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Author Interview with W.H. Beck & Book Giveaway

“What if [Malcolm] could prove to the Academy that he was a critter of…valor and merit? Maybe…he could admit the truth. Maybe then everyone could start thinking that not all rats are skuzzy.” ~ from MALCOLM AT MIDNIGHT

I’ve always been one to root for the underdog. Yes, even a rat. At our house, we aren’t pet people (allergies spoil the fun), and that one rat in the garage last summer was a little disconcerting. Still, like my son, I enjoy a good book about a critter surrounded by unfortunate rumors. Or, mistaken identity.

My son and I read W.H. Beck’s novel, MALCOLM AT MIDNIGHT, together and loved every page, every illustration. Beck tells the story of Malcolm, a rat who, after being mistaken for a mouse, becomes the fifth grade pet in Mr. Binny’s classroom. He learns quickly that he’s not the only pet in the school and that much of the serious work going on at McKenna happens once the Midnight bell rings.

Soon after he’s admitted into the Midnight Academy of McKenna school pets, Malcolm becomes the prime suspect in the mystery of a missing iguana. He sets out to prove, then (to himself and the other classroom pets), that rats are not all bad. In fact, he depends on his “every ratty fiber and trick” to save the day, and – likely – the entire school.

I’m honored to host W.H. Beck for a Q&A. Because my son and I read this book together, I asked him to come up with the first two questions. He rattled them off right away, adding that he hopes for a sequel. Which means, MALCOLM AT MIDNIGHT is too good not to share. I’m giving away a copy, so drop your name in the comments for a chance to win and look for the lucky reader on Tuesday, February 20th.

Now, welcome W.H. Beck!

CC: How did you decide to write your book?

WHB: Well, when I started Malcolm, I was working on a nonfiction animal series, so I think I had critters on the brain. I’ve also always loved stories that take place in the “regular” world, but have something a little fantastical going on just out of sight. Since I work in a school, it was fun to imagine what happened after all we humans headed home. It just grew from there.

CC: Did you ever own a pet rat?

WHB: Ha! No, we have a dog and a gecko—but I do get asked that a lot. The truth is, I’m not exactly sure where the rat came from, except that I wanted an animal that had to use his animal “superpowers” to solve a mystery. When I read about how rats can compress their bones to fit through the hole the size of quarter, hold their breath for three minutes and swim up through sewer pipes, and gnaw through glass and cement and steel…well, it seemed too fun not to use in a story. It also made it interesting to have Malcolm struggle with rat stereotypes.

CC: As an elementary school librarian, I imagine you run into a variety of readers, from voracious to completely uninterested. How does the challenge of meeting students at both ends of the reading spectrum influence your life as an author?

WHB: What a good question! And the answer is…I’m not sure I think about this overtly when I write. I am usually just trying to write a story that I like. But I think you’re right that it does influence me subconsciously. I’ve seen the power of humor in a story for kids and have a good sense for how long readers will stick with a descriptive passage (zero seconds, in case you’re wondering—it WILL be skimmed over). But I think what voracious readers love and what might draw in reluctant readers may not actually be all that different. And it may not be all that different than what brings me to a story—an interesting idea, characters I care about, something unexpected happening. The trick is coming up with all that, and doing it well. J

CC: What are you reading these days?

WHB: I am reading THE RUNAWAY KING by Jennifer A. Nielsen. I was a huge fan of THE FALSE PRINCE, so I was delighted to get the second book in the series as an ARC. (One of the perks of being a librarian as well as a writer!)

CC: Do you have any advice for up and coming writers?

WHB: I’m a huge believer in READING for writers (and really, for everyone—that’s why I became a school librarian, after all J). Anyway, for writers it is so important to read to not only know the market and what is selling, but also to study the craft. To analyze why stories work (or don’t work) and to figure out how other authors develop characters, create tension, and so much more. It’s the best homework there is.

~

As a kid growing up in Wisconsin, W.H. Beck’s dad always teased her that she would be a librarian someday. That’s because she read all the time—walking home from school, while brushing her teeth, under the table at dinnertime, and under the covers at night. And, sure enough, after earning an elementary teaching degree from the University of Wisconsin, she went on to get a master’s degree in information studies from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. (Yes, that’d be library school.)

