow me, proceed to # 2.)

2.  Tell me you want the Paperback Pair.

3.  Sit back and wait for the announcement.  

No, wait!  Don't just sit back and wait!  Send your friends over here! 

So you might be asking, Does "Join this Site" mean I have to read it?  Of course not!  But it'll help me look good and in this business it's all about perceptions, right? Or deceptions maybe...

I will try to hook you into reading.  And that's no lie.  At least, come back to see if you won!

ART SCULPTURE BASED ON BLUE

BLUE was the book selected for the 2009 ALAMANCE READS (a community wide reading event). The Friends of the Alamance County Library pulled off some incredible events related to the book and its various themes.

Today, in connection with the upcoming issue of TALKING STORY newsletter which I co-produce with Carol Baldwin I am reposting one of the group sculpture projects that Artist, Ann Hobgood created with local youth.

Ann Hobgood with Found Objects Sculpture Based on Blue

She simply (and I'm sure it wasn't simple!) listed EVERY SINGLE ITEM mentioned in the book, collected them, and the group assembled them into one amazing sculpture!

Enjoy!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

A CANDID PHOTO TO MAKE MY DAY!

Fan mail is always sweet but when it comes with a candid shot of a reader with book in hand?  

Delectable!

This reader is Sydney who I've never met.  But obviously, I love her!

In the words of her mom:

"Sydney is 10 years old and in the 4th grade. She was introduced to BLUE by her 3rd grade teacher. She just finished reading the book for the third time and is very excited about starting the sequel, COMFORT."

Thank you, Sydney's mom for sharing that!  Some days authors feel as if their stories are no longer being read.  A little proof to the contrary goes a really long way.

BLUE MONDAY: In Which I Discover Alex and Deborah - book bloggers extraordinaire!

First I meet Alex via comments at my blog.  I start exploring Alex's blog and it's love at first sight.  Clearly this is a blogger who cares about kids and the effects that war has had on them. The Children's War deals directly with books about children during WWII.

Before I've even caught up on reading The Children's War, I discover Alex has blogged about BLUE.   Finding a lovely review on a book blog is always a day maker!

Finding blog comments that lead me to another book blog is just icing on the BLUE Monday cake! Deborah has several blogs (prolific woman!).  At A Bookish Libraria: The Dame Reviews she blogged extensively about polio and her mother's experience with it in the very epidemic that is at the heart of BLUE. I'm most eager to learn more about Deborah's mom's story.

POST WAR TRAUMA

Post war trauma is one of the major topics in COMFORT, the sequel to BLUE. Tomorrow I'll post the prologue.  But, for now, I want to call attention to a documentary on the subject.

Tonight on HBO at 9:00 you can see War Torn: 1861 - 2010 - about war related PTSD.

Trailer

THE LITTLE READ IN CALDWELL COUNTY

This week I get to spend two whole days in nearby Caldwell County. I'll be speaking to 4th graders about BLUE and the 1944 polio epidemic. Here are a few pics of my Caldwell experience last spring.

I do have fabulous pictures of some of the students I spoke to but I don't have permission to post all those kids on the web so I will let this lovely sculpture from the county office represent the 4th graders. 

I got to hang out with Media Specialists and school board members over lunch.

At Baton Elementary, Linda Andrews went all out with a polio and BLUE related display.

After school, 2 media specialists, Annamarie Stuckey and Susan McFarland took me on an outing.

It was just my sort of adventure -

    winding country roads which led to a historical spot.

Now the site belongs to a riding club. But...

 

 Before economics forced a change, it was the site of 4-H Camp

 The land was donated by a Caldwell County school principal, Luther Robinson,  whose daughters got polio during the 1953 epidemic in Caldwell County. He wrote his heartbreaking but inspiring story in We Made Peace With Polio.

Many others in Caldwell County were affected by polio that year. So my visit is not just about BLUE and the 1944 epidemic. It's about the history of the students and their families. It's an honor to explore history with students in Caldwell County and I'm grateful to the Educational Foundation for sponsoring my visit!

