Kathryn Lasky's Blog, page 16

Halloween Thoughts

What do these three books have in common?

 One is about Monarch butterflies. One is about the return of souls in Mexico. And one is about a Monster Pig! But the one thing they all share is Halloween or All Souls Night.  More than twenty years ago Chris and I went to Michoacan in Mexico retracing the route of migrant butterflies to their roosting place in a forest where they winter over. We discovered that in Mexico these beautiful Monarch butterflies are said to bear the spirits of the peoples’ ancestors. The holiday celebrating the return of their souls is called Los Dias De Muertos, the Days of the Dead. It is a celebration with food and parades and children dressed up in costumes! Families gather in the cemeteries to weed and decorate the graves.  We were so intrigued we came back the following year for this celebration and made a book about it. Then a few years later I decided to do a retelling of the Three Little Pigs with a macabre twist on Frankenstein—So Porkenstein came to be with wonderful illustrations by David Jarvis.

This week is definitely the time to take a look at books that came out of my favorite holiday—Halloween. And every day I shall try and post a picture from one of the books.

Taste the Apple, Make The Trade

I have disturbed a reader

I received a letter today from a young nineteen year old woman that concerned a book I wrote some years ago, A Time For Courage, part of the Dear America series . The book, historical fiction, is about the suffrage movement. There was one sentence in the ‘Historical Note’ at the end of the book that the woman found horrifying.  Here it is: “In the 1960s and 1970s, the women’s movement found vigorous new leaders who fought for issues such as equal pay, better birth control methods, and equal opportunities in the workplace.”

Now with all hundred thousand plus copies of that book that have sold I have never received a letter objecting to this sentence. The woman says everyone has a right to their opinions but she is clearly upset with mine. She states,“I would not let my children read this book.” I could not help but think of the wonderful response that Dav Pilkey the author of Captain Underpants gave recently to a critic who protested the introduction of a gay character in that series.

"I understand that people are entitled to their own opinions about books, but it should be just that: a difference of opinion. All that's required is a simple change," he wrote. "Instead of saying ‘I don't think children should read this book,' just add a single word: ‘I don't think my children should read this book…. When it comes to books, we may not all agree on what makes for a good read—but I hope we can agree that letting children choose their own books is crucial to helping them learn to love reading." 

To her credit she did say "my children", however the woman went on to question if birth control was a woman’s right! There was so much I wanted to say to her but I refrained. I wanted to tell her that my own mother, who if she were alive would be over one hundred years old, was a founding member of the Planned Parenthood Chapter in Indiana as well as the League of Women Voters. Upon her death, my sister and father and I decided to give the entirety of her charitable trust to Planned Parenthood. My father has now died but my sister and I continue to support Planned Parenthood as vigorously as possible as we feel the organization is essential to women’s health care. Only 3% of their funding goes to abortions, the rest goes to birth control methods and mammograms and other programs supporting women’s health care. I wanted to tell her how proud I am of my mother and how I have tried to teach my daughter the same values. But I said none of that. Half of writing is exercising restraint. So I just wrote the following:

Dear____

I appreciate very much that you wrote me. It is often not easy to read and digest troubling material that one encounters in books. If my book has helped you realize how complicated the world often is, I feel that we have both gained something. As a friend of mine, Sophie, says “As you get older you will read more widely, and time and time again, you’ll encounter material that disturbs. It’s a sign that you are becoming an adult. The world is less simple and the luxury of living in that simple world begins to vanish. It’s time to taste the apple, to make the ancient trade of innocence for knowledge.”

Sincerely

Kathryn Lasky

The Extra is now published in paperback

With a nice bargain price

One ordinary afternoon, fifteen‑year‑old Lilo and her family are suddenly picked up by Hitler’s police and imprisoned. Just when it seems certain that they will be going to a labor camp, Lilo is selected by Hitler’s favourite filmmaker, Leni Riefenstahl, to work as an extra in her new film. Riefenstahl is beautiful, and charming to everyone on the set. But behind her smile lies the power to sentence Lilo and her friends to life or death.

Endorsed by Amnesty International UK as contributing to a better understanding of human rights and the values that underpin them.

Booklist says: Lasky has written a harrowing and deeply moving novel that focuses attention on a seldom-told story of the Nazis’ attempt to exterminate the Romani people.

The Russians are Publishing

Look at the difference!

Okay what do these two covers of the same book Hannah, the first in my Daughters of The Sea series say about the oddities of visual translation? The left hand picture is the American edition of the book. The right hand picture is the Russian edition.

