Kristine Rudolph is the author of the new middle grade novel The Twin Stars and the Soccer Superstar. She lives in Atlanta and in Austin, Texas.
Q: What inspired you to write The Twin Stars and the Soccer Superstar, and how did you create your character Cassaty?
A: Before I wrote for kids, I took a stab at writing for adults. I have a law degree and also love true crime, so the natural path was for me to write domestic thrillers, right? Except. Gah! It turns out I am just not able to go as deep and dark as publishers and agents want. I realized I didn’t want to live in that space, mentally.
Writing a “light mystery” for younger readers was the perfect solution. The Twin Stars and the Soccer Superstar started with a “what if?’ question — “What if you are a superfan and your hero goes missing? — and evolved from there.
I have two daughters who play soccer. They are four years apart, about the difference between Cassaty and Katey in the novel. My oldest daughter is a high school senior and started playing when she was 4, so I have watched *a lot* of girls' soccer over the past fourteen years.
Watching my children develop on the field as players and witnessing how soccer has impacted their growth definitely informed my character development.
Q: The author Zachary Steele called the book a “beautifully written story about the lengths to which we will go to process grief, and the weight it carries in all that we do.” What do you think of that description?
A: Zach is a wonderful person who wrote a lovely novel called The Weight of Ashes. It’s got a real Stand By Me (the movie, not the song) feel to it. The main character is dealing with the loss of a sibling which, spoiler alert, is a big theme in my book. I love that Zach saw the parallels between our books even though they tell very different stories.
In addition to being an author and the founder of Broadleaf Writers Association, Zach is bookshop manager at the legendary Hub City. So to have him call my book "beautifully written” means the world to me.
Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?
A: I outline, but I always outline in a rough form leaving lots of room for me to get to know my characters better. With this book, I really kind of started with the ending and worked backward. So, yes, I knew how it would end when I started typing. The “soccer superstar,” Katey Korey, was very vivid in my mind’s eye, and I knew exactly how she would behave at the novel’s end.
I usually have a solid sense of a book’s beginning and ending when I take pen to paper to outline. It’s that messy middle, though, that gets me every time!
Q: What do you hope readers take away from the book?
A: In his book, Booktalk: Occasional Writing on Literature and Children, children’s author Aidan Chambers develops the idea of an author’s second self.
It’s a really interesting concept. He argues that many books for children feature a character who is there to say the things the author would say if he or she were in the story.
Because children’s literature features mischief, shenanigans or just plain immaturity, an author needs to insert a reasonable foil. Think about some of your favorite children’s books and I would wager you can come up with a few examples.
In this book, Cassaty’s sister Amelia is the author’s second self. She is the truth-teller. Throughout the novel she is encouraging the others to live authentically and to let themselves feel their feelings instead of trying to paper over them.
My great hope is that Amelia will resonate with my readers and they will feel slightly less bound to expectation, both real and perceived, when they finish the last page.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I am trying to find a publishing home for a book I adore, called Myra & Birdie, which is historical and contemporary and brings the Orly airport tragedy to young readers.
The crash at Orly had profound implications for the city I live in, Atlanta, and left 33 children orphaned. But these kids’ grief was really papered over and there is precious little written about Orly. I really want to get this story out there.
As for writing, I am in the early stages of a political novel involving high school debate and First Amendment issues. Timely, right?
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: My aunt and uncle live in Fredericksburg, Texas, which is the real city on which my fictional town of Barons Creek is based. Fredericksburg is a magical place with loads of history. It was settled by Germans and still retains elements of that heritage.
The dance hall in the book, Russell Hall, is based on Luckenbach, Texas, the site of a very famous dance hall. My aunt’s father made Luckenbach famous and she’s kept his spirit alive in the town, so it’s really fun to honor that legacy in this way.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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