NEMESIS

Editor Carolyn Yoder, sent me a heads-up email that Philip Roth will be on NPR's ALL THINGS CONSIDERED this afternoon.  

Turns out he's releasing a new book today - The Nemesis.

In this case the nemesis is polio.  The time is 1944.  The place is Newark, NJ  - 622 miles from Hickory, North Carolina where another polio epidemic rages at the exact same time!

Contrasting communities.  Roth's character lives in a Jewish neighborhood in the city.  Mine lives in a mostly Christian rural area.  It's easy to imagine the differences.

But there were so many similarities - fear, change of plans, the challenges of the WWII homefront, and guilt.
Lives changed by disease with all its attending emotions.


I, for one will be reading THE NEMESIS.  If you read and blog it, can you do me a favor and mention BLUE at the same time?   It's geared toward a younger audience but is deeply and widely appreciated by adults.

I suspect these two books would complement each other very well. (If I do say so myself!)

YESTERDAY IN HISTORY: D-Day - June 6, 1944

Most schools are probably still in session so a trip to a D-Day commemoration is likely not possible for your family right now. But sometime this summer you may want to take your youngsters (the older ones) to one of the nation's WWII memorials. 

• The National World War II Museum in New Orleans. (Hey, the Gulf Coast could use our support right now!)
• The town of Bedford VA lost more soldiers per capita on D-Day than any other area in the US. The National D-Day Memorial Foundation was built to commemorate their loss and that of other towns across the country. My visit there (while I was researching BLUE) gave me a much clearer image of how the assault took place.
• At the Museum of Avaiation in Warner Robins, GA you can see a short movie Papa said, "We should never forget." which tells the story of D-Day from a young French girl's perspective.
• Through June, the Little White House Museum in Warm Springs, GA features an exhibit of The Tuskegee Airman. 
• National World WII Memorial in Washington, DC
• Rosie the Riveter National Memorial Park in Richmond, CA
• The USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor, Oahu, HI

War Memorials always give me conflicting feelings because I believe so strongly that war doesn't solve problems. But I value history and hope that by reliving it, I will learn something and live well as a result.

STORY QUILTS BY H.H. POOLE STUDENTS

Earlier in the week I posted images of student projects based on Blue. One was a really cool quilt. Today I'm posting all the quilt projects. Wish you could see them better. Every quilt square tells a part of the story and each is a touching experience. Try clicking on the image to get a better view!

THE WRITER'S DILEMMA: To blog or to actually write a book?

A "quilt" based on my book BLUE, created by a middle school student at H.H. Poole Middle School in Stafford, Virginia. I love how each square shares a bit of the polio story or a piece of history.

I have a theory that one reason blogging is so popular is because it represents the fulfillment of our dreams to be published. We toss a few words on the page, move them around a little, add a pic for emphasis, and then, Voila! we click on a button that says PUBLISH POST!

This is heady stuff.  And guess what?!  We don't even have to go through an editor, marketing team, copyeditor, or book designer.  Just like, that with no roadblocks in the way, our words are out there!

Never mind that relatively few people are reading those words.  Never mind that the words do not shake the earth or even make a reader laugh or cry.

It just feels good.  Blogging satisfies a writer's needs to express herself.  And that, my dear imaginary readers, can be dangerous!

Because, in my case anyway, blogging can take an unexpectedly large chunk of time. Usually, it takes the most valuable time in my day - my writing time!  By the time I get that blog post, up my bones are begging to move about.  My brain requests a change of activity.  The clock reminds me of some unavoidable activity that I need get to.

Therefore my work-in-progress does not progress!  Some days it becomes a work-in-stagnation.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do about this because blogging wisdom says that regular and frequent posting keeps my imaginary readers coming back.  Publishing wisdom (out there in the for-real publishing world) seems to indicate something similar. 

At least, in the real world of publishing, I do get requests for more books.  I'm not sure anyone has ever begged me for another blog post!