Hermione’s Bedroom

Made by my granddaughter the Harry Potter fan

Recently in the New York Times there was an article about reading to young children and “links between growing up with books and reading aloud, and later language development and school success.” In early May our son began reading Harry Potter to our granddaughter Lulu who was almost seven. “More ! More!” She would ask when it was time to go to sleep. Our son suggested that she go back and try reading the chapter they had just finished on her own as he was tired. So she did. In late June our son had to go to London on business. By that time they were almost through with book three. She started book four on her own and had read the first four chapters independently by the time he returned. Now she and her dad are almost finished with book 5. She reads on when her dad is too tired.

In her day camp her culminating project was a carpentry one. She chose to make Hermione’s bedroom at Hogwarts, complete with Scabbers, the rat and the cat, Crookshanks. She would want me to mention that all the figures in the picture have movable joints that she did with pins.

To say that reading fired her brain is an understatement!

But let us all bless J.K Rowling , arguably doing more for reading than any other person on the planet.

A new article about Legend of the Guardians

Winston Cook-Wilson says it is Zack Snyder's best film!

Here's the article from Inverse:

Many have no doubt forgotten 2010’s owl-centric action-adventure epic Legends of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’hoole; five long years later, it is a cultural footnote. I’m not sure why. A film that is AOATT (All Owls All the Time) and incorporates a word as unlikely as “Ga’hoole” into the title should, by rights, have become an instant after-school-program classic by now. Somehow, this has not come to pass. Ga’hoole even escaped 2010 as only the fourth highest grossing animated feature.

How? The preview immediately distinguished it from the crowd of computer-animated children’s films with their cars or robots or Minions. This warrior-owl tale was something new. I could imagine myself as a pre-teenage child, gaping at and thirsting after it – waiting in line on opening night. Never outside of nature film (and probably even within it) had the world seen this many owls in so much daredevil action. If that isn’t innovation, than what is?

Another fascinating element of the upcoming film was that it was not coming courtesy of, say, the producer of Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa or How to Train a Dragon, but from… the director of 300, The Watchmen and the forthcoming Batman V. Superman. This salient information felt like it had been snuck into the preview; no doubt the studio was unsure whether it would be a draw or a recipe for disaster. There was no way for parents to know: Would these 3D-animated, well-preened owls fight to the bloody death and eat each other’s entrails, while beating bits of owl spleen and refuse off of their feathered breasts? Or was the film going to be phoned-in garbage – Snyder, somehow down on his luck like M. Night Shyamalan, throwing anything at the wall that might make a buck?

But the circumstances were quite the opposite. Snyder, you might be surprised to learn, is a staunch family man, whose children (currently, the man has six!) loved Kathryn Lasky’s Guardians of Ga’hoole book series. The film was, in fact, Snyder’s pet project – an adaptation of Lasky’s first three Guardians novels — one which he could take on because his previous films had topped the box office. The film’s back story does recall M. Night, in some sense: The noted horror director’s worst and most tedious film, Lady in the Water, was also a passion project, inspired by a bedtime story he made up to tell his children (he also published a book). This is evident in the movie; like most improvised stories you tell your kids, it’s not very well thought out, and in the soporific sense, it functions very well.

With Ga’hoole, Snyder suddenly became a director with human feelings and emotions – so much more than simply the Dane Cook of the multiplex action film. That’s not to say that Ga’hoole isn’t chock full of textbook Snyder stylistic gambits. It is violent, erring on the more daring end of PG due to blood dropping from plumage, scary war-helmeted owls and fascistic overtones. Most importantly, however, the film is heavy on speed-ramping and slow motion — Snyder’s only unimpeachable trademarks. These owls zoom forward to dig their talons into their foe, almost get there, and then back up and do it again. Unlike all the hyper-macho, hyper-gory extended-cut-scene action in 300, it’s a joy to see these owls in instant replay mode.

Snyder’s film also hits on all tropes that make a good young-adult-directed fantasy movie. Soren, the strapping young owl who believes the legends about the virtuous legion of the Guardians of Ga’hoole (remember, from the title?) is the Luke Skywalker/Harry Potter stand-in, an eager student and golden heart who’s not afraid to break the rules in the service of good. There is also a Dark Side, represented by the “Pure Ones,” the enemies of the Guardians — into whose clutches Soren’s surly and less popular brother, Kludd, falls. The eccentric, twitchy aging Guardian-cum-owl-historian Lyze of Kiel (alias: Ezylryb, if you can even believe it) is equal parts Obi-Wan and Yoda — certainly Yoda-esque in stature. The atmosphere of cute animals fighting clans of each other and traversing distances on quests ties in directly in appeal to Brian Jacques’ legendary Redwall book series. For Disney fans — and the younger sibling who doesn’t understand the plot — there’s a goofy Rafiki-esque anteater. Ga’hoole is a perfect and fail-safe collage of influences and archetypes: not original, but nonetheless charming.

