I had a great time at the Children’s Authors Breakfast at the BEA. I can only wish that I was as funny as Eoin Colfer and Sherman Alexie, and I can also only wish that someday I’ll be as big as Judy Blume and Neil Gaiman. I was particularly anxious to hear them talk about why they write for children, as I’ll need to make an argument for more latino/-a writers writing for children at the Reforma National Conference in September.
Yes, Colfer really does look that geeky in real life.
Publisher’s Weekly has kindly written an article on the breakfast, saving me the trouble, but actually, it was much funnier in person than what the stolid article can possibly recreate. And yes, potty-mouth was the order of the day, as you can see from a few of the quotes…..even though all four of the writers involved don’t use a lot of profanity in their writing.
For me, the highlights were not the quotes that PW used in its article. I was interested in Sherman Alexie’s references to how books saved him as a kid: “I write books about childhood for people who didn’t have a childhood: I didn’t [because] I grew up very poor on a government reservation.” He went on to talk about how on the reservation, he was alone and terrified and isolated–and everybody around him was alone and terrified and isolated. Recently on book tour, a kid in the sixth grade got up in front of a crowd of 400 people and told Alexie that he has Tourette’s Syndrome, so his classmates bully him. He wanted to know what he should do. Alexie, thinking “shit shit shit shit shit,” replied that he was bullied as a kid, too, but his greatest allies were books and librarians. “Those bullies are bullies because they go home and they don’t feel loved,” he concluded. But, he said, this kid obviously feels secure and loved enough to ask this question in front of 400 people and he pointed that out to the young person involved. As young adult writers, Alexie finished, “We’re all trying to give the right answer–and it’s a terrifying and lonely and isolating experience.”
Neil Gaiman expained that he always wanted to be a children’s writer because when you’re a kid, you want to write what you like to read. “Children’s books allow you to explore themes you can’t explore in adult novels,” he said and gave Coraline as an example (for those of you who haven’t read it, brilliant book): “Coraline is about bravery. As a kid, I thought brave people weren’t scared. But [now I know that] being brave means being terrified but doing what you have to do.”
 I was encouraged when the brilliant Gaiman stumbled over trying to explain what his new book was about and, realizing he sounded kind of vague and dumb, said, “Authors don’t know what our books are really about…we just hope people will read it.” Thank God! I never know what to say when people ask me what my books are “about.”
