Archive for the writing process

It’s a Thrill When Books Are Translated

April 13, 2026 / / One comment

I’m in the process of downsizing, moving to a much smaller & as yet undetermined location. One of the painful aspects of that is figuring out what to do with all my beloved books — the ones I’ve read and the ones I’ve written. In fact, I just returned from a quick trip to my neighborhood middle school, where I donated a bunch of books for classroom libraries.

Anyone who has ever moved, knows that it comes with a degree of navel gazing. You come across an old photo album and time stands still. Or, no, time goes in reverse. You lose an hour, happily. Part of that process, for me, has been trying to get a copy of each of my books, across 40 years, packed up for safe keeping. This way my children can throw them in the Dumpster at a later date. Because I sure can’t do it. 

So, yes, I’ve pulled out all my books over the years. Spread them out on the floor. And look at this:

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If you are lucky in this business, some of your books get translated into different languages, almost by pure magic. While this is not a complete record, here are some of those titles: Jigsaw Jones in Arabic, German, Spanish; Scary Tales and The Fall in Japanese; Bystander in Greek; Before You Go in German; and Six Innings in Korean. Each one leaves me agog. 

How cool is that? Which is another way of saying: How lucky am I?

Very, I realize. Very lucky indeed.

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One Memory of My Father

April 1, 2026 / / 2 comments

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In an era of great book covers, this one strikes me as pretty bad. But just wait till you get inside!

I’m reading Susan Orlean’s extraordinary memoir, Joyride. She is, quite obviously, one of our greatest living writers. The book is largely about her writing life, which one gathers is not at all distinct from her life in general. I find it vastly inspiring. She makes me want to be a better writer. A truer writer. Highly recommended to anyone who cares about writing or admires Orlean’s work. Which of course you do, because how can you not?

But I keep putting this book down after a page or two. Over and over again. Long ago I determined that was a very positive sign. The poem that has me staring out the window. The book that elicits memories, new ideas, inspirations, eureka moments. I think of these as source books. Deep wells from which the imagination drinks its full. I suspect it will take me forever to finish it. I also suspect that I’m going to need to own this one, scribbling in the margins. Returning the book to the library just won’t suffice.

Oh, right, my dad. Orlean was writing about her mother and a memory of my father leaped into my head. He passed in 2006, long ago, and I suppose days go by when I don’t think of him. I also suppose that such streaks rarely happen. He’s always there, as anyone with a deceased parent understands. 

My father was an insurance man. A practical man. A man of his time. Smart about things, like money and the stock market and when to rotate the tires. He loved mucking about on his boat. In fact, as I think of it now, “puttering around” was his prime activity. Pruning a tree limb, slathering it with tar. Setting down an imperfect line of Belgian blocks along the driveway. Playing bridge and doing jigsaw puzzles and pouring a scotch. He had a minor but persistent artistic streak, a flag that he never truly unfurled. It came out in different projects, a late-period adult education painting class, that sort of thing. He never took me to a museum or read novels or did anything that I recall to cultivate an artistic sensibility in his children, which includes me, his youngest. 

So I think when I became a writer it sort of baffled and intrigued him. He might have even admired it a little, I’m not sure. He wasn’t supportive or not supportive. It was just sort of like, okay, whatever. So long as you can put food on the table. I think he felt that way about all his children. Go live your life; I’m here if you need anything.

The memory is this: He would sometimes come across an article in the newspaper. Something that tangentially tied into what he thought I did for a living. Maybe he just came across a news item that made him think of me. I imagine him at the kitchen table, an unfiltered Camel burning in the ashtray. He’d grab the scissors, clip it out, fold it neatly into an envelope, and send it my way. If there was a note attached by a paper clip, it would be brief, “I found this interesting.” That sort of thing.

We don’t live in that world anymore. When folks stuffed newspaper clippings in envelopes. It used to happen, I’m sure some readers remember, but not anymore. That time has largely vanished from the earth, living only in memory. How the mailman would arrive and lo, here was a letter from my father, unbidden and unexpected, containing some odd miscellany he felt I’d enjoy. 