Most of the movie’s appeal though, is that you are staring into big, twinkling-eyed owl faces the whole time and not, say, standard-issue zombies, over-saturated images of racist Persian stereotypes or other characters that looked better in their respective comic books. With Ga’hoole, Snyder provided the best owl material seen in cinema since Archemides bumbling around in The Sword in the Stone, and this film has at least five owls working on that level. You’ve got owls for any mood and occasion. By making the one definitive owl adventure film, Snyder made his only truly positive contribution to cinema to date. If this finds its way into streaming-service syndication, I have faith that, in time, Ga’hoole will get the recognition it deserves.

Night Gardening Starred Review

From Publisher's Weekly

Newbery Honor-winning children's author (for Sugaring Time) Kathryn Lasky, here adopting the pseudonym of Swann, successfully turns her hand to adult fiction with a moving tale of 60-something love. Divorced Tristan Mallory is a top-notch landscape architect imported from New Hampshire by a wealthy couple in order to make magic on the grounds of their Cambridge, Mass., estate. Tristan, however, soon finds himself making even more magic next door. Through a crack in the brick wall and with a nod toward the children's classic The Secret Garden, he observes Maggie Welles in her own long-neglected garden. The widow of an alcoholic, Maggie has recently survived a stroke, and at first Tristan merely admires her resilient personality from afar as she bravely undertakes the grueling exercises necessary to regain her speech and motor skills. After the two dramatically meet, they conspire to revamp Maggie's garden, working nocturnally for privacy from Maggie's therapists and her pestering, alcoholic children. Having cultivated their shared passion, Maggie and Tristan awaken sensual feelings in each other, their erotic interludes a gateway to the true love that has eluded them for a lifetime. Swann seamlessly blends a Zen philosophy of gardening into her radiant tale of second chances, using her love for horticulture as a richly nuanced metaphor for the regenerative nurturing and flourishing of characters. Sentimental in the most heartfelt way, without resorting to the maudlin, Swann scripts wonderful dialogue for her principals, crafting sharply witty relationships, a believable setting and a deeply satisfying romantic plot.

I’m happy to share the news

Feature film option signed

My novel NIGHT GARDENING (written under a pseudonym E.L. Swann) now optioned and being developed as a feature film by Joel M. Plotch a filmmaker based in Paris and New York.  Inspired by the childrens classic The Secret Garden my novel is set in Cambridge, Massachusetts, a journey into a real and metaphorical garden.  It is a story of love and healing that celebrates passion in all its forms.  

Worst Advice Ever:

So I was reading something recently

 about someone who was recounting how he had become whatever—fill in the blank(writer, tech designer, painter, dancer) and how this person’s father had taught him an invaluable lesson. That if you can’t do it right just don’t do it at all.

I for one think this is the lousiest advice anyone can ever give to anyone else. It completely ignores how valuable doing it wrong is. How else are we to learn, to gather strength, to dare to do anything. I am a celebrant of flaws, mistakes and colossal goofs. I feel that I rarely ever get it right. There are always things that I see in a book after it comes out that I wished I had done differently. But nevertheless it has always been worth the trip. So as a corollary I shall say I am also an enemy of perfection. Some poet maybe Emily Dickinson or perhaps May Sarton said—“Perfection is a cold hard thing.”

And since we have just arrived in Maine and I am glorying in the sky, the osprey soaring over the cove and my garden from which I just picked these peonies. Their heady fragrance is unbelievable but just remember—these beauties are riddled with ants. Yes nothing is perfect. The ants are part of the package. I might have one just now tickling my nose from sniffing the scent and if a few crawl across the dinner table tonight, so be it! 

Inner Worlds

“Ten years ago I started to build a theater in my head….”

 That is such a beautiful sentence. It was written by Hilary Mantel the brilliant author of Wolf Hall that is now onstage in New York and also on Masterpiece Theater in a six part television series. I think it’s the best description I have ever read about what it is to be a novelist. One builds theaters in their heads. As Ms. Mantel points out the author does the costuming, the lighting, the whole works and of course the characters. Then she went on to say in regard to the play of her novel, “We don’t need stars[for actors]. Just a company of self- effacing shape-shifters…” This led me to reflect on the difference between being an actor and a writer. In my own head when I am writing I hear every voice clearly, the nuances, the varying intonations, the gestures and the subtle facial expressions. I capture them and put them on paper. But I could not any more act than fly. I hated being in plays at school when I was young. I had terminal stage fright. I was once in a sixth grade play –a greatly reduced version of Les Miserables, long before the musical. I had one line. I had to come on stage and deliver four words. “Jean Valjean is dead.” I froze. I could not remember my line. When I finally did remember it after an agonizing pause I blurted out. “Oh Jeez Jean Valjean is dead.”

 

So when I write I do believe I am a shape-shifter. But the shapes can only step out onto the paper and never the stage.