Now that ought to tell me something...

I'm not saying I'm giving up blogging. I'm just saying, don't be surprised if I start posting lots of fabulous middle school book related projects and go back to de-stagnating my work-in-progress.

If they make you laugh or cry or if you beg for more, I'll know I've hit on something.

Another H.H. Poole project based on BLUE.  This one gets me at an emotional level.  Something about those health dept. officials/polio experts arriving at Ann Fay's house.  It doesn't look good for Ann Fay.

I know this scene is depicting the emergency polio hospital in Blue but it also reminds me of a potential scene from Comfort - physical therapists attending polio patients at Warm Springs, GA.

MORE Q & A WITH MIDDLE SCHOOLERS FROM H.H. POOLE

Oneof these books is not about a disease.  Do you know which one?

1. Why do you write about diseases?

This is multiple choice. There could be more than one right answer. And no, you don’t want me to be your doctor.

A. I am a sick person.
B. I should have been a doctor.
C. I  probably have a fear of getting sick.
D. I am fascinated with the emotional aspects of illness and the way it changes people’s lives.

2. Who’s your favorite character in your books?

• Well, in every book, I’m always attached to my main characters.
• I think Imogene Wilfong in Blue is very cool.
• But I also happen to love Junior Bledsoe in Blue and especially in Comfort! He’s a very hot item you know. One of my readers sent me an email saying if her husband ever divorced her she was going to drive to North Carolina and track Junior Bledsoe down!

3. How did you get ideas for your stories?

There are so many fascinating hidden stories in history. When I'm working on one project I discover some story that grabs me by the heart and tries to drag me away with it. Usually I force myself to ignore it until I finish the project I’m on. But in the back of my brain a story begins to take shape and as quick as I can I go after it!

Example:  I was writing Vacation Bible School curriculum when I discovered Father Damien. I only needed a short story about leprosy for the curriculum.  But the research led me to more info and I wanted to do something longer with it. So I eventually wrote and published Healing Water, about a boy who is banished to Hawaii's leprosy settlement on the Kalaupapa Peninsula. He meets Father Damien there.

On the Kalaupapa Peninsula.

4. What was it like to go to Kalaupapa? 

I had to hike down a steep trail for a few miles. That was challenging. I had to hike back up. That was hard. The next day my legs hurt so badly I could barely walk.

Being there was cool but also a little bit frustrating because I wanted to roam freely and spend lots of time alone, getting to know the landscape and thinking about my story and my characters. But I had to stick to the guided tour and of course, there were other people around. I understand why people like me can’t just roam freely in this very private place but still, I wanted to.

CONTINUING THAT CONVERSATION WITH H.H. POOLE MIDDLE SCHOOL

1.  How did you feel when you finished the book BLUE?

The first time (after I wrote the first draft) I was thrilled. Each time after that, I was just relieved to have revisions done. By the time it was actually, factually done, I was so sick of it I wanted to throw up!

But now, I like it again.

2.  Why did you make the book so sad?

What do you think? This is multiple choice. There could be more than one answer.
A. I am a very mean person.
B. I’m not a funny writer. Since I can’t make you laugh, then I’ll at least make you cry.
C. I am trying to figure out why bad things happen in the world. One of the ways I do that is through exploring tragedy through storytelling.
D. Polio was a very sad chapter in America’s history. I thought someone needed to tell it.

3. Have you ever had any experiences with the things you wrote about? Like did anyone you know have polio? Did you know anyone who was in the war? 

No one in my family had polio so this story did not grow out of personal experience. But, through my research, I’ve made some dear friends who had polio.  They’ve answered lots of questions for me. Whenever I have another question I just ask them.  I do know some vets but I haven’t actually had personal family experience with someone serving in a war.

Here I am with Jackie, one of my polio experts.  We met in a restaurant in Florida.

