Another Bone-Headed Mistake

Dear Friend Who Came to My Party and Gave Me the Lovely Pen,

Thank you. It's a beautiful pen, the sort I feel every writer should have, and that I didn't until you gave it to me. I'm using it at my desk now to write notes on my current manuscript--due Friday, that's tomorrow--and it's a fabulous change from the crummy derelict pens that always seemed to end up abandoned on my desk. (The last one I was using wrote in orange ink. Where did that come from? 1983?)

I really love the pen, and I love you for giving it to me, and I wrote you a note expressing my emotions. And then I mailed it to the wrong person.

I'm sorry. That was a really great party, and I had such a good time with everyone, and I wasn't expecting any gifts or cards and I got things mixed up. I didn't realize I had--not until yesterday, when a friend who fortunately has a finely-honed sense of humor called and said, "Kim, I got your lovely note thanking me for the pen. Thing is, I didn't give you a pen."

I was thinking about this much of last night--I'm taking a whopping dose of prednisone, thanks to a virus that decided to activate my asthma, and while it's a great drug for keeping me breathing it also keeps me wide-awake at weird hours, mulling guest lists--and the thing is, I can't identify you with any certainty. I can make some guesses--but I did that once already, and look where it got me.

So I'm going to confess my sins right here, on this blog, and hope that you read it. Please know that I'm not ungrateful and not trying to be impolite. I've dropped the ball, but I really do love the pen.

Snowed In

It's snowing like mad here today. It doesn't snow in upper east Tennessee all that often--we usually get 4 measurable snows a season, when "measureable" is defined as anything over 1/4". Really I think we've had a storm like this only a handful of times since I've lived here--the most memorable between when my daughter was 2 weeks old, and the power went out, and we were hanging out in the basement because we were really afraid one of the pine trees surrounding our house was going to come down.

That was a really wet snow. Yesterday we had wet snow, though what fell on the farm was mostly ice pellets. The farm didn't get much, but I'm told downtown Bristol, 3 miles away, got several inches. We had several inches already from Thursday.

I live on a hill with a long, curving driveway. I'm good at driving in snow, courtesy of growing up in Indiana, but snow + hills + very little in the way of road salt or snow removal equipment = staying put on the farm. I know from last winter, when I had to rush my husband to the hospital in a storm, that I can unhitch my enormous truck and power through most things--but yikes. Not sure I could manage this.

Normally I really like holing up at the farm like this. It gives me an excuse to cancel all sorts of things, stay in my pajamas, read books, and write. But honestly, this time around I am annoyed. We were meant to drive to Charlotte this weekend, to see my sister and her family. My sister just moved from Wisconsin, and it's exciting having her closer. My husband and brother-in-law were going to play golf, and my sister and I were going to take my daughter to Nordstom's to buy birthday shoes (my daughter has size 11 feet; Nordstrom's stocks that size) and I was going to bury myself in Dewey and Fred, my lovely nephews. And mostly I miss my sister. It's going to be awhile before we can reschedule, because of my crazy schedule, which is entirely my doing. I'm sorry about that.

The only ways to get to Charlotte from Bristol are to go through one of two mountain passes, both of which got a foot of snow yesterday. Mountain passes in Colorado are equipped for snow like this. Mountain passes in North Carolina are not. My sister gets it, and I get it, but I don't have to be happy about it.

But now I'll sit down with my novel--the one I'm writing, not reading--which is not something I usually get to do on a Saturday. The snow is falling, silent and white. It's a beautiful world.

In Which I Am Interviewed

Today I'm cross-posting an interview I did with Anne Bryant Westrick, author of Brotherhood, for her blog.

When Brotherhood was in the works, Anne asked me for a blurb. When I found out that a white woman from Richmond, heart of the Old South, had written her debut novel about the start of the Klu Klux Klan, I admit that my first reaction was, oh hell no. Not puttin' my name on that But I vastly underestimated the book, as I soon learned--it's truthful, balanced, nuanced, everything historical fiction should be. I've been proud to count Anne a friend ever since, and I was very pleased to be on her blog, which, for the record, is much more visually appealing than mine.

Thanks, Anne!

Twitter, the NYT, my son, and me

An astonishing thing happened yesterday evening.

My son followed me on Twitter.

My children are 18 and 21 now. From their vantage point, my attempts at social media are cute, the way their 3-year-old cousin Dewey calling me "Uncle Kim" is cute, or their baby cousin Fred's attempts to pronounce anything are cute. Oh look, she's trying to social media. Isn't that cute?

