We welcome Margarita Engle today to Best Dog Books. She will share some inside information on her recently launched book, MOUNTAIN DOG.
What is the title of your book? The pub date and publisher? Genre? Targeted age group?
*MOUNTAIN DOG (August, 2013, Holt/Macmillan)
What kind of dog stars in your story?
* Labrador Retriever
Where is it set?
*Sierra Nevada Mountains of California
In 70 words or less, provide a succinct plot description of your story.
*Tony has been raised in a dog fighting home in Los Angeles, but when his mother is arrested for animal cruelty, he goes to live with his great-uncle, a forest ranger. In the mountains, Tony is befriended by Gabe, a search and rescue dog trained to find lost hikers.
How are you connected to the setting of your story?
*I grew up in Los Angeles, and now I live in central California, where I help my husband with his volunteer work as a search and rescue dog trainer/handler. My role is hiding in the forest, so the dogs can practice finding a lost hiker.
What inspired you to write this story?
*I originally wrote it as a short story, for Ann Martin’s anthology, Because of Shoe and Other Dog Stories. When she asked me to expand it into a full-length middle grade novel, I decided to write it in free verse, using the boy’s voice and the dog’s for alternate chapters. It was glorious fun!
What was the biggest challenge you had writing your story? How did you overcome it?
*All my other novels in verse are set in my mother’s homeland, Cuba, so it felt strange to write about California, even though I was born and raised here.
What kind of story can we expect next from you? Is it set outside of the United States? If so, where? And what is it about?
*My next novel in verse is SILVER PEOPLE, Voices From the Panama Canal (Harcourt, March, 2014). It is about the Caribbean islanders who were recruited to do the hard work of digging (by hand, with shovels!) while subjected to U.S.-imposed racial apartheid. It is also a love letter to the tropical rainforest, a place I absolutely love.
What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
*MOUNTAIN DOG isn’t my only book about search and rescue dogs. I also have a picture book for younger children, WHEN YOU WANDER (Holt/Macmillan, April, 2013).
Can you remember the first book that made an impact on you? And why?
*The Black Stallion was my first favorite animal book, but I also read Call of the Wild, and White Fang. I loved anything that showed a close relationship between man and nature. Island of the Blue Dolphins eventually became the book that had the greatest impact on me, during my young adult years, because I felt such deep empathy for the last speaker of her language (decades later, I learned that my own ancestry is Taíno, a Cuban Indian tribe that survives only in DNA, but lost its language and customs during the Spanish Conquest.)
Lara’s Gift will be released by Alfred A. Knopf on August 6, 2013 and is appropriate for kids 10 and up. It’s a dog story and historical fiction.
Who is your key dog character and what kind of dog is he? Tell us a little more about him.
*Zar is the key canine character in Lara’s Gift. He is a borzoi, also commonly referred to as a Russian wolfhound. His loyal and loving character is inspired by my own borzoi, Zar. And his bond to Lara and hers to him represents the kind of special bond I had with my first dog when I was a child. That bond gave me strength and made the impossible seem possible! It’s exactly this feeling that I wanted between Lara and Zar.
Where is your story set?
Russia, 1914.
How are you connected to your story?
I spent about ten years working and living in the former Soviet Union, its republics, and neighboring countries. I fell in love with the culture and the people when I took a Sovietology course at Denmark’s International School in Copenhagen. It involved a life-chaging study tour to Moscow and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) where my personal development grew and skyrocketed on many levels. I knew there was more I could learn so I got an MBA in international business and studied Russian to prepare me for a career working overseas. Everyone should live abroad at some point in life.
In 70 words or less, provide a succinct plot description of your story.
Set in Imperial Russia, young Lara is being groomed in the family tradition to take over as Count Vorontsov’s next kennel steward. Because Lara wants nothing more than to breed borzoi dogs worthy of the Tsar, she spends all of her time caring for them, especially Zar, the runt she saved at birth. So when her papa takes away her dream, and refuses to accept her special gift with the borzoi, Lara is forced to face her biggest fear to not only prove her papa wrong, but to also save Zar from a pack of wolves threatening life on the country estate.
“LARA’S GIFT is a gift to anyone who loves adventure, a good story and above all, a beloved dog. It makes a reader believe in the power of intuition, family, and fighting for one’s true calling.”
