Aug. 2

 

 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
Aug. 2, 1924: James Baldwin born.

Q&A with Katie Hafner

 

Photo by Christopher Michel

 

 

Katie Hafner is the author of the new novel The Boys. Her other books include Mother Daughter Me. Her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including The New York Times and Esquire. She lives in San Francisco.

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Boys, and how did you create your character Ethan?

 

A: In the summer of 2017, I was on a bike trip in Scandinavia with my daughter. It was one of those trips where they take your luggage from one destination to the next, and you stay in really nice hotels and eat delicious food.

 

During one of those delicious meals, one of the guides told a story that I found intriguing, and so did my daughter, because she said, “Mom, that’s a novel.” And so I wrote it. I knew only the barest of facts and let my imagination take it from there.

 

I knew I wanted the main character to be a man -- an anxious man who hasn’t integrated very successfully with the outside world. Then I just let him develop from there.

 

Q: The writer Laura Zigman said of the book, “Hafner is a wry and wise explorer of the secrets buried deep in our most intimate relationships.” What do you think of that description, and how would you describe the relationships in the novel?

 

A: One of my main goals was to get the reader to connect with the characters by watching the characters connect with one another. I also wanted all the relationships in the book to originate with Ethan, in a hub-and-spokes way.

 

So, I created relationships for him that would help him connect to the wider world, the most important being with Barb, his wife, who's empathic and outgoing. She becomes Ethan's sturdiest spoke. It's Barb who shows Ethan that intimacy and connection needn't be dangerous, and can be wonderful and rewarding. 

That central Ethan-Barb relationship plants the seeds for more connection in Ethan's life. Tragically, so deep is Ethan's bond with the two boys he and Barb foster that he drives Barb away. And yet....

 

Q: Did you know how the book would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: I knew generally how it would end but I got stuck on just how to pull it off. There had to be a plausible ending, and filling in the gaps with just the right particulars was a challenge. I hope you think it works!

 

Q: The novel is set in the Philadelphia area, and also in Italy. How important is setting to you in your writing?

 

A: Setting is super important to me. I chose Philly because I wanted an East Coast location, and although I’m not from Philly, my husband went to undergrad and medical school there, and when I was working on the book my daughter was living there.

 

There’s a key role played by the Mütter Museum in Philly, which was another reason to set it there.

 

I also wanted to find just the right house for Ethan and Barb to live in, and I found it in west Philly. My husband and I were admiring the house from the outside one day when the owners came walking up the street, and they gave us a tour.

 

Italy is important as a setting because it’s such a magical place: the hills, the villages, and the little churches everywhere. So I set Ethan and Barb’s honeymoon there in the first half of the book, then had Ethan repeat the trip with the boys, as he tries to recapture the magic.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: A few things:

 

I’m getting back to a book I started in 2015, which has a story I really love. It’s a low-key (no one is threatening to blow up the world) science thriller. But the plot is very intricate, the story multi-layered.

 

When I started that book, I realized it was a lot to take on as a first novel, so when the plot for The Boys fell into my lap, with a much cleaner narrative line, I put the first book aside. I think I’m ready now to take it on.

 

I’m also very busy with the podcast I produce, Lost Women of Science, which we publish in partnership with Scientific American.

 

And I’m working on a collection of essays about taking up the game of golf later in life in order to spend more time with my husband. Strange, I know.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Katie Hafner.

Q&A with Pablo Trincia

 

 

 

Pablo Trincia is the author of the book All the Lies They Did Not Tell: The True Story of Satanic Panic in an Italian Community. The book is now available in an English translation by Elettra Pauletto. Trincia is a journalist whose work includes the podcast Veleno. He is based in Italy.

 

Q: How did you first learn about the story you write about in All the Lies They Did Not Tell, and at what point did you decide to write this book?

 

A: I was looking for a cold case to work on for a podcast series, when a friend showed me this article about Lorena Covezzi, a mother who'd recently been acquitted 16 years after being accused of running a satanic paedophile ring with her husband. Their four children had been taken away and sent to other foster families.

 

When I first talked to her, Lorena told me that many other children from her community had been taken away from their families by the social services behind weird and unsubstantiated allegations. That really triggered my interest.

 

Q: How did you research the book, and what did you learn that especially surprised you?

