Tag Archive for The Case of the Sneaker Sneak

FAN MAIL WEDNESDAY #229: About Those Crazy Names

 

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Here’s one from the Sunshine State!

Dear Mr. Preller,
 –
My name is Nicolas.  I am 8 years old and I am in 3rd grade at ____  Elementary School in Miramar, FL.  I am writing to tell you that I really liked The Case of The Sneaker Sneak.  This is the third Jigsaw Jones book I have read because I really like Jigsaw Jones.
 

51Xxdj8lrdL._SX335_BO1,204,203,200_Jigsaw is a lot like me.  He and I both like mysteries.  We like to solve puzzles.  I also like that Jigsaw plays sports.  I play sports too.  I play soccer, although I like to watch football like Jigsaw plays with his friends in the book. My family likes to watch and play football on Thanksgiving every year just like they do in the book.  I could really picture myself playing with those kids.  I think it is great how Mila and Jigsaw are always able to find clues to solve mysteries and help others.

One question I have for you is where do you come up with all the unique names of the characters in the book?  Do you know people named Solofsky, Pignattano, or Copabianco?  Do you have friends with nicknames like Bigs or Stringbean?

I really enjoy the Jigsaw Jones books and can’t wait to read the next one in my collection.

Sincerely,

Nicolas

I replied:

Dear Nicholas,

Thanks for your terrific letter. I am so glad that you are enjoying the series. I just wrote a new one, The Case from Outer Space, and it will be out in the Spring of 2017 — less than a year away! (You can click here to read a sample chapter. Or not! It’s a free world here at Jamespreller.com.)
 
I’ve never really thought about it before, but I guess you are right. I do put some unique names in the books. Joey Pignattano came directly from my love of the NY Mets. When I was your age, the Mets won a World Series in 1969, and one of their coaches was named Joe Pignatano. I changed his name slightly by adding an extra “t,” and that was that. Copabianco came from a girl I knew in college. It was just one of those long Italian names that musically rolls off the tongue. I did not know anyone named “Bigs” or “Stringbean,” but I did have a friend that we called “Wingnut” because of his large ears. 
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The books in the Jigsaw Jones series have been a little hard to find lately, because they are in the process of moving from one publisher (Scholastic) to another (Macmillan). Hopefully there will be more available next Spring, with all new covers. Look for them where fine books are sold.
 
Keep reading, Nicholas, and I’ll keep writing! And if you ever feel up to it, you might enjoy checking out my “Scary Tales” series. They are not much harder to read than Jigsaw, but you do have to be the sort of kid who likes creepy, suspenseful stories. 
 
My best,
 
James Preller
P.S. For a lot more background on The Case of the Sneaker Sneak, click here — you won’t regret it!

 

Fan Mail Wednesday #183: Tough to Tackle

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How does a letter get selected for the blog? No idea! It’s pretty random, but it never hurts your chances when you include original artwork. I love that stuff. Here’s a letter from Ethan in Michigan, including an Ethan original . . .



Fan Mail June 14

 

 

I replied:

Dear Ethan:

Thank you for your terrific letter.

I’m so glad that you liked Jigsaw Jones #16: The Case of the Sneaker Sneak. That first chapter, with the football scene, grew directly out of my own childhood memories from Wantagh, my home town on Long Island.

We used to play tackle football all the time. A bunch of neighborhood boys would head over to Beech Street School on our bicycles and play for hours. The hardest boy to tackle was a slightly older, tougher kid named Michael Leninger. I remember him clearly –- and I remember the pride I felt when I took him down all by myself. It was painful, but worth it. I gave those feelings to Jigsaw, more or less, when he tried to tackle Bigs Maloney.

For my blog readers, here’s how the book opens:

Scan 6Eddie Becker grabbed my football jersey. “Okay, Jigsaw. This is it. Tie score,” he urged. “If they score a touchdown now, we lose the game. You know what’s coming, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” I grimaced. “Bigs Maloney, right up the middle.”

Joey Pignattano squeezed his eyes shut. Joey didn’t want any part of tackling Big Maloney. I didn’t blame him. We’d been trying to bring down Bigs all afternoon. It was like trying to tackle a refrigerator. 

Thanks, too, for noticing the opening to Jigsaw Jones #4: The Case of the Spooky Sleepover. That was the first time I ever wrote about Ralphie Jordan. He was “a world-champion smiler. Nobody had a bigger smile or used it more often. Only today, Ralphie wasn’t smiling.”

Have a happy, fun-filled, book-filled summer. And thanks for the awesome artwork! 

My best,

James Preller

Stories Behind the Story: The Case of the Sneaker Sneak

When I speak to students, I remind them that I’m an ex-kid myself. It’s not as obvious as it used to be. I was a boy who loved boy things, with no burning interest in books or writing. I make that point only because it’s true.