This was a man, a veteran of World War II, who didn’t express a lot of emotion. Or, like, any? I’m searching my memory and nothing shows up. Oh, well, no bother. But those clippings in the mail, delivered days later, were his attempts at connection. Saying, I am thinking of you. Saying, I now understand, I love you. 

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Thank you, Susan Orlean, for somehow mysteriously summoning up that memory for me. You wrote another great book. 

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Category: Family, the writing process / Tags: , , , , , , , ,

My One Writing Tip

March 20, 2026 / / No comments

PRO TIP: I am often asked — often at the end of a presentation — for any advice I’d offer to fellow writers. And this is certainly true in any writing classes I’ve taught. Aspiring writers seeking that golden nugget of advice. The key to the kingdom!

And though I’ve been asked hundreds of times in different contexts, it always stumps me. I yammer haltingly. I fall back on the tired cliches — read widely, write often — and conclude that no one is satisfied with my response, most especially myself.

But I do have one thing that I do think is true: If you wait until you know what you are doing, you’ll never write, because you’ll never get there. I see this a lot. You can take endless classes and seminars, read all the books, Save the Cat and all that jazz. And some of them will be enormously helpful.

But you will only learn how to write a book . . . by writing a book.

And that never stops being true, even after decades of determined effort. You are always confronting your limitations and shortcomings.

Don’t wait until you are ready. You’ll never be ready.

Dive in.

Trust me. Nobody really knows what they are doing.

And if you did know, by some miracle, it wouldn’t be fun anymore. The discovery is everything.

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Celebrating 40 Years As a Published Author, Pt. 2: The Norfin Trolls!

March 12, 2026 / / 3 comments

 

I have a nostalgic affection for all the weird, crappy little jobs I took on as a freelancer over the course of my career. I mean, maybe I should be recounting my triumphs, but an entertaining part of my story is the odd jobs I took along the way. Money in the pocket. The work that kept “the dream” alive.

Around 1993, Scholastic made a book deal with a popular toy company, The Troll Company.  They created and sold Norfin Trolls, which some people seemed, unaccountably, to like. As a freelancer with connections at Scholastic (I worked there from 85-90), I was offered a two-book deal, flat fee (no royalty), and was handed a catalog produced by the company. The catalog included lots of pictures of trolls in various outfits. The golfer, the tourist, the farmer, the pirate, the wizard, etc. Here’s a sample spread:

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I can tell you want a closer look.

 

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My assignment was to make up a couple of stories featuring the Trolls. At that time, sometimes to my chagrin, I was considered a “clever” guy by various editors at Scholastic. Of course, I aspired to be more than just a clown. I was a literature major, filled with deep thoughts and passionate feelings, but they saw me as a creative court jester who worked cheap. Perfect for the Norfin Troll project!

This is, of course, four years before Jigsaw Jones came along. I was just beginning to get assignments. So, one hundred percent, I was happy to do it (I just wasn’t going to put my name on it). One very cool aspect of the project was that a team of photographers — the talented due of Mary and Joe Van Blerck — would pose the dolls, build artistic sets, and photograph the scenes for the book. It was pretty amazing what they accomplished, actually. Quite skilled. Never met ’em.

I still have one copy of the first book, Too Many Trolls. The main challenge was to come up with an idea that allowed for lots and lots of cute trolls. I remembered the classic Marx Brothers state room scene from “A Night at the Opera.” Yes, I decided, I could steal that! In the film, everyone crowds into a small room with hilarious results.

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That was it! So I told the story of Hanna, who was visiting Aunt Inger and Uncle Hans (I lifted these names directly from the catalog). Remembering my lessons from the Whole Language pedagogy of the day, I added a recurring phrase, “Shhh, baby is sleeping,” and was on my way. 