Kathi Appelt, Newbery Honor author of THE UNDERNEATH
“Wrapped in the rich tapestry of Imperial Russia, Annemarie O’Brien has crafted a timeless tale celebrating the unbreakable bond between dogs and their people. A must-read for history lovers and dog lovers alike!”
Bobbie Pyron, author of THE DOGS OF WINTER and A DOG’S WAY HOME.
What inspired you to write this story?
* Many years ago when I worked in the former Soviet Union during the Gorbachev years, I was gifted a borzoi puppy named Dasha. With gentle, cat-like qualities, she was like no other dog I had ever had. While I knew that borzoi were the symbol of the Tsar and considered a national treasure during the Imperial era, I had had no idea that this association nearly caused the breed to become extinct in their homeland after the Russian Revolution.
It haunted me that the Bolsheviks could be threatened by this association so much to declare any borzoi an enemy of the State to be shot and killed without question. While many borzoi were killed, some survived because of people who risked their lives to protect the breed. I realized how fortunate I was to have Dasha and felt compelled to tell her story.
My curiosity about the people who risked their lives to keep the breed alive led to a bunch of questions that nobody could answer. So my imagination took off with all the “what ifs” that consumed me. And that’s when the seeds of Lara’s Gift were planted.
What was the biggest challenge you had writing your story? How did you overcome it?
*I didn’t know where to start my story. I must have written twenty different openings until I finally landed on the one that went to print. I really struggled with how far back in time I needed to go. I have openings that range in time from the Russian Revolution in 1917 to the Gorbachev years in the 1980s. None of them worked.
It wasn’t until I read Tamar by Mal Peet that I knew I needed to start in the Imperial era with a prologue. Thank you, Mal Peet for writing Tamar! Your prologue was such a strong hook and made me re-think its function in a novel. So much so it was the basis of my VCFA graduate thesis and lecture.
Another huge influence on me was the opening birth scene in Runt by Marion Dane Bauer. While I wasn’t consciously “borrowing” the idea of a birth scene from Runt, I do know I chose to start with a birth scene for the same reasons I thought the opening in Runt was brilliant. The opening showed readers why the naming of the pups was important, and set up why it was so important for Runt to earn a new name. I’m a huge fan of picking names for my characters that serve more than just one purpose in a story. Writers can go so much deeper with the choices they make in a character’s name. It’s another layer in all of m,y stories.
Marion Dane Bauer also influenced my writing process by breaking story down through a “story-arc-litmus-test-of- questions” she shared in a lecture at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. They include:
Who is your protagonist?
What does she want?
What stands in her way?
What is the inciting incident?
What is the climax?
It might not look like rocket science, but these questions have helped me stay on track with my stories. By knowing the answers to these questions, I know if I have a story arc. If there’s no story arc, there’s no story.
What other YA/MG books have you written? Do any of them feature a key dog character? If so, which ones? What are these stories about?
*I am currently writing a companion book to LARA’S GIFT. It is set during the Gorbachev years.
What kind of story can we expect next from you? Is it about a dog? If so, what is it about?
*I am in the final throes of revising a story set in Thailand. There is no key dog character in it yet. Who knows? Maybe I’ll weave a dog thread into it.
What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
*The best gift I ever got was advice from my father: follow your heart in everything you do and happiness will follow. I have lived my life with this advice carried close to my heart and found happiness in all of my big life decisions. Though it wasn’t my intent when I began writing Lara’s Gift, this happens to be its theme and something I only realized well after the revision and re-revision process. I guess it’s true that a little of the author comes through on the page, whether intended or not! I hope readers come away encouraged to live life with passion and heart.
Can you remember the first book that made an impact on you? And why?
*My all-time favorite book as a kid was: Harry the Dirty Dog by Gene Zion. I remember being thrilled by the adventures Harry had, as well as scared that Harry’s family wouldn’t recognize him. I was so pleased to see this book come out again and bought it for my kids.
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore was also a favorite and something I still admire as an adult. I never tire of reading it aloud. The words and imagery sing! Before I die, I hope I can write something so brilliant and timeless. While there are many picture book versions, I chose the one Gennady Spirin illustrated.
