Questions for the Author

Leta & Elissa’s questions (two teenage sisters):

Q. Did you model any of your characters on real people?

A. Simple answer – no. I can’t help but think, though, that unconsciously traits of people I’ve known or read about have worked their ways into my characters.

Q. When you wrote The Purloined Boy did you write the chapters in order or did you jump around?

A. I wrote them in order, but during revision and rewriting I was forced to jump around in order to keep the story consistent. Revising one thing meant revising six things.
I write from an outline. I know where the story is going. I do occasionally get surprised along the way. Sometimes an association or a plot twist will open up a whole range of possible narrative choices. At such times I must make difficult decisions. The two criteria I use are: what would “so and so” do here? – meaning the character in question; and, will this choice lead the reader to where I see the story going?

Q. What was your first inspiration for the book? Was it an image? An experience?

A. It was an image. I think visually. Really, the whole thing came from the picture of a person by a hole with light streaming out of it. I knew the person was deliberating whether to pass through the hole or not. That gave rise to a whole series of questions: where is the hole?, how did the person get there?, where does the hole lead? When I started answering those questions, before you knew it, I had an outline for a story.

Q. Who’s your favorite character and why?

A. That’s a tough question! I like them all – even the bad guys. Not that I’d like to know them or spend time with them, I like them because I find them interesting or amusing.
Who would I like as a friend? Trevor’s friends in the story are the people I’d like to have as friends. Maggie, Epictetus, Zephyr and Mother Root are all great. Who was the most fun to write about? It’s a toss up between Zephyr and Mother Root. I suppose I like writing about them because they’re quirky, mysterious, and supernatural.

Q. Why is Zephyr a mouse?

A. This question comes up a lot. There’s a lot I could say. But I’ll keep it simple. From the stand point of the story – when Trevor finds himself in the Pantry – it just made sense to me that a mouse would have to rescue him. If not a mouse, then what? – a cockroach?

Q. Why did you call the group of good guys the “Venerable Guild of the Sun-Eaters? What’s the significance of eating the sun?”

A. That’s a question that opens up a whole set of issues!
It’s hard to answer that without giving away the whole story. But just let me remind you of where Trevor ends his journey. Remember? Hint, hint.

Q. What new and/or important thing are you trying to say? What are you trying to contribute to the literary world?

A. You can’t answer a question like that without sounding really pretentious.
I wanted to tell a good story – a good story in the full sense of the word “good.” I wanted to tell a tale that was entertaining, enriching, and well-crafted.

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Eli’s Questions (a ten year old boy):

Q. How did you decide on bogeymen out of all the scary things you could write about?

A. I’m not really sure. I guess a big reason is that while everybody seems to know what they are they don’t show up in many fairy tales or fantasy stories. That’s good for a couple of reasons – first, I don’t have to spend time explaining what a bogey is to the reader. Everyone already has a mental image. Second, my story doesn’t have to distinguish itself from other stories the way it would if I had used trolls or goblins.
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Besides, the word “bogeyman” just sounds funny and I thought the notion of children being stolen and eaten was so scary it needed a little comic relief.

Q. Why did you decide that Zephyr would be able to glow in the dark?

A. I can think of two reasons. First, there was the practical problem of Trevor being able to see Zephyr in a pitch black room. Remember, the first time Trevor meets the mouse he is in the bogey’s Pantry and there are no lights. Making him glow solved that problem. Second, I wanted readers to have a hint of where Zephyr comes from. Can you guess where?

Q. Could the tree move around when it fought the bogeymen? Were its roots still attached?

A. Good question! The Troth – that’s the name of the tree, remember? – didn’t need to move to fight. It could blaze forth and send out shoots of consuming fire against the enemies of the Guild. Once, long ago, it did just that! That’s why the bogeys are so afraid of it.

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Brent’s Questions (a twenty something graduate of The University of
Connecticut with honors):

Q. We readers love to get caught up in the world of a story, sometimes almost forgetting the world to which we’ll return when the story ends or the phone rings. Does the same thing happen to you as an author while you’re in the process of creating a story?

A. Yes. Definitely. I have a sense that I am journeying to a real place when I write. Writing down what I see is hard work but I get so lost in it the hours fly by. I usually write in the morning and it is not uncommon to look up and see the clock read 11:30 and wonder where the time has gone. It is very gratifying to see my stories read and enjoyed by others but I think that I would write for my own pleasure even if no one else read them.


Q. Is there anything that you hope your readers will take with them when they leave the world of your story and return to the “real world?”

A. As I’ve said before, that’s a hard question to answer without sounding pretentious. But I do hope people will be enriched by the experience. I think reading allows you to enter the mind of another person – something like what happens at the Feast of the Fresh Fish in The Purloined Boy. Hopefully, people enjoy the trip and take away a few treasures.

Q. Do you think that a story makes a young imagination grow, or does it just use what is already there?

A. Thought provoking question! I have two answers.
First, at one level I am inclined to say that it makes the imagination grow – if by grow one means expand. There is a notion – promulgated by flat-headed, sensible, bean-counter types – that stories are a waste of time and children ought to be directed toward more practical pursuits, like filing manila folders or using a calculator, I guess.

I‘ve known a lot of practical people who know how to do those things, and only those things. They’re useful people, but I would never want to change places with them. I would hate to live in the tight confines of such minds.

Imagination is defended sometimes by saying it makes you a better leader, or communicator, or problem solver – but such justifications only reinforce the primacy of the bean-counter world-view. Even if an imagination stretched by good stories did nothing more than make one’s mind more livable – they would be worth writing and reading.

Second, at a more philosophical level, I think stories work with what is already in the mind in some sense. I’m a bit of a Platonist here. The reason we relate to stories is because they speak to us about things we already know about in some way. The word “educate” means “to draw out.” Knowledge in this view is latent.

Looking at it this way, I think, means that stories both make the mind grow and use what is already there. Think of a seed. For the seed to grow it must “be there.” The seed is real and exist prior to the growth. The reading of a story waters and nourishes the seed and helps it to grow. Just how far this goes is hard to say. Do the images themselves already exist in the mind, or are they introduced from the outside?

I believe they already exist. Yet, we in some sense make them. It is a paradox. I think that’s one thing Tolkien was getting at in his story, Leaf by Niggle.

Q. Does your book have a family tree of things that have influenced it? What’s in the family tree of your book? Other books, other people, personal experiences?

A. Another great question. I have read some great books – these inspire me. I wish there were more like them. I feel there is a shortage of the sort of books I like to read.

Besides fiction I can see a number of thinkers in my work. Plato is big. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of the “Father of Philosophy” will see him in my stories. The Stoics are there too – especially Epictetus. The Bible is big for me. Augustine is huge. On a contemporary note, the social historian Christopher Lasch has been a big influence. More generally the Medieval project of creating a synthesis of all knowledge intrigues me.