She still lives and reads in Wisconsin, but now she shares her home and books with a husband, two sons, and a sneaky (but loveable) dog. By day, she’s an elementary school librarian. And early in the mornings, late at nights, and in between kids’ sports practices, she writes.

For more about W.H. Beck and her books, visit her website, where she’s put together a wonderful list of blog posts about MALCOLM AT MIDNIGHT, the revision process, post-publication, and the making of the book trailer.

Remember, drop your name in the comments for a chance to win and read your own copy of Malcolm at Midnight.

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Deciding to Write a Memoir, Guest Post by Sandra Bornstein

I met Sandra Bornstein after posting an author interview with Erika Dreifus, as Sandra was the winner of Quiet Americans. Sandra came to the blog as a reader, but today she shares her experience as an author. She’s crafted a lovely post about the challenge in writing memoir, and she’s giving away a copy of her new book, May This Be the Best Year of Your Life. Read Sandra’s guest post below, and leave a comment for a chance to win a copy. Thanks, Sandra, for sharing your experience and your book!

“Each of us is a book waiting to be written, and that book,
if written, results in a person explained.”
~Thomas M. Cirignano, The Constant Outsider

My decision to write my memoir, MAY THIS BE THE BEST YEAR OF YOUR LIFE, reminds me of the story of Pandora’s box. For decades, I had kept most of my life’s story private and well-contained. Only a few friends and relatives were privy to my childhood and day-to-day happenings. I was content to live beneath my own personal radar screen.

However, after having the unique opportunity to live and teach in a Third World country, my opinion changed. I was not prepared for the culture shock that I experienced. Monkeys in my classroom were never anticipated. Despite these unusual disruptions, I was able to share my multicultural expertise and teaching experience in significant ways. I was the only American primary teacher on the campus.

I had an inspiring story to tell. Similar to Pandora, I did not believe that the contents should be confined for eternity. I was curious.

Could I write my compelling story and keep an audience engaged?

Would it be worth the price of revealing my life to the public?

The mere act of writing about my life unleashed a flurry of memories. Some of these memories brought a warm glow of happiness while others rekindled periods of sadness, unfairness, and despair.

By having to confront the negative aspects of my life, I clung to the belief that others would benefit from the lessons that I learned from my journey. Amidst all of the evil that was released from Pandora’s box, she was able to locate hope. Likewise, I waded through my challenging episodes and sought out the promising and encouraging moments.

Even though I was telling my story, I had to look at each chapter with a minimal amount of bias. Without the help of my developmental editor, Joe Kita, it would have been much more difficult to find an appropriate voice and locate the major threads to my story.

Part of the challenge of memoir writing is to maintain a balance between retelling a truthful story and keeping your audience engaged. Far too many authors in recent years have excessively embellished the truth in order to sell more books. Maintaining my integrity throughout was always my intended goal. Elie Wiesel was absolutely correct when he stated, “I will say, with memoir, you must be honest. You must be truthful.”

If I was not going to be true to the facts, I might as well have written a novel. However, by adhering to the truth, I ran the risk of peeling back too many protective layers that had kept my life behind closed doors for decades.

But then again, isn’t that what makes a memoir compelling? It is those tender moments when the author reveals her inner feelings and connects emotionally with the reader. In so doing, the reader walks hand-in-hand with the memoirist and relates to the real life message of the story. The author’s life becomes fully illuminated.

Sandra Bornstein, an educator with four sons, was living her version of the American dream in Colorado when her peaceful and predictable life was jolted after her husband accepted a job requiring extensive international travel. Following a series of events, Sandra ended up living by herself in a 300 square foot dorm room while teaching at a world renowned international K-12 boarding school in Bangalore, India. She adapted to an unfamiliar environment, embraced her Jewish identity, and endured deteriorating health. In her memoir, May This Be the Best Year of Your Life, Sandra shares what she has learned about perseverance, travel, education, faith, and family.

Remember: leave your name in the comments. The winner of Sandra’s memoir will be chosen on Tuesday, January 22nd.

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Q&A with Sarah McCoy, author of The Baker’s Daughter

“She’d learned that the past was a blurry mosaic of right and wrong. You had to recognize your part in each…and remember. If you tried to forget, to run from the fears, the regrets and transgressions, they’d eventually hunt you down and consume your life….” ~ from THE BAKERS DAUGHTER


They say history repeats itself. More often, though, history seems mirrored in present events. Details and scenery have changed, but we, as humans, still grapple with the same convictions, the same truths.