The author with her borzoi, Zar and Zola, by Turner Photography
Where can readers go to find out more information about you and/or your books?
For published authors and unpublished authors, check out our writing contests.
Leave a comment and share this post on some social media platform to win a copy of LARA’S GIFT. For every share or comment, your name will be entered into the pot. The winner will be drawn and announced on this blog September 5, 2013.
I’d like to welcome my illustrator, Tim Jessell to Best Dog Books for a special interview on the artist’s perspective in creating books for children. Tim has done many book covers that feature dogs. I am especially fond of his Dog Diaries covers, as well as for Lara’s Gift.
What is your step-by-step process from start to finish for creating your cover art?
I start usually w/ a very rough thumbnail, working out basic composition ideas/problems. This is often done on a post-it note size piece of paper. I then digitally sketch it out more refined in Photoshop w/ a Wacom tablet (Intuos 4). How tight the sketch is at this stage depends on the subject matter and how much of the concept from the art director is already “nailed down”. Obviously, sketching digitally it makes it much easier to nudge elements around (and size) in this stage.
Upon pencil sketch approval, I begin finished art. I rarely do an initial color study as guide (same when I worked traditionally). I paint as traditionally as I can on the computer, considering I was “analog” for quite some time before going digital around 2001 – I call my approach “tradigital”. The pencil sketch floats on a layer above the painted background(eventually dropping it “into” the painting). I paint the background first, working “forward” in the image as I go, w/ the main focal point (figures/dogs/aliens, etc.) coming last. After I’ve “said something” to the entire piece, then I build up the detail, again, usually from background to foreground.
One can see my digital watercolor/pastel method here.
How long does it take you to create your cover art?
Usually 3-5 days. Often long hours. I work late into most nights and most weekends. Friends and acquaintances maybe envious of my self employed life style(?), but many would balk at the actual hours I put in weekly (and no one still pays me while on vacation, ever. I don’t take many)
How do you come up with the cover art design? How much freedom do you have? What role does the publisher’s art director have?
It can vary quite a bit. Sometimes it is already very much laid out for me, and I am merely the “executer” of the plan. Other times, they want to see a few rough sketches as the publisher is not quite sure which direction is best. I will also get assignments where they only require certain elements and I am responsible for all the details of pulling it together (hey, it’s all details in my world) ;)), and many times they will let me pick from several concepts they have in mind. I will of course interject any ideas that I think will help improve the image. It can be very much a team effort. Just like in sports, a good team produces good results. It all works for me as I really do enjoy the variety between the “just paint this” to “whatever you think is best” spectrum.
How much research goes into the dogs that you create?
A lot, especially if they are actual historical canine figures.
How do you find your dog models?
Like most modern day illustrators the internet is a wealth of visual reference for the artist. Say I’m painting a husky from straight on, but I need to see the the bottom of the paws and/or how the feet are working… I find what I’m looking for, but it’s from a German Shepherd image. This happens all the time w/ illustrators – we are “Dr. Frankenstein” when it comes to visual reference
Writers constantly revise their work before it gets published, how many revisions do you do on average before your cover art is finalized?
Most often, not any. I’m good that way (smile). Seriously, most of the time elements are already figured out in the pencil stage, and if I execute the painting stage well there are usually no changes. But sometimes there are minor tweaks in color, a face here or there.
What do you enjoy most about creating cover art?
Creating a scene/world from a blank white rectangle…. and the feeling as if I could step inside that “world”.
What is your biggest challenge creating cover art? And how do you overcome it?
It is often human faces, characters age, etc. As illustrators will tell you, editors, etc. can be more fussy or have a preconceived notion about a figure’s face (personal taste). It can be very subjective when it comes to painting a 12 year old girl, for example. Look at casting in TV or movies. The high schoolers usually look like they could’ve graduated college! Or I’m thinking a true 12 year old (that’s a moving target!), yet the editor sees them more like a 9 year old in their mind’s eye – just very subjective… and that can create issues w/ the artist responsible for all the actual nitty gritty visual details, not just descriptions on a page.
… but the true daily challenge is really creating work that I am proud of. I imagine it’s like being a song writer. Not all are gonna be hits, but one strives for it anyway.
What kind of training does one generally need to design book covers?
Love books, read books – beginning in childhood. Draw, draw, draw. The painting, lighting, color will come later.*
How did you break into children’s books?