 

A: I've been obsessed with this story for many years. It's so bizarre and the more I dug into the stories of the families involved it got more and more dark. I had no idea that you could create false memories in somebody's mind, up to the point where the relationship between a mother and her child can be hopelessly broken.

 

Q: You've said, “I quickly realized that this was not a story about pedophilia or Satanism...It was much bigger than that.” How did you come to that realization, and what do you think the story was really about?

 

A: I believe this story is really about a large group of professionals - psychologists, doctors, judges, prosecutors - who believe in an ideology full of conspiracy theories about satanic groups that kidnap and kill children, even though very often there is no evidence to back up their beliefs.

 

The problem is that often these people are part of a network of organizations that operate in welfare and tribunals, and can therefore directly impact on many children's and their families' lives.

 

Q: What do you hope people take away from the book?

 

A: I hope people understand that a biased mind is dangerous, and that we need to use international guidelines on how to talk to children. Science always has to win over conspiracy theories.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I'm working on many podcast projects; my podcast and book on the sinking of cruise ship Costa Concordia has been recently released and now I'm working on other ideas.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Even though the events took place in Italy, I think it will appeal to American readers because similar events have happened in America – look at the McMartin preschool trial, for example. My book will interest readers who are fascinated by conspiracy theories, cults, false memories, and other Satanic Panic stories.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Lester Blum

 

 

Lester Blum is the author of the new book The Spirit of Ruchel Leah. It focuses on his family's story. His other books include the children's picture book Beyond the Swirl. He is also a photographer and playwright.

 

Q: Why did you decide to write this book?

 

A: When my grandmother died, my aunt gave my father a stack of letters and postcards written by another aunt, Ruchel Leah, from Poland which my grandmother had saved. My father felt compelled to bring her Holocaust story to the world. To that end, he began translating the letters which had been written mostly in Yiddish with a few in Polish and Russian.

 

Once he had the letters translated, we discussed that the letters themselves only touched the surface of the story. I told him that I would try putting it all together into a book so that people would understand the struggles, anguish, and courage of Ruchel Leah, her husband, Anschel, children – Elka and Surcha and her brother, Moshe before they disappeared in the horrors of the Holocaust.

 

Upon his demise it was our legacy - my sister, Elaine A. Blum and I - to research the explanatory information to formulate The Spirit of Ruchel Leah so that the reading audience could understand what many endured during and after the Holocaust.

 

The book is a tribute to his wishes to remember all who were lost in the Holocaust.

 

Q: How did you research the book and what did you learn that especially surprised you?

 

A: Research was akin to taking multiple directions to arrive at a set location. Elaine and I embarked on a diverse journey of investigation ranging from genealogy research to an exploratory trip to Poland, to the pursuit of archives located in the United States, United Kingdom, France, Israel, and Poland.

 

To place the letters into the proper historical context, we first investigated the social, economic and political milieu that gave rise to the restrictive United States 1924 Immigration Act and the Act, itself, that sealed the family’s fate. We also exposed the partisan workings necessary to move the system in favor of granting individual visa requests.

 

Secondly, we worked to gain a thorough understanding of the course of the war placing the letters within the historical context as it impacted the family’s flight from the small village of Goworowo to Belarus and the ultimate assumed resolution of the fate of the family and extended family.

 

Thirdly, we researched aspects of the potential fates of family and extended family in Poland/Belarus and France—ghettos, deportations, extermination camps, work camps, partisan groups, Siberian Labor Camps, illegal immigration to Palestine, Cyprus detention camps, and displaced persons camps.

 

To do so, we perused many books, visa records, passenger manifests, archives with deportation and camp information, illegal immigration routes and agencies to Palestine, and any documentation that related to facts mentioned in the letters.

 

We investigated and explored all historical and genealogical information available on the shtetl, Goworowo, as it pertained to all the players mentioned in both Ruchel Leah’s letters as well as those in the post-war letters from extended family.

As our research process progressed, we increased our knowledge of the resources and various archives available which could enable us to fill in the missing pieces of our story. We also realized that in light of the lack of some definitive answers, informed conclusions were required.

 

The research resulted in The Spirit of Ruchel Leah presenting a microcosm of Holocaust experiences.

 

Q: How much did you know about the family history as you were growing up?

 

A: As we were growing up, we knew the basic story of Ruchel Leah. We knew that when the rest of the family immigrated to the United States in 1930, Ruchel Leah, her husband, daughters and brother, Moshe, remained in Poland. When the Germans invaded Poland, we knew that they had fled east and ultimately, they all disappeared during the Holocaust.