One by one, groups of visitors appear to threaten the quiet: one golfer (his ball sails through an open window), two neighbors whose TV is broken, three peppy cheerleaders, and so on, until ten plane crash survivors (!) show up (cheerful, but in need of a phone) and Hanna has finally had enough. She cries out, “Sixty Norfin Trolls! There are too many trolls in this house! I’m sorry, but everybody has to leave. Baby needs peace and quiet!”

They all depart, loudly, and peace is at last restored. Baby has managed to sleep through the trollish tumult. But on the last page, you guessed it, baby cries, “Goo-goo-goo-GAHHH!”

A classic work of literature, long out of print.

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Lastly, I employed the pen name, Mitzy Kafka. I fondly remembered the old picture book, Tell Me a Mitzi by Lore Segal, a title that always struck me as funny. As for Kafka, I was and remain a fan of the great man’s work, and somehow the surreal oddness of Kafka’s books connected in my mind to the surreal oddness of my assignment. Thus, Mitzy Kafka climbed from her chrysalis, fluttered her soggy wings, and emerged to enjoy a brief but resplendent existence.

I share this story because, hey, it was a good book for what it was. I’ve read far worse in hardcover. So I cashed my check and could still look at myself in the mirror. Best of all, no trolls were harmed during the making of the book, despite the plane crash. I did my best, plied my craft, and the end results — to the extent that I had control over these things, left me restlessly satisfied, if unfulfilled.

I feel like some people view “the writer’s life” as some sort of edifying, ethereal experience — as if we were special people, uniquely gifted — and I’m here to say that for much of my (cough, cough) career, I’ve been like a carpenter trying to earn a living. Too Many Trolls, and jobs like it, helped pay the mortgage. And in the meantime, I kept hammering away. 

Mitzy Kafka would have been proud.

Here’s some sample spreads from the book, since you won’t find it anywhere else!

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Pure nonsense, of course. Lighthearted fun. And, I am pleased to report, I still think it’s pretty good — for, you know, what it is.

I cashed the check.

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Category: Greatest Hits, the writing process / Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

BRIEF EXCERPT from SHAKEN: Establishing Kristy, the Soccer Player

March 4, 2026 / / No comments

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My most recent novel, Shaken, ages 10-14, will be out in paperback on March 17th. That’s less than two weeks from now.

In the book, an awesomely talented 7th grade soccer player, Kristy Barrett, experiences a serious concussion.

I more or less pull the rug out from under her. That’s what writers do. We make awful things happen to perfectly decent characters. In the rest of the book we find out what Kristy’s made of. In the first few pages, I needed to quickly establish that, for Kristy, soccer was everything. Her social currency, her primary source of self-esteem, friendship, and identity. 

If “Soccer is my life!” what happens when that hat blows away?

But before the “inciting event” of Kristy’s concussion — which is the engine of our story — I needed to establish the current situation. 

Here’s a few paragraphs from pages 3-4, where we learn something about this young athlete: 

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By the time she played her first organized practice at U4, anyone could see that Kristy Barrett was a special player. She was simply quicker and more focused than any other four-year-old on the field. Of course, half of them were clinging to their parents’ legs, or slurping on oranges, or plucking dandelions while Kristy raged up and down the grass like a creature possessed. Amazingly, that dynamic continued on through rec ball and travel, even when they let her play on the boys’ team. In seventh grade, Kristy was starting for the varsity high school team. She was special. That was the word, over and over: a special kid. 

But wasn’t everybody? 

Kristy didn’t much care what people said. She loved to play. That was all, the whole shebang. But after a video of one of her goals went viral — and was included on ESPN’s “Amazing Plays” Sunday feature, along with a thirty-five second interview — everyone, absolutely everyone, knew. Not long after, a coach from the USA Development Program called, saying, “It wouldn’t surprise me if one day Kristy represents the United States in international play.”

Maybe even a future Olympian. 

Altogether not bad for someone who hadn’t, at that time, turned thirteen. But that’s how it works at the highest levels of sports. When you know, you know. 

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THANKS FOR STOPPING BY!

 

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Category: Shaken, the writing process / Tags: , , , , , ,
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