When I was 6 years old, lying on my bed room floor drawing the further adventures of Max from “Where the Wild Things Are”, by Maurice Sendak… I certainly thought I was breaking into it then. 😉 I’m kidding, but then again… I’m not! There was no line between fine art and illustration then, or now for me.
What advice would you give young people (or adults!) interested in a career designing book covers?
Same advice as above… and study art history as one pursues and education in graphic design/illustration. It’s all part of “speaking the language” – the better ones “vocabulary”, after all. Be constantly on the look for inspiration. It seems I can never turn off my illustrators eye for light and shadow in the daily(mundane?) world around me. I love “Magic Hour” – the hour before sunset. Sky and cloud shapes are a constant marvel. For designers, study the top and historic typographers/font designers – a world unto itself.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
They must be a great group of folks – aficionados of dogs and books – ” ‘Nuff said”(to quote Stan Lee). Thanks!
For more information about Tim Jessell or a look at his art, please click here or here.
Here are my kids and Kuma (puppy Shiba Inu, male and 16 year old Boris – Siberian Husky. He died at 17! Very very old for a Husky).
Thank you so much for joining us today at Best Dog Books, Tim Jessell! I look forward to seeing more of your work on books for kids. And a HUGE thanks for creating such a lovely cover for Lara’s Gift! I only get sincere compliments and raves.
Let’s welcome Marcia Goldman today at Best Dog Books, a blog that features interviews with authors who’ve written a story for kids with a key canine character.
Lola Goes To Work: A Nine-To-Five Therapy Dog
Publisher: Creston Books
Publishing date: July 2013
Genre: picture book
Targeted age: 3-7yrs
Photographer: Marcia Goldman
AOB: Who is your key dog character and what kind of dog is he/she? Tell us a little more about him/her.
* Lola is a 5 pound Yorkshire Terrier. She is 5 years old and has been a therapy dog for a couple of years. She is a little dog with a very big personality.
AOB: In 70 words or less, provide a succinct plot description of your story.
*Meet Lola, a little terrier with a big job. Children will identify with the feisty Lola as she struggles going to school, passing tests, and finally achieving her Big Dog dream. If Lola can make it in a world of Great Danes and Labradors, so can anybody who’s feeling like a runt.
Reviews or blurbs you wish to share:
“My mom said: ‘If Lola can do it, you can, too.’ Thanks, Lola.”
-Bobo
Amy Tan’s 4-month -old Yorkie
“Lola Goes to Work is a lively and adorable introduction to the fascinating world of working dogs. Children will love reading about Lola as she shares what it takes to become a therapy dog, providing comfort to those in need.”
-Michael Oakleaf, Library Media Specialist
“Lola is the hardest worker I know!”
-Lassie
“See Lola. See Lola work hard. Lola is a hard worker.”
-Spot
“Good dog!”
-Anonymous
AOB: What inspired you to write this story?
Lola and I were visiting preschool classrooms for children on the autistic spectrum. We would join circle time and I would read to the children while Lola sat on my lap. I looked for a book with a dog that looked like Lola, but I could not find one, so I decided to create my own. My first book was just about all of the things Lola liked and didn’t like. I am always asked how Lola became a therapy dog, so I decided to have Lola tell the story.
AOB: What was the biggest challenge you had writing your story? How did you overcome it?
* Lola doesn’t mind getting her picture taken, but some of the poses were a little more challenging. What works best is string cheese!!
AOB: What other YA/MG books have you written? Do any of them feature a key dog character? If so, which ones?
*I have written 10 books and they all feature Lola. Every story has a message. Lola Goes To The Doctor, Lola’s First Chanukah, Lola Gets A Baby Brother are a few of the titles. Lola and Bear is about friendship while Lola Says Goodbye is about understanding death. These are all works in progress, as Lola and I learn more about telling stories together.
AOB: What kind of story can we expect next from you? Is it about a dog? If so, what is it about?
*We are still deciding which Lola book will be next, but I’m thinking Lola Goes to the Doctor.
AOB: What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
*Lola is such a good little companion, whether it is going off to work together, or patiently letting me create these books. It has been a joy creating these books about her.
AOB: Can you remember the first book that made an impact on you? And why?
