It is with immense pleasure that I welcome Rosanne Parry to Best Dog Books, a blog that features interviews with authors who’ve written a canine story for kids. Rosanne is here to talk about A WOLF CALLED WANDER which is a an illustrated middle grade novel published by HarperCollins Greenwillow in the US for kids aged 8 and up.
Best Dog Books: Who is your key dog character(s) and what kind of dog is he/she?
The Wander in my story is a gray wolf.
Best Dog Books: Tell us about your story.
Wander is inspired by OR7 (meaning he was the 7th Oregon wolf to wear a radio collar). He dispersed from his birth pack in 2011 and ran more than 1000 miles in one month from the Wallowa Mountains to the Siskiyous. There he found a mate in a place where nobody has seen a wolf for almost 100 years. He founded the Rogue Pack which still lives in the Rogue River watershed. His pups have grown up and established the first wolf packs in Northern California in more than 100 years.
Artwork credit to Mònica Armiño
Best Dog Books: What inspired you to write this story?
So often the news about the environment is bad news. When I was reading about OR7 I thought, here’s a story of resilience involving an animal that has always fascinated me. Wolves are astonishingly intelligent. Their strength and endurance outpaces our canine companions by miles. And their pack structure is beautiful to behold. They care for the pups of the pack together, they hunt with thrilling precision and coordination. And they care for their injured pack mates. I knew a wolf would be a great subject for a story. My challenge to myself was to craft a story that would be interesting to humans but not have any human characters in it.
Best Dog Books: What was the biggest challenge you had writing your story? How did you overcome it?
Putting myself in the mind of a wolf was a welcome challenge. And fortunately I live in Oregon and have traveled to all the places in the book. So I had the opportunity to kneel in the forest to put my eye at the level of a wolf. I spent a lot of time with my eyes closed asking myself what I could hear and smell in the places I visited. I thought about a wolf’s body language and what it would feel like to communicate as a wolf does by ear and tail movements. And I imagined what it would be like to be strong enough to run 50+ miles every single day.
The photo above is me and illustrator Lindsay Moore (SEABEAR) researching orca in the Salish Sea for our upcoming title A WHALE OF THE WILD.
Best Dog Books: What kind of story can we expect next from you? Is it about a dog? If so, what can you tell us about it?
My next book will be called A WHALE OF THE WILD. It will be a first person account from the point of view of a brother and sister orca in the Salish Sea. It was inspired by the Southern Resident community of killer whales.
Artwork credit to Mònica Armiño
Best Dog Books: What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
A WOLF CALLED WANDER is graced by more than a hundred stunning illustrations from the amazing and talented Mónica Armiño. I’m over the moon to work with her and love what her art brings to the book. This story has been translated into ten other languages including Arabic, Russian and Chinese. Oregon is a very exotic place from their perspective, so I’m grateful that the pictures help make the story accessible world-wide.
Best Dog Books: Can you remember the first book that made an impact on you? Why?
What I remember of my childhood reading is the library in my neighborhood where I could check out any book I wanted. Free access to books of my choosing made a huge impact on every part of my life. I checked out kids books and adult books, sheet music, maps, fiction, non-fiction, vinyl records, and newspapers.
Best Dog Books: What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
There is no one correct way to write a book. You have to tinker with your own process to make it fit with the life you have because if you’re waiting for some convenient, not-busy time of your life to start writing, you are going to be waiting a very long time. Also it helps a lot if you really love it. Because loving it will make you want to practice and practicing will make you better. I am a fan of Ursula LeGuin’s STEERING THE CRAFT. I read lots of books on writing and at the moment I’m reading one about song writing, Ursula’s STEERING THE CRAFT is the one I go back to more than any other.
If you’d like to learn more about Rosanne Parry, you can check out the author’s website or follow the author on twitter.
Thank you Rosanne Parry for joining us at Best Dog Books. I enjoyed reading A WOLF CALLED WANDER and gave it 5 stars on Amazon and Good Reads. Good luck on future projects!
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