Best Dog Books is pleased to welcome Emma Smith. She is a children’s librarian and the author of 13 books for children. She specializes in narrative nonfiction picture books. Her first children’s book, Journey: Based on the True Story of OR7, the Most Famous Wolf in the West, won Bank Street College’s Cook Prize. Emma lives with her husband, their two kids, one cat, and one dog in San Francisco, California.
Who is your key dog character and what kind of dog is he/she? Tell us a little more about him/her.
OR7 was a real-life wolf who, beginning in 2011, traveled from his home in northeastern Oregon all the way to California, finally settling in southwestern Oregon. He gained fame for being the first wild wolf in California in almost a century, and for contributing to the repopulation of wolves in this part of the country. He fathered many pups, some of whom went on to form packs of their own. Sadly, he is believed to have died this year.
Tell us about JOURNEY: BASED ON THE TRUE STORY OF OR7, THE MOST FAMOUS WOLF IN THE WEST. What’s it about?
This picture book tells the true story of the famed wolf who spent almost three years traveling close to 2000 miles, becoming the first wild wolf in California in almost 100 years. In this book, I used alternating narrators—Journey the wolf, and a girl who follows his progress via the news and other forms of media.
I was thrilled that Journey won Bank Street College’s Cook Prize, as well as Northland College’s Sigurd Olson Nature Writing Award. It was also featured in the Huffington Post and on NPR
What inspired you to write this story?
This was my first published children’s book, and my first attempt at nonfiction (or fiction/nonfiction hybrid). When I heard about Journey in the news, I was captivated. Then when I read that he had, against all odds, succeeded in finding a mate in southwestern Oregon and fathering a litter of pups, I knew I had to try to write a book about him. What I love about this story is how it teaches that the human and the natural worlds can coexist. I like to think that Journey’s travails inspire empathy and compassion in young readers, as well as a respect for the natural world. It’s a conservation success story.
What was the biggest challenge you had writing your story? How did you overcome it?
The hardest part was getting inside Journey’s mind without anthropomorphizing. It was a struggle, for example, to suggest that he felt lonely without saying “He felt lonely.” I got around this with evocative language and by describing his body language.
I also had to imagine Journey’s exact actions during his travels. Because he wore a tracking collar, biologists knew his route, but not much else. I filled in the details—what animals he probably encountered, what he smelled, what he saw. (Because of this, the book is classified as fiction.)
What other books have you written? Do any of them feature a key dog character? If so, which ones? What are these stories about?
I have three picture books coming out this year, and one has a dog as the main character: Odin, Dog Hero of the Fires. Odin is the true story of a Great Pyrenees who survived the devastating 2017 wildfires in Northern California.
Claude: The True Story of a White Alligator tells the surprising backstory of the famous albino alligator at the California Academy of Sciences, in San Francisco.
And I’m very excited about my November release—The Pig War: How a Porcine Tragedy Taught England and America to Share. This historical picture book relates how in the 1800s the United States and Britain almost went to war when a farmer on a small Washington State island shot someone else’s pig.
I also managed to work my own dog, a golden retriever named Piper, into a chapter book that came out in 2019! (Escaping the Fire, the first of the Gavin McNally’s Year Off series from ABDO.)
What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
I’m really excited about an upcoming project—a picture book biography of Robert McCloskey. It focuses specifically on the making of Make Way for Ducklings, but people might also know him as the author-illustrator of books like Blueberries for Sal. (He was a dog lover, too! Penny the English setter was a character in One Morning in Maine.)
Can you remember the first book that made an impact on you? And why?
There were so many, but one that featured dogs was Lassie, Come Home. I loved that book and read it multiple times! I couldn’t get over how faithful Lassie was, and the depiction of her voyage home was the definition of a nail-biter! Now that I think of it, it may have taught me a lot about writing a compelling story, before I even knew I wanted to be a writer! (The Incredible Journey was another favorite, with similar characteristics.)
Where can readers go to find out more information about you and/or your books?
You can find more information about my books and myself (including a picture of my dog!) at www.emmabsmith.com. I’m on Twitter at @emmablandsmith and Instagram at @emmasmithsf.
Readers can also feel free to email me directly: emmasmithsf@yahoo.com.
Thank you so much for having me on your blog, Annemarie!
For other great books about dogs, check out 101 Best Dog Books for Kids.
For published authors and unpublished authors, check out our writing contests.