My son left for college right around the time I got a Twitter account. He refused to follow me on philosophical grounds: I misused the language (I still tend to say that I sent a "twitt."). Also he didn't enjoy the random twitter conversations I tend to get into about 17th century fashion or aviation or, yesterday, taxation here and abroad. Also he already reads my blog. (Many of my twitter posts are links to my blog.)

It became a running joke between us. "I'm up to 147 followers," I'd say. "You're missing out."

"Yeah, I've got, like, twice that," he'd say.

"That's because you're in college."

"It's because you don't need Twitter."

"I'm excellent at Twitter. And soon I'm going to get a selfie stick."

"The last thing you need is a selfie stick."

My son is in London this semester. I'm loving technology, because FaceTime Audio means I get to talk to him cheap, which translates to often. We can text each other, too.

Before the ALA media awards were announced, a week and a half ago, he sent me a message, "Win the Newbery and I'll follow you on Twitter." When I won an Honor, I suggested it was Good Enough. He declined. "Go big or go home," he said. (He's going to deny saying that. I'm pretty sure he said something like it, at any rate. What can I say? I'm a novelist, I make things up.)

Last night we were hunkering down for a snug night in front of a fire. It was snowing out, hard, which is rare in our parts, and I made chili and cornbread for dinner. It was still simmering and I was on the couch with a book when my husband, checking our joint email, read aloud, "Number 6 on the New York Times Bestseller List."

"What?" I said. He read it again. I jumped up, saying, "You're joking. You'd better not be joking! That would not. Be. Funny," but by then I could read it for myself. It was an email from my editor, announcing that The War That Saved My Life would debut at #6 on the January 31st edition of the list.

New York Times Bestselling Author. I like it.

I'd already spoken to my son, and even though it was late in London knew he planned to stay up to watch the Notre Dame basketball game. I texted him the news. Ten seconds later, my phone dinged. I had a new twitter follower: my son.

Yeah, in my family we know how to celebrate. And as soon as this snow clears, I'm gonna buy me a selfie stick.

George Washington's Birthday Cake

There's a lot of conversation going on about Scholastic's decision to pull from publication a recently-published picture book, A Birthday Cake For George Washington. Here's how the publisher described the book in press releases: Everyone is buzzing about the president's birthday! Especially George Washington's servants, who scurry around the kitchen preparing to make this the best celebration ever. Oh, how George Washington loves his cake! And, oh, how he depends on Hercules, his head chef, to make it for him. Hercules, a slave, takes great pride in baking the president's cake. But this year there is one problem--they are out of sugar. 

The outrage--and there was plenty of outrage from readers and reviewers--came from two basic issues. One, the "smiling, happy slaves" trope, extended throughout the book; two, the assertion by the publisher/author that the book was based on history. Which is was to the extent that Hercules, Washington's chef, was enslaved, wore fine clothes, and had a daughter named Delia. The happy picture book leaves out the part where Hercules, apparently not so enamored of his position as the book might imply, runs away, and where Delia is left enslaved the rest of her life.

The book's editor, author, and illustrator are all Black. I don't know them personally. I've not read the book, and I'm not likely to now that it's been pulled from publication. You can buy it from third parties on Amazon, but I won't.

Not having read it, I can't have a real first-hand opinion. I can pretty much only comment on other people's comments. One person argued that the book did a service to young readers--that for most of them, it would be the first time they heard that George Washington owned slaves. If this is true, it's appalling. We need to do a better job of teaching history. 

I also don't think that any child's introduction to slavery should be light-hearted. You can't go straight to rape, death, and torture, nor to the toddler-sized manacles in slavery museums, but you also can't start out with a grin. Someone on Betsy Bird's blog said that you needed to have a basic understanding of a subject before you can move on to nuance. Nuance can't come first, or it becomes by default the basic understanding. So you need slavery is evil before you can examine enslaved people could be happy sometimes. 

I argue that you need that understanding down to your bones. I've never forgotten touring Poplar Forest, Jefferson's vacation home, with the historian who ran it (deliciously named Octavia Starbuck) and having her say, "We get school groups in here all the time, and the children say, 'oh, Jefferson was a good slaveowner.' We try to explain that there's no such thing, but most of them just don't understand.'"

As writers, we have an obligation to foster that understanding. We have an obligation to the whole truth. All of us, Black and White.