When I was a kid, some of my friends began a tradition that we came to refer to as, “The Turkey Bowl,” where we played a loose, informal game of tackle football on Thanksgiving morning. And there I see it on the first page of my 3/1/01 manuscript: The Case of the Turkey Bowl, a title that would not last.

I played so much tackle football as a kid. Usually at Beech Street School in Wantagh, Long Island, with boys named Pat Sweeney and Jimmy Bradshaw, Michael Rose and Gary Francke, and whoever else was around that day. Nowadays I’m involved in youth sports from the adult perspective. And I make the same sour observation: “Kids these days, they don’t know how to play unless there’s five grown-ups standing around looking bored.”

It’s something that we’ve lost over the years — dis-organized ball — and I think it was something important. Kids today don’t have the freedom, or possibly the wherewithal, to play self-regulated sports. It just doesn’t seem to happen much. And maybe that explains to a degree why I like living in upstate New York. It feels about 30 years behind the times, in a good way.

The first chapter of this book is based on my memory of those days, those great games we used to play. I remembered one of my greatest triumphs: the day I tackled Michael Lenninger. He was an older kid, bigger, stronger, but somehow he joined our game. Every neighborhood had a Michael Lenninger, and on this day the guy was killing us, a punishing runner who left would-be tacklers scattered like bowling pins. Well, during that game I became determined to take down Michael Lenninger. I knew it would hurt. But the next  time he charged up the middle, I held my ground, wrapped my arms around his churning legs, and dragged that big bull to the turf. I remember that moment vividly, across almost 40 years, even though it was a big deal to exactly no one else. Why? Because it mattered to me, it was important. I showed courage and resolution on the proving grounds of Beech Street School; I proved something to myself.

In the book, Jigsaw tackles Bigs Maloney — or at least attempts to:

Bigs pawed the ground, snorted, and charged.

Where was a red cape when I needed one?

Aaaaaaargh!

Whap, kersplish, oof, splaaaaaatt!

The next thing I knew I was lying flat on my back. Dizzy, I stared at the spinning sky. A few clouds floated past. They were white and fluffy. One even looked like a wittle, itty-bitty bunny wabbit. Off in the distance — far, far away — I heard Bigs Maloney rumble into the end zone. Or maybe it was a herd of rhinos tap-dancing on my skull. I wasn’t sure.

Joey knelt beside me. He poked at me with his finger. “Jigsaw? Are you okay?”

I blinked. At least my eyelids weren’t broken. “Anybody get the license plate of that marching band? I think I was just trampled by a tuba.”

—–

In most of the books in the series, I try to reference a real book — usually one that I admire. So in Chapter Three, we find Jigsaw and his father reading Skinnybones by Barbara Park. I’d probably just read that book with my son, Nick, and we both enjoyed it very much. I once got to interview Barbara Park, in fact, and she was wonderful, alive and warm and funny.

My boys refused to read her Junie B. Jones books, since like many boys they were repulsed by the idea of a female protagonist. For some reason, Maggie never really got hooked, though she read several. As for me, I admired Mick Harte Was Here, and was happy to show a little love for Barbara in this book. Also, I think it’s one of those things that helps make the stories realistic for readers. “Hey, I read that book!” Just another way of connecting their world to Jigsaw’s.

—–

Another writer I’ve always respected is Dick Francis. I recently loaned one of his books to a literary friend, and he sort of sniffed at it, unimpressed, and returned it to me unread. Probably in a hurry to read more Margaret Atwood. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Anyway, Francis writes mysteries, thrillers, suspense novels set in the world of horse racing. The books aren’t wildly ambitious. He just writes bestsellers that people like to read. A little adventure, a little love interest, a strong main character, an unfolding mystery: voila!

I had a friend in high school whose mother was an avid reader and a huge Dick Francis fan. She turned me onto him. I remember her complaint about many “literary” books by flashy writers: “Too many words, too many words,” she’d sneer. She liked writers who got to the point; who didn’t show off; who told a story and got out of the way. Her tastes would not have gone down well at the Academies of Higher Learning. I didn’t recognize it at the time, but Mrs. Flynn had given me a lesson that would stick with me, and grow inside me, for years to come. The value of restraint.

Back to Dick Francis: One of his things was there’s always a strong nonfiction element to his stories. He’d research a topic and integrate it into the story. So you’d read one of his mysteries and in the process learn about photography, or the brewing process of a single-malt scotch, or horse breeding, or whatever. I loved that about Francis, and have tried to emulate that aspect in my Jigsaw Jones books.

I’m wondering: Is emulate a fancy substitute for steal?

