Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch is the author of the new middle grade novel Kidnapped from Ukraine: Under Attack. Her other books include Winterkill. She lives in Brantford, Ontario.
Q: What inspired you to write Kidnapped from Ukraine: Under Attack, and how did you create your characters Rada and Dariia?
A: Everything that Rada and Dariia experience is based on documented accounts of civilians who lived in Mariupol when the Russians attacked. The girls’ characters are inspired by real people that I have met, as well as myself and my own older sister, who is only 18 months older than me.
Q: In the book’s Author’s Note, you write, “I never thought I would write a book about a war as it was happening.” Can you say more about that?
A: I initially felt that it was too soon to write about it because the war isn’t over. But then I realized it was my moral responsibility to shed light. The people who are living through this war are surviving hour by hour. They can’t stop what they’re doing and write a book.
But this is a David and Goliath situation. Russia is 28 times the size of Ukraine and Putin’s goal is to erase a nation, and if he’s successful, he’ll erase another, and another. My book gives the perspective of a family living through this.
Q: How did you research the novel, and what did you learn that especially surprised you?
A: While people have shared their stories with me, the details of their experiences are not mine to share in a novel. However, those conversations inspired the personalities of my characters.
For day-to-day events, I relied on a wide variety of first-person narratives, testimony, and day to day newspaper accounts, including The New York Times, the Kyiv Independent, the Kyiv Post, the Moscow Times, Reuters, and Meduza.
What surprised me? The sheer inventiveness and audacity of individual Ukrainians who decided to fight the Goliath in any way that they could didn’t surprise me, but it really stood out.
Q: What do you hope readers take away from the book, and what do you see looking ahead for Ukraine?
A: Empathy. Also, the knowledge that ignoring the war will just make it grow.
As to what’s ahead for Ukraine: they will win, because the alternative for the free world is unimaginable.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I’m writing a medieval novel that may or may not be a trilogy.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: My website is calla.com and I update it frequently.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch.
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