Tiny Notes on the Sequel

Today I've got very little for the blog. I'm impatient to start my real work, the work on my sequel to The War That Saved My Life. (Until about a week ago, the sequel had a title. It doesn't anymore. I'm lousy at titles.)

The thing is, I thought I was mostly finished with this one. If you met me on my October book tour, right after I turned in the latest revision, you heard me say that I thought we were headed to copyediting. I continued with this rosy point of view until December 15, when, right before leaving town for the holidays, my lovely persistent editor suggested I try a little harder. Again.

I throw myself small funerals on these occasions, and my family unites to tell me to get over it. The problem is, they are right. Though I thought most of my books were as good as I could possibly get them when they were published--and they were, at the time--I'd love to go through some most of them again, with what I know now.

(So far, the only change I'd make to TWTSML is swapping "tinned" beans for "canned" beans. That was a miss. Yes, we used some American words in place of British ones, as a deliberate choice for an American audience. But "canned" beans was just a miss.)

Anyway, it's not a bad thing, to improve with age. On Saturday evening my husband threw me a blowout party to celebrate the ALA awards. He did all the work, nearly every little thing; I actually spent most of Saturday foxhunting. (We chased a coyote, them being more prevalent in these parts.)  It was an epic day in all ways, not excluding a quiet morning on the drive to the hunt, just me in my big roaring truck, when I found the one line I needed to make the sequel sing.

I won't tell you, of course. I sent my editor an email, but she was celebrating MLK Jr Day and hasn't responded yet. It doesn't matter. We might not be all the way there, but we're getting closer. 

Other Broken Things

Fifteen months ago, I was one of something like three dozen authors featured at Anderson Bookshop's enormous YA Literacy event. It was amazing--if you're a teacher or librarian, you should absolutely go--but even better, I came out of that weekend with a bunch of new writer acquaintances and two new friends.

One of those friends is Christa Desir. I love her. I just loved her from the start. Our very first conversation went from Thomas Jefferson to racism in current society to the portray of interracial relationships in fiction to our favorite bodice-rippers. Then I think we talked about cute shoes. Later, childhood trauma, her work in rape advocacy, PTSD, the work she does with incarcerated youth in Chicago, the girls I knew at the Janie Hammitt home, her children, my children, how much middle school sucks for everyone, and that her youngest child goes by the name Butter.

Just last week I learned that Christa has a photograph displayed in her kitchen of her face superimposed on Wonder Woman's body. And here I thought I was the only one. And Christa said that the main difference between her and me was that she cussed more. I don't think that's true. I just don't cuss in my writing, because nobody puts up with f-bombs in books meant for fifth-graders. When you're writing for high school you can get away with that shit.

Christa is one of the very few people in the world that I felt I could trust immediately with my whole self. So when her new book, Other Broken Things, came out, I was both eager and nervous. It would suck to hate Christa's book. I would never love her less, but I would feel horrible.

No worries. I tore though that sucker. I love it whole. From the opening line, "I'd cut a bitch for a cigarette right now," to the end, "I guess I'll keep coming back." It's about a 17-year-old recovering alcoholic named Natalie, fresh from rehab and trying to figure out what her life can be like sober. It's gritty and tough and honest--much like Christa. The funniest part for me is the acknowledgements in the end, when Christa thanked the beta-reader who suggested Natalie should have a hobby, like horseback riding. Yeah. Christa picked boxing. I'm a little surprised she didn't go with roller derby, which is Christa's actual hobby, but boxing was the bomb. Horses wouldn't have worked in this one.

Here's my very favorite part. Natalie's parents aren't easy, and she's complaining about her father to a friend she meets at AA meetings: "Does that mean that I should just stand on the sidelines watching as he continues to treat my mom like shit? As he continues to get mad that I'm not everything he wants me to be."

The friend replies, "No. You should tell them, tell them both, how you feel. Because that's your truth. Because you're allowed to make your own choices. But you shouldn't expect them to change or suddenly support you. The choice is theirs to make alone. You're not the hall monitor for better behavior in parents. It doesn't work that way. Their system of dysfunction has been working for them for a long time, I'm guessing. You can choose not to be party to it, but you can't pull the whole system out from under them if they want to hold onto it. Let go of the resentment. Be honest with them. Be honest with yourself. But this can't belong to you anymore."

And a bit farther down, my favorite line: "Everyone needs someone to care about their stories."

I care about this story. Well done, my sister and friend.