 

At various times, my father would tell us stories of their life in the village, such as when Ruchel Leah at age 16 was arrested by the Polish police, accused of being a Russian collaborator during the Soviet occupation of the village in the Polish-Soviet War of 1919-1921.

 

That was the total extent of our knowledge until my father began translating the letters. More questions arose as each letter was read. Our understanding and knowledge of this portion of the family history began to expand.

 

Q: What do you see as Ruchel Leah’s legacy today, and what do you hope readers take away from the book?

 

A: The legacy of Ruchel Leah is one of courage, strength and resiliency in the face of unparalleled odds. Although women generally were perceived to hold the role of caring and nurturing the families, the reality was they were often the backbone of the family in addition to their “traditional” role. It was their strength and courage that worked to preserve the families during the travesties of war.

 

We would like the reader to take away an understanding of a portion of the history of the Holocaust and the concept of maintaining one’s strength and courage in the face of adversity.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: Work on a book is not completed once it has been published. Another job begins – that of marketing and promoting the book so that the message reaches a wider audience. To that end, I am working, in collaboration with award-winning director Vladimir Rios, on a documentary film about The Spirit of Ruchel Leah.

 

I am also in the preliminary conceptual stages of a middle school level book set during the Holocaust using the characters originally created in my children’s book, Beyond the Swirl. This story will incorporate research from The Spirit of Ruchel Leah.

 

Elaine is currently working on a book of essays augmented by my photographs taken during our trip to Poland about the “corridor of death” during the period between the Soviet evacuation and the German takeover of a sector of Poland in 1940 and the remains of the shtetls of Poland. She is also finalizing a book collating both our matriarchal and patriarchal genealogies going back to the early 1800s.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I believe that it is extremely important for this generation to understand all aspects of the history of the Holocaust. Perhaps with knowledge of the past we can prevent any repetition for future generations.

 

The world is currently in a precarious situation with hate being prevalent in many areas. The war in Ukraine is reminiscent of what transpired in 1939-1945 – innocents being murdered, massive populations being displaced, widespread hunger and statelessness.

 

Never forget! Never again!

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Maya Sonenberg

 

 

Maya Sonenberg is the author of the new story collection Bad Mothers, Bad Daughters. Her other books include the story collection Cartographies, and her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Fairy Tale Review and Web Conjunctions. She teaches in the creative writing program of the University of Washington, and she lives in Seattle.

 

Q: Over how long a period did you write the stories in Bad Mothers, Bad Daughters?

 

A: The stories in Bad Mothers, Bad Daughters were written over about a dozen years, the last completed almost two years ago. I’m a slow writer! But I also hope that expanse of time allowed me to include stories about mothers, daughters, fathers, and sons at different stages of the lives and relationships.

 

Q: How did you decide on the order in which they would appear in the collection?

 

A: I ordered the stories in a very loose progression based on the ages of the characters. In the first story, while the narrator has children already, she also spends a lot of time looking back at herself as a child. Stories toward the end include grandmother figures. I also considered the rhythmic placing of longer and shorter stories.

 

Q: How was the book's title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: The title of the book comes from one of the stories, “Bad Mother: A Story in Five Paragraphs.”

While writing these stories, I was highly aware that they focused on mothers and daughters in complex relationships, experiencing uneasy emotions, but only when it was time to title the entire collection did I see that particular story and the idea of the “bad” mother or daughter as central to the book.

 

That story showcases many of the shared qualities of these stories—not only the focus on the “bad”—or really, not so bad—mother/daughter, but the use of inventive forms (“Bad Mother” uses the form of the five paragraph essay) and the use of what Kate Bernheimer has called a fairy tale feel, even when the stories don’t retell specific tales.

 

Q: The writer Jedediah Berry said of the book, “These visions of mothers and daughters--broken, breaking, seeking, striving--stick in the mind even as they open the heart.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I love it, of course, especially its shout out to both the mind and the heart. Addressing and appealing to both of those is always important to me as a writer. And Jedediah Berry is one of my favorite writers, so I’m incredibly grateful that he liked this book.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I seem to have three or four projects cooking now.

 

I’m working on a series of personal essays related to the work of choreographer Merce Cunningham.