*I honestly don’t remember my favorite as a child, but reading The Little Engine That Could to my children was always my favorite. I liked the can-do spirit and the positive message. In some ways, Lola is my little engine that could!
AOB: Where can readers go to find out more information about you and/or your books?
*We’re working on a website now, but Lola already has her own facebook page and there’s more information on the Creston Books website, and on the Creston Books facebook page.
Thank you for joining us today at Best Dog Books, Marcia Goldman!
Let’s welcome Margarita Engle to Best Dog Books, a blog that features interviews with authors who’ve written stories for kids with a key canine character.
WHEN YOU WANDER, A Search and Rescue Dog Story (Holt/Macmillan, April, 2013). It is a picture book for young children, in the form of a single poem that tells a story from the point of view of a wilderness search and rescue dog trained to find lost hikers. It is illustrated by Mary Morgan.
AOB: Who is your key dog character and what kind of dog is he/she? Tell us a little more about him/her.
*The dog is a first person narrator, so he/she isn’t named, but is a very sweet, cute Golden Retriever, dedicated to finding lost people.
AOB: In 70 words or less, provide a succinct plot description of your story.
*The search and rescue dog speaks to a child, explaining what the child should do if he/she gets lost in a forest—stop, stay in one place, and make friends with a tree, because the farther a lost person wanders, the harder it is for search and rescue dogs to follow their scent trail. The poem/story begins with: “I am a graduate of sniffing school! I practice sniffing every day, just in case you ever go out in the woods, and lose your way.”
AOB: What inspired you to write this story?
*My husband is a volunteer search and rescue dog/trainer handler, with two dogs, Maggi and Chance. I hide in forests in the Sierra Nevada mountains and other wild regions, at least once or twice a week, so that SAR dogs and handlers can practice finding a “lost” person. They call me a volunteer “victim.” It has been such a pleasure watching dogs with strong “play drives” transformed into hard-working heroes, because dogs don’t distinguish between play and work. It’s all great fun to them. Search and rescue is basically an extended hide-and-seek game.
AOB: What was the biggest challenge you had writing your story? How did you overcome it?
*I don’t usually find it natural to write in a sweet, cute style, but I felt that the subject of getting lost would be too frightening for young children, unless balanced by comforting images, both in the text and illustrations.
AOB: What other YA/MG books have you written? Do any of them feature a key dog character? If so, which ones? AOB: What are these stories about?
*Most of my books are YA novels in verse about Cuban history. My other picture book is SUMMER BIRDS, the Butterflies of Maria Merian, one of the earliest women scientists.
AOB: What kind of story can we expect next from you? Is it about a dog? If so, what is it about?
*MOUNTAIN DOG is also about search and rescue dogs; it is a middle grade chapter book in verse, scheduled for publication by Holt/Macmillan in August, 2013.
AOB: What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
*The true inspiration for When You Wander came from a search and rescue training day, when I was standing around with my husband, and a bunch of other volunteers and SAR dogs. Three little girls walked into our camp, headed straight for our Yellow Lab, Chance, and spoke to him, instead of to any of the people. All three said, “We don’t know where we are!” Then they burst into tears, and hugged Chance. He comforted them. They had wandered away from a big group camped in a nearby meadow, but by wandering in circles, they got farther and farther away from their own tent. No one at their church camp even realized that they were lost. Everyone thought someone else was watching them. I realized how important it is for children to learn basic wilderness safety, and how much easier it is for them to learn from animals, than from people.
AOB: Can you remember the first book that made an impact on you? And why?
*When I was very little, my favorite picture book was The Ugly Duckling. I loved the unexpected transformation. My Cuban mother was still learning English at that time, so she also recited a lot of Spanish poetry, especially Versos Sencillos (Simple Verses) by José Martí.
They are poems written for adults, but some of them are easy for children to understand. The nature of poetry captivated me. I loved the rhythms and rhymes. It was like music.
Readers can go to Margarita Engle’s web page to find out more information about her and her books. You can also find her on Facebook.
Thank you Margarita for joining us today at Best Dog Books!
We welcome Margarita Engle today to Best Dog Books. She will share some inside information on her recently launched book, MOUNTAIN DOG.
What inspired you to write this story?
What else would you like us to know about you or your story?