In Sarah McCoy’s novel, THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER, the past and the present come together in El Paso, Texas in the lives of Reba Adams, a journalist, and Elsie Schmidt, a woman who came of age in Germany during World War II. When Reba sets out to write a simple story about Elsie and her German bakery, she realizes that this story will not come easy. She returns to the bakery again and again. The histories of both women unfold and reveal that, no matter the time or place, nothing in life is black and white. In every decision we make, we risk consequences, and sometimes we face tragedies. Reba and Elsie find courage, compassion, and love.

THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER is an international bestseller and is currently in the semifinals for the Goodreads Choice Awards Best Historical Fiction. If you’ve read the book and love it like I did, you can help vote THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER into the finals by clicking here.

I’m honored to host Sarah McCoy today, where she talks her novel, how she discovered the story, and the effect that writers have on readers (and vice versa). Leave your name in the comments for a chance to win a copy of THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER. The winner will be chosen on Tuesday, November 20th.

And now, welcome Sarah McCoy!

CC: In your story, memories of the holocaust and current issues facing US Border Protection come together at the counter of a small German bakery in El Paso, Texas. The two stories – of Reba and Riki, of Elsie and Josef – blend so well. What inspired your idea for the novel?

SM: I spent a portion of my childhood in Germany where my dad, a career military officer, was stationed. My husband also grew up in Germany, speaks fluent German, and worked at a restaurant that shows up in the novel–the Von Stueben– during his college holiday. So we both have ties to the German culture. Fast forward a decade, we moved to El Paso. The local magazine asked me to write a feature article on the German community. The Luftwaffe has trained fliers in the United States since 1958. In 1992, they consolidated their troops at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico, just up the road from El Paso. For the feature, I shadowed a local baker and his team at Marina’s German Bakery. Michael, the owner, graciously allowed me to interview him, his staff and customers, poke around the kitchen and come home smelling of gingerbread and cardamon. It fed my creativity, one could argue.

Not long after that article ran, I went to an El Paso farmer’s market and met an 80-year-old German woman selling her own homemade bread. I was completely smitten by her, and all that I imagined she might have experienced in her life. While picking out my brötchen, I asked how she came to be in El Paso. “I married an American soldier after the war,” she told me. Voila! Elsie, my 1945 protagonist, was born. My memories of living and traveling in Germany served as my imaginative landscape and fueled my hunger to research the country and its people during those last awful months of the World War. Teaching at the University of Texas at El Paso during that time, many of my students wrote about their fear and anxiety regarding the deportation of family and friends. I imagined many in Germany (Aryan, Jewish, etc.) felt similarly. Thus the stories wove themselves together. I didn’t start off thinking, “Oh, yes, of course, I’ll pair Germany and El Paso.”

In my books, I lean toward taking two seemingly unrelated settings, time periods and people, and weaving a grand tapestry that connects them. The only separation is time and space, like the ends of a table runner. In my reading, I find those kinds of stories the most fascinating. I try to write what I would be beating down the bookstore door to read.

CC: Several characters in The Baker’s Daughter face moral decisions, to follow the rules or follow the heart, and we read of the consequences in doing both. I was especially struck by the harsh reality of the women in the Lebensborn Program (I had never heard of such a program!), as told through the letters from Elsie’s sister, Hazel: following the rules did not guarantee anyone immunity from the pains of the war. How did you go about researching subjects like this for the novel?

SM: Again, I hate to play the “inspiration” card, but I didn’t set out to write about the Lebensborn Program. I didn’t go “researching” it. It came to me as I was gathering my landscape: the German community in 1945 Garmisch. My storytelling always begins with characters–usually having a discussion in a scene– and I can’t get their voices out of my head. This was how Elsie, Jane, Reba and Riki developed. From there, I fill in the setting of their world. One of the things I love about writing historical-contemporary hybrid fiction is that because I live in modernity, I can see and speak of things ancient people couldn’t. I have the benefit of hindsight. I’m able to pluck certain bizarre facts from the history books and ask, “What is that? Tell me more.” And then Google around for weeks until I’ve found as much information as technology has to offer on that subject. It’s a remarkable age we live in! Archives and historical data across the globe can be found if you are willing to put in the Internet surfing hours.