In this book I do a bit about turkeys, the wild compared to the tame, and so on. Just a little content in the book, so maybe somebody learns a little something along the way — and I always do it knowing that I owe the concept to Dick Francis. Now you know it, too. Hopefully, again, it also reflects the lessons that typically go on in real schools, another connection to the reader’s world.

—–

Oh, hey, look at Chapter Six, “The Kid in the Hall.” Here’s a combined reference to my beloved New York Mets and Dav Pilkey. In terms of plot, Jigsaw is looking for a witness, and who better than the biggest troublemaker in school, the kid who is perpetually sent outside to sit in the halls. His name is George Seaver (Tom Seaver’s birth name) . . .

. . . and his teacher is Mrs. Koosman, named after probably my favorite southpaw of all time.

I modeled the character of George Seaver on what I imagined a young Dav Pilkey to be like, a kid making his own comic books in the hall, dreaming up adventures, talented and a little weird. I’m sure that Pilkey talked about this in an interview somewhere. From my book, The Big Book of Picture-Book Authors & Illustrators:

This outrageous behavior did not endear Dav to his teachers. “When I was in second grade, I got in trouble a lot. To punish me, my teacher would send me out into the hallway. Before long, I was spending so much time in the hall that my teacher moved a desk out there for me.”

Dav seized the opportunity by stuffing the desk with art supplies and paper. To keep himself busy, he drew pictures and made up stories. Dav didn’t realize it then, but he was preparing himself for his future career. “I used to staple sheets of paper together and write my own comic books,” he remembers. “I had invented a whole slew of amazing superheroes, including Captain Underpants, who flew around the city in his underwear giving wedgies to all the bad guys.”

Thus inspired, I wrote this scene:

George was drawing a picture and giggling to himself. Without looking up, he said, “Jigsaw, Mila. What’s what?”

“More like who’s who,” I said. “We’re working on a case. We’re wondering if you might have seen anything.”

George finished the picture. It showed a boy flying happily above the clouds. I looked closer. The boy in the picture looked exactly like George. He shoved the page under a stack of papers.

“What are you drawing, George?” Mila inquired.

“Comics,” George replied. “I’m going to publish graphic novels someday.”

“But in the meantime,” I said, “you’ll be happy making Mrs. Koosman bonkers.”

George smiled. “Hey, it’s a living.”

—–

I stole a joke from Woody Allen in Chapter Eight.

Somebody stole Bigs Maloney’s sneakers, forcing a cancellation of the game, and Jigsaw has to confront the prime suspect,  Lydia Zuckerman, the notorious Brown Street Bruiser. But before I get to the joke — and you’ll recognize it when it comes — I have to say that I’m happy with how Jigsaw stands up to Lydia in this scene. And also, how it was foreshadowed in the football game. Jigsaw’s character is consistent, even if his results may vary. The guy has got guts, and we see that in the very first chapter.

Lydia is big and tough, and she’s in the middle of her exercise routine:

“Not now,” Lydia said.

“I’ve only got a few questions,” I offered.

“I’m busy,” Lydia retorted. “Get out.”

Lydia grabbed a towel and ran it across her face. She started on a set of push-ups.

I stood beside her, arms on my hips. “I don’t want trouble,” I said. “But a witness saw you at the scene of a crime. I’m not leaving until you give me answers.”

“What crime?” Lydia grunted.

“Bigs Maloney’s sneakers took a walk,” I told her. “Thing is, Bigs’s feet weren’t in them at the time.”

<snip>

I turned to leave.

Lydia looked me up and down. “Hey, detective. You ever think about exercising?”

“I tried lifting weights once,” I answered. “But they were too heavy.” [Thanks, Woody!]

Lydia smiled. “You’re funny, Jones.”

“Yeah, a regular laugh riot,” I mumbled.

——

Thanks for listening! From what I can tell, this book is out-of-print and unavailable in stores. I can’t tell you how that feels.

POSTSCRIPT, 5/3/16: I originally wrote the above about seven years ago. Today I’m happy to announce that “Sneaker Sneak” will be brought back into print in the Spring of 2017. The title may be changed to The Case of the Smelly Sneaker.

Fan Mail Wednesday #53-55

Watch out, folks — step back, step waaaaaay back. Because this here is Fan Mail Wednesday, the Triple Threat Edition!

Hello! I am an elementary school teacher and have a collection of author signed books in my classroom. I was wondering if I could send you my copy of Six Innings for you to sign for me. I would include return postage. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Shelly

I replied:

Happy to do it!

James Preller
12 Brookside Drive
Delmar, NY 12054

Note: I shared this email because the same answer goes for anyone else who wishes to make a similar request. I’m happy and honored to sign a book any time, any day of the week. I think the idea of building a classroom collection of signed books is pretty cool and probably not that difficult. I’d bet that most authors would be happy to do it. The SASE, a forgotten courtesy, is key.

