Lois Duncan's Blog: Discussion Group "Lois Duncan Roxx" - Posts Tagged "don-t-look-behind-you"

I'm involved in a new adventure! Here's the background -- Little, Brown, who was the original publisher of most of my YA suspense novels, has been leasing paperback rights to those books to Dell. Those leases get renewed at regular intervals. Little Brown now has started their own line of paperbacks, and want to bring those books out themselves. So, as Dell sells off their back stock, they aren't reprinting them. Little Brown will be bringing them out as paperback trade books, three at a time, until they're all back in print.

Meanwhile, I'm in the process of bringing some of those older books,(some published as long ago as the 60's),into the 21st Century. Nothing drastic -- the stories and characters have held strong over the years and won't be changed in any way -- but the characters in the books will have cell phones, computers, digital cameras, etc. I'm having a lot of fun doing this. One of the first books to be published in this new format will be Don't Look Behind You, due out this coming September.

I'm updating my older novels for new paperback editions by Little Brown and currently am working on DON'T LOOK BEHIND YOU, in which my characters watch a re-run of the Disney classic, "Song of the South." (I needed that, because later Brer Rabbit's line, "Don't throw me in the briar patch!" plays an intricate part in the plot.) My editor surprised me by saying, "Maybe you can find another film with a similar scenar? That particular film has become very controversial."

How sad! It's an enchanting movie -- one of the first, I believe, in which photography and animation were combined. I still find myself singing, "There's a Bluebird on My Shoulder." It's based on the beloved Uncle Remus stories. Yes, it was laid in a time of American history in which slavery existed in the deep South, but why should there not be literature -- or movies -- involving that time period? It DID exist, and you can't erase it from history. Does this mean "Gone with the Wind" should be thrown in the dumpster as well?