So when I saw a snippet about the Lebensborn Program, I stopped. I knew it had to be a part of the book. That, too, is one of my ardent goals as a writer: not just to tell a whimsical story that entertains my readers, but to educate, inform, and take them on an archeological journey that exposes some aspect of our shared human past. It goes back to that table runner analogy. Yes, we might be at the end where the tapestry is bright and new, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t a product of the thread at the sun-worn other. One day, vivid patterns will be looking down the table at us.

CC: A few months ago, you traveled to Holland for an international book tour, and, recently, you returned from the Southern Festival of Books in Nashville. How is touring and meeting readers overseas different from a book tour in the US?

SM: It isn’t that different at all. People are people no matter where you go. Yes, their names might be different but their smiles, embraces, and enthusiasm for my work is the same. I adore my Holland readers just as much as those in Nashville, New York, and San Francisco.

I feel incredibly blessed that the book has remained on the Dutch Bestsellers List since it launched in spring 2012. That blows my mind! Equally so, I was humbled to tears at an El Paso book event when a 91-year-old woman told me that THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER taught her more about the German people in WWII than she’d ever known–and she lived through the war years. Similarly, I met a Jewish woman of the same age in Holland who cried and kissed my cheeks. While I couldn’t understand the words she spoke, the emotion was so significant that I was left physically trembling. Again, I believe in the connection of our human spirits, past to present. I’ll cherish those moments for the rest of my life. It’s what fuels my writing: giving voice to the voiceless and forgotten or unknown stories.

CC: What are you reading these days?

SM: I’ve actually just returned from California, final leg of book tour for THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER. I have a contract deadline for my 3rd novel due to my publisher (Crown/RH) this summer. So I’m currently reading nonfiction books related to my 3rd book’s historical and contemporary settings. While on tour this summer and fall, I scheduled some vital research stops on both the East and West Coasts. Now home, I’m digging into those notes and the documents I obtained from the historians at each of those stops. It’s quite a bit of research reading, as you can imagine.

This being the case, I’m not reading any fiction. However, I have a stack of books from my fellow featured authors at the Booktopia Santa Cruz event: Tayari Jones’ SILVER SPARROW, Matthew Dick’s MEMOIRS OF AN IMAGINARY FRIEND, Ann Packer’s SWIM BACK TO ME, Tupelo Hassman’s GIRLCHILD, and so many more! I’ll no doubt pick up one of those when I have a break in my creative flow. Or an audiobook! I wasn’t much of an audiobook listener but being at Booktopia with narrators Simon Vance and Grover Gardner has turned me on to the idea. Their voices were just so… lovely. Simon’s narration of Hilary Mantel’s BRING UP THE BODIES is on my list. Oh dear, so many choices. I’m sure readers feel this same way!

CC: What advice can you offer writers on the rise?

SM: One of the best nuggets of wisdom I ever received came from my mom when I was seven-years-old and had been admitted to my school’s GT (Gifted & Talented) program. She told me, “You’re not ‘gifted’, honey, you’re just a high-achiever.”

As an adult I questioned why she said that. It sounds so harsh! She explained that she never wanted me to assume that opportunity and success was owed to me by virtue of talent. It’s like Albert Einstein said, “Genius is 1% talent and 99% hard work.” Such solid truth. I’m grateful my mom championed humility, drive, and perseverance rather than simply stroking my ego. I pass on that advice because it’s proactive. It puts the ball back in your court and encourages you to get ready to swing hard.

SARAH McCOY is also the author of the novel, THE TIME IT SNOWED IN PUERTO RICO. She has taught English writing at Old Dominion University and at the University of Texas at El Paso. The daughter of an Army officer, her family was stationed in Germany during her childhood. She calls Virginia home but presently lives with her husband and dog, Gilbert, in El Paso, Texas. For more about Sarah and her books, visit her website, follow her on Twitter, or subscribe to her Facebook page.

Remember: leave your name in the comments for a chance to win a copy of THE BAKER’S DAUGHTER. Random.org will choose the winner on Tuesday, November 20th.