 4. How did you think of the characters’ names?

•  I  found Ann Fay’s name on a piece of paper and knew immediately that was the double name I wanted. (She had to have a double name because so many southerners do!)
•  And I had to have a Junior because there are so many of them around here where I live.
•  I had a best friend named Peggy Sue growing up so I wanted to use it to honor her.
•  I once knew a woman named Immogene. I thought it was perfect.

I think, for most of the characters, I just thought of names that fit the time period and seemed right for my characters.

5. Why is the book called BLUE?

Here's a little hint.

It’s all about symbolism. (which I love, BTW) As I was writing the story, blue kept cropping up – it wasn’t planned but it all worked together so beautifully. (And I like to make connections like that as I write.)  You may have noticed there are a bunch of blue items in the book.

So I’d like to throw the question back at you. Feel free to leave a comment below with a list of items that might have helped to name the book.  (Or Ms. Goll can email it to me.) I'll post a picture for each one you get right.)

And just so you know – I actually called it Tough as Hickory – but authors don’t always get to choose the titles for their books.  My editor is very good at keeping me involved with such decisions. She actually came up with the idea of Blue and I wisely agreed with her!

Oh, BTW, I hope your teacher or librarian will enter the book and DVD contest announced below.  You could possibly get a free book (or books) for your school!

CHATTING WITH H.H. POOLE MIDDLE SCHOOL

Sudents at H.H. Poole Middle School have read BLUE. In preparation for my April visit, they sent me some questions. I am going to dribble the answers out here over the next several posts.

Feel free to lurk while we chat.

I'll begin with a few of the personal questions they sent me. (and if you click on the ABOUT ME link at the top of the page you'll see me as I really am -sort of)

1. What are your other favorite foods besides banana bread and dark chocolate? Do you like potatoes?

I love potatoes.  Anyway you slice them. Or season them. Or cook them. They're one of my favorite comfort foods. I also love raw veggies, exotic foods in general, fried okra and just about anything healthy! And a lot of things that aren't healthy. Can you tell I love to eat? (FWIW - I am not fond of horseradish!)

2. Do you have a bodyguard?

Yes, my 3 year old grandson is my “duper hero”. He is “drong and brave”. Don’t mess with him!

Actually I try not to make enemies. I don’t have any valuables. And I’m way too boring for the paparazzi to mess with. So my duper hero can handle anything that comes up.

3. When is your birthday?
July 18. Eight years after NC’s polio epidemic. You do the math!

Here I am as a baby with my older sister.

4. Did making forts help you create wisteria mansion?
Oh, I think so. I gew up on a homestead that had a barn with lots of empty sweet potato crates in them. My siblings and I used those crates to build houses and mazes. And I would go with my friends into the woods and create playhouses too.

My hubby and I are creating a wisteria mansion in the field behind our house. (He does most of the work because I burned up too many belts on his mower.) Unlike my real house it gets bigger and better every year.

I’ve always loved creating play and living spaces. When I feel discouraged with my house or maybe a little depressed I just rearrange my furniture and it makes me feel like I have a whole new house.

5. What’s your favorite book?

Okay, this is a very hard question. When I go to a restaurant with 10 items on the menu I cannot decide which I want. And you want me to choose one favorite book from the thousands of options? So let’s try to narrow this down.

I mostly read historical fiction. I like books from the early 20th century. I am drawn to holocaust stories. So I will give you several favorites.

A few incredible holocaust books 
The Diary of A Young Girl by Anne Frank
Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli
Yellow Star by Jennifer Roy
Book Thief by Marcus Zusak

Historical but not holocaust
The Night of the Burning by Linda Press Wulf
Sudie by Sara Flanigan
Billy Creekmore – by Tracey Porter
City of Cannibals – by Rikki Thompson
Jip: His Story by Katherine Paterson

Other
Hatchet by Gary Paulsen
Wintergirlz by Laurie Halse Anderson
When We Were Saints  - by Han Nolan

There are tons of amazing books out there and I'm sure I've forgotten something really important.  But I love anything by Katherine Paterson, Jerry Spinelli, and Gary Paulsen.