Q&A with James Ponti

 

Photo by Elena Seibert Photography

 

 

James Ponti is the author of the new middle grade novel City Spies: Mission Manhattan, the fifth in his City Spies series. He lives in Orlando, Florida.

 

Q: Why did you decide to focus on Manhattan in your  latest City Spies novel?

 

A: Without getting into too many spoilers, the key was actually the combination of Manhattan and Washington, D.C., which are both featured in the book.

 

There are things that happen during the story that require some of the team members to take matters into their own hands. I wanted two major cities that were close enough together that there were plenty of options for how a group of teens could get from one to the other on their own.

 

But I also wanted cities that felt very different from each other. New York and D.C. fit that bill and it doesn’t hurt that they happen to be two of my favorite places to visit.

 

The book kicks off in Venice, which was ideal because of some of the environmental themes in the story. (And because, it meant my wife and I got to go there.)

 

Q: In our previous Q&A, you said, “There are five kids on the City Spies team and the biggest challenge I have as a writer is making sure that each gets the proper amount of attention in every book.” How did that work out in this latest installment of the series? 

 

A: It actually got more complicated because now there are SIX! And if anyone’s seen the Broadway show about the wives of Henry VIII, you know that can be a lot of competing storylines.

 

The beauty of the situation is that at its heart City Spies is a story about what makes a family. With six we have an even number, so we can tell three independent relationship stories. The fact that, unlike the others, the newest member is Mother’s biological child brings these themes to the forefront.

Q: How did you research this novel, and what did you learn that particularly surprised you?

 

A: The best part of the job is the research, which for this book included everything from speaking to a scientist on a satellite phone in the Amazon to walking the streets of Venice.

 

I visited each place in the book (except for MI6 headquarters because, you know, secrecy). I walked where they walked to get a feel for everything, which included seeing Kat’s bird’s-eye view from the tower at the top of Piazza San Marco, sneaking around the abandoned Iranian embassy in Washington, and getting a special behind the scenes tour of the New York Public Library, the global shrine to kid lit.

 

My favorite factoid from the trip is that the bookshelves in the stacks aren’t just functional, they’re structural and literally hold up the building.

 

Q: What were some of the ideas that inspired the plot of the novel?

 

A: Many of the young readers I meet are interested in the environment. I think it’s because it’s something they can see and impact as opposed to many of the political issues they hear about, that are more abstract to their worldview.

 

I wanted to have this as an element of the story and I was truly inspired by the dozens of notable teen activists working to fight environmental issues around the world. The best known is Greta Thunberg, but there are many others who are doing amazing things.

 

One thing I noticed about them is that in many ways, they mirrored my characters, coming from around the world and countries big and small. It’s always a challenge to figure out why MI6 is sending this team instead of adults and the idea of protecting one of these teen environmentalists felt organic.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: My new series, The Sherlock Society, debuts Sept. 3, so I am tidying up the final bits and pieces of that, while I’m also finishing up a draft of a manuscript for City Spies 6, and spit-balling ideas for Sherlock book 2. (Two books a year is both fun and daunting; perhaps it’s a good thing that all of the sports teams I root for had horrible years so I wasn’t distracted.)

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: As I said, to me these books are about family, so it seems worth pointing out that there was a very surprising development in my family this year.

 

I always had an unusual background in that I was born in Italy and never met my father. The unusual family that I had inspired the dynamic of the family in City Spies.

 

Well, this year, a niece in Italy found me and overnight I got eight new half-siblings. As we begin to establish relationships, it’s affecting how I write the City Spies team. What makes a family indeed.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with James Ponti.