Letter #54:

Hello Mr. Preller.

My son and I love your Jigsaw Jones books. We have a question about The Case of the Sneaker Sneak. Is there a typo on page 19 with the secret code? We have both done the secret code and it does not make sense. When we do the secret code we get the following:

Is Helen u nmts or what?

Thank you for your help.
Kelly + Kyle

My answer:

Dear Kelly & Kyle:

Thank you for bringing this to my attention. We have since located the person responsible for this error, and he has been flogged by wet noodles and reassigned to a warehouse in Outer Siberia.

Justice is swift and oh so sweet.

Erm, okay, this sounds vaguely familiar. Hold on while I take the book off the shelf:

Yes, there’s a mistake in there. When you crack the code it now reads: IS HELEN HELEN NRTS OR WHAT?

Ugh. Not what I had in mind. It should read: IS HELEN NUTS OR WHAT?

I remember finding that mistake in the finished book. It bummed me out. We’d like to think of our finished books as perfect, not a comma out of place, not a word misspelled. And we try so hard — all of us, the writer, the editor, the copyeditor (or proofreader), designer, etc. Unfortunately, mistakes happen. While I’ve made my share of them, I can honestly say that in this case it wasn’t my fault. Because the code could not be typeset in the standard manner, it became “art” rather than “text,” and not my bailiwick. Which is why things probably got messed up: too many cooks in the kitchen. Also, the publishing schedule for series books can sometimes be tight and unforgiving, and that compounds the problem.

Thanks for bringing this to my attention. Believe me, heads will tumble.

BWA-HA-HA-HA!

Oh, by the way: I recently read that book again, #16 in the series, for the first time in at least 6 years, and I was surprised by how much of it I really enjoyed. You inspired me to write about it in a future blog post, some behind-the-scenes stuff, as I’ve done for other books. But I will say this: I hate the title, I’ve always hated the title. Just the worst. I got overruled by the committee on that one. It happens. Rats and Snails! Double Rats!

JP

POSTSCRIPT: My editor at Scholastic, the mercurial Shannon Penney, wrote to say: “Just wanted to make sure you know that the code typo in SNEAKER SNEAK has since been fixed, so no worries about that!”

Letter #55:

Hello James
My name is Doha.
I am in 6th grade.
i am 11 years old.
You are my favorite author.
I love your Jigsaw Jones books.
My reading tutor told me to ask you how
many times did you have to edit and write
your last book before you published it?
And what was your last book you published?
Just wanted to say again i love your books.

Doha

I replied:

Dear Doha:

And if your reading tutor told you to jump off a bridge? Would you do it? Would you?

Doha, my friend, you can’t do everything your reading tutor tells you to do.

Unless, hmmm . . . have you been hypnotized lately? Think back: Do you remember any kind of watch swinging back and forth, back and forth, with your reading tutor murmuring the words, “You are getting sleepy, so sleepy.” Does any of that ring a bell?

Because it’s possible that you are under the spell of some kind of evil scientist crazy person. I’m just typing out loud here, throwing out ideas. We have to consider all the possibilities.

Anyway, for the sake of this letter, let’s assume that it was a harmless suggestion. “Write the author, bug somebody else for a change.”

Okay, okay. I’ll play along with your tutor’s sick twisted plan suggestion. I tend to revise as I go. Constantly. I don’t have a number for it. But it seems like every time I read something that I’ve written, I fiddle with it a bit. I have to change something, especially the first few times I read it. After a while, it sort of stabilizes. At the same time, when a scene doesn’t sit right, I’ll go over it and over it endlessly, twenty times, easily. Sometimes I’ll then revert back to the original — reinstate what I had crossed out — when I realize to my horror that some of my changes only made it WORSE!

I mean to say: There is such a thing as too much fussing around.

I believe a good policy would be to carefully read over what you’ve written two times. Be open to make changes, try your best to make it better, and move on.

But no matter what anyone says about the importance of revision — and it is essential, and actually kind of fun — the single most important thing is to get those initial words down on that blank sheet of paper. Let it flow, let the story and the feeling come without worrying too much about whether it’s any good or not. There are great things inside of us all. Writing is one way of letting them out. And in many ways that requires an act of faith, a leap of trust, a belief in yourself, in Doha — a belief that you’ve got something inside you that no one else carries around. Your thoughts and feelings, memories and fears, dreams and ideas.

Your job as a writer is to tap into that river and let the words flow.

Since you asked: My new book is called Bystander (isn’t the cover awesome?), and it will be out in late September. I hope you read it!

Thanks for writing.

JP