Tag Archive for Dylan Van Zant

Fan Mail Wednesday #95 (Friday Edition!)

October 14, 2010 / / No comments

Do you remember that classic scene in the original “Miracle on 34th Street,” when a line of uniformed postal workers comes into the courtroom to dump sacks of letters on the judge’s desk?

That’s the way it is around here every day at Jamespreller.com.

So let’s take a gander at one . . .

Dear James Preller,

My name is Dillon. I am in 7th grade and I go to _______ Middle School. Some things I like to do is ride dirt bikes and four wheelers because I have a lot of woods and fields to ride on. I also like to go hiking and find cool things like stuff in my creek and in my woods or anywhere.

I am reading the book Six Innings. I liked your book because I like baseball and books about baseball even though I’m not that good at it. When I read your book it was good. That’s coming from me and I usually don’t like to read at all.

My favorite character in the book was Dylan Van Zant. He was my favorite character in the book for a couple of reasons. One reason is he has the same first name as me. Another reason that Dylan Van Zant is my favorite character is because he is nice and not a mean kid at all.

Thank you for taking the time to read my letter to you. But before I am done I will ask you some questions and one is why did you pick Dylan Van Zant to be a nice kid and a really good baseball player. Like in real life sometimes people who are really good baseball players are mean. Another question is why did you pick the title Six Innings.

Sincerely, Dillon

I replied:

Dear Dillon:

Thanks for your letter. I liked that you began by telling me a little bit about yourself. Like you, I also enjoy nature, though I’m not really a dirt bike kind of guy. Too noisy. Growing up, I had some friends, Timmy Tighe and Frank Connelly, who built their own motor bikes — basically lawn mower engines attached to regular bicycles — and we loved cruising around on them. Their hands were always filthy, covered in oil and grease. These days, you couldn’t get me on a motorcycle if you paid me. I can only imagine skidding across the cement  . . . ouch, Ouch, OUCH. I guess if you’re a good rider you can’t let those negative thoughts into your head.

When I think of motorcycles, all I can imagine

is a long, sad stay in the hospital.

I’m glad you enjoyed my baseball book. It makes me happy when someone who doesn’t normally like to read writes to say that my book wasn’t as bad as he might have expected. Out of all the characters in that book — besides Sam’s father — I might have identified the most with Dylan Van Zant. As a Little Leaguer, I loved to pitch. I could never throw that hard, but I had great control and I absolutely loved standing on that mound with the ball in my hand, literally the King of the Hill.

It’s true what you said: Sometimes when people are very good at things, they can be obnoxious about it. You know, conceited, superior, like they are the greatest thing since sliced bread. (I can’t stand those types of people.)  I think with Dylan, he knows he’s not a superstar; he just loves playing the game.

I titled the book Six Innings because that was my first idea for the book, to use the structure of one Little League game — across six innings — to tell the story of the players and the plays. It was a sturdy format, because it gave me a beginning, middle, and end.

Mostly though, I have vivid memories of my Little League games, they were important to me, and I know that many kids felt, and still feel, the same way. Thanks for writing. I appreciate it. I hope you continue to seek out other books you might enjoy, even if the pickings look slim. I’m sure there are books in your school library that are just right for someone with your interests and obvious intelligence. Try your school librarians — professional know-it-alls, they love bringing good kids and books together.

My best,

JP
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Category: Fan Mail, Six Innings / Tags: , , ,

Deleted Scenes 4: Six Innings

June 24, 2009 / / 2 comments

The Little League season has taken a turn. The regular season is gone. My team of 9-, 10- and 11-year olds finished with a strong record, 11-5, good enough for 2nd place. They were my cardiac kids; we lost five games by a total of seven runs. Now I’m coaching a team of 9-year-old All-Stars. We’re practicing every day. And at my local Little League at Magee Park in Delmar, New York, there’s the big championship game tomorrow. The 12-year-olds, the Majors. Two of my friends are the rival managers. I’ll know many of the kids on the field. It is the exact circumstance, recurring annually, that inspired my book, Six Innings.

——

During the revision process for Six Innings, I cut more than 10,000 words, much of it back story. When I first started writing it, even before I thought about the game itself, I wrote all sorts of stand-alone character pieces that had nothing (and everything!) to do with the championship game, the book’s six innings.

Sometimes when I speak with students, we’ll talk about the importance of character, as well as the maxim, “Show, don’t tell.” In this scene, I wanted to show readers something about Dylan Van Zant, his determination, his stick-to-it-iveness. But also: let them know that he choked under pressure once before, because we’re going to see him in a similar situation one hundred pages down the road. I could have told the reader, “Dylan tenses up sometimes, freezes, but he’s also a very determined guy.” Instead, I invented this little story about a foul-shot contest. Or actually, two contests: The first one, his response to losing it, and then the second contest.

I ended up cutting the whole shebang. But somehow  the book is better for it just the same, because by writing I learned everything I needed to know — and show — about this one character, Dylan Van Zant.

The sample below is taken from the middle section, which I labeled at the time, “Headlights.”

——-

Dylan began practicing for next year’s foul-shooting contest on the very next morning.

He was the first in the house to awake. Dylan didn’t brush his teeth, comb his hair, or eat breakfast. He just threw on some shorts, his sneakers, an Under Armour t-shirt, and stepped onto the driveway. The free throw line was already marked off. Dylan walked to it, head down. He bounced the ball rhythmically — boom, boom, bah-boom; boom, boom, bah-boom — alternating hands, remembering the agony of yesterday’s missed shots. Clang, the ball hitting the rim and bouncing away. The tightness in his arms, the dryness in his mouth. That taste of failure.

Dylan took one hundred foul shots. That was the bargain he struck with himself. Every morning, he would go outside and shoot free throws. Most mornings, he kept the promise. Sometimes, life intervened. So he’d shoot in the afternoon.

One particular day, Dylan overslept, raced to school, and worked on a science project late into the night. It was past his normal bedtime. Darkness had fallen, and with it rain; the court was cloaked in velvet. So Dylan asked his mother to please, please, please pull up the car and turn on the headlights. And there he stood at the line in the shimmering dark, knees bent, eyes on the rim, firing up free throw after free throw until he was satisfied, and soaked, and cold. The day’s bargain complete.

The contest would not be for another nine months.

This time, vowed Dylan, I’ll be ready.

———

For other deleted scenes from Six Innings, click here, and here, and here.

A little trivia: the name Dylan Van Zant brings together two of my favorite songwriters, Bob and Townes, who wrote one of my favorite songs ever, “To Live Is to Fly.”

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Category: Six Innings, the writing process / Tags: , , , , , ,
 
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