 

I’m working on a book of miniatures, containing family photos, essays about the miniature, and bits of memoir.

 

I’m working on a longish fairy tale-ish story about an old woman and a black fox that is growing out of “No Place Safer,” the collaboration I did with writer and artist Ellen Santasiero on the website 7x7.

 

On the back burner is a book about my complex love for Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books and my grandmother as an immigrant “pioneer.”

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Alan Gratz

 

 

 

Alan Gratz is the author of the new middle grade graphic novel Captain America: The Ghost Army. His many other books include the middle grade novel Ground Zero. He lives in Asheville, North Carolina.

 

Q: You write that you've been a big superhero fan since childhood. What inspired the creation of this new graphic novel featuring Captain America?

A: One of my first attempts at getting published—long before I was writing novels for young readers—was schlepping comic book scripts around to show to editors at comic conventions. My career ended up taking a different path—a happy and successful one!—but one that looked like it might take me away from comics forever.

 

Then I saw that Marvel and Scholastic were teaming up to create superhero graphic novels for middle grade readers, and I saw my chance! But what character should I pitch to them? I immediately thought of Captain America, and his sidekick Bucky Barnes.

Q: Why did you decide to set the story during the World War II era?

A: I've already written a number of books about World War II for middle grade readers—Prisoner B-3087, Projekt 1065, Refugee, Grenade, Allies. That made Cap's World War II exploits a perfect match! And he's so much more famous now for his post-World War II adventures that I felt like it gave me a lot of room to play with his past.

 

As to why I love writing about World War II, especially for young readers, there's a real clear good-guys and bad-guys aspect to that war. Like, the more you read and learn about Nazi Germany, the worse it is. They had to be stopped. The people and nations of the world sacrificed a lot to do it, but defeating the Nazis was worth it.

 

That's the kind of black and white situation I really respond to—and I think middle grade readers do too.

I was also really excited to be able to work in a neat piece of World War II history that I hadn't yet found a way to use in one of my prose novels: the U.S. "Ghost Army." The Ghost Army was a real U.S. WWII unit made up of artists, actors, sound engineers, and advertising professionals.

 

Their job was to trick the Axis powers into thinking we had more people and equipment than we really had. They created inflatable tanks that looked real from the air, fake radio transmissions that included false information, and audio recordings of troop movements to mislead enemy soldiers.

 

Cap and Bucky meet the U.S. Ghost Army, and end up fighting alongside them. And of course, because this is a superhero comic, they end up fighting a literal ghost army too!

Q: What do you think of Brent Schoonover's illustrations?

A: They're terrific! Brent has a style that is both modern and classic at the same time. That modernity makes it look natural and realistic, and its classic look gives it sharp, clear lines and a retro comic feel. He's the real hero of this book, because he's somehow able to squeeze in the 20 different things I've written into the back of a panel and still make it look good!

Q: You write, "I love Cap because he's proud to wear the Stars and Stripes, but isn't a rah-rah cheerleader for everything the United States does. Captain America instead represents what we Americans aspire to be: courageous yet humble, just but kind, and steadfastly loyal to our friends and allies." What do you think he stands for in this polarized era?

A: Maybe the hope and vision of America? I don't want to say, "What America once was," because we've always been flawed. The United States has made plenty of mistakes. What country hasn't? There's no way to be perfect.

 

But Cap is a living, breathing human being who actively embodies one of my favorite Maya Angelou quotes: "Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better." I hope that's what our country is, and will continue to be. 

Q: What are you working on now?

A: My next prose novel is called Two Degrees, and is the story of three young people surviving the effects of climate change in the present day: a girl surviving wildfires in the Sierra Nevadas, another girl surviving a hurricane in Miami, and two boys trying to escape a polar bear in Churchill, Manitoba! That book is due out in fall of 2022.

 

We're also working on a graphic novel version of Refugee, which I'm very excited about!

Q: Anything else we should know?

A: Marvel's been a blast to work with. Right from the start, they encouraged me to connect my story to Marvel comic book continuity in as many ways as I could. So long-time fans will find some Easter eggs in the book.

 

At the same time, I worked really hard to make sure it was equally fun for someone picking up their first Marvel comic. I hope Captain America: The Ghost Army makes all readers want to go read more Marvel comics!

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Aug. 1

 

 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
Aug. 1, 1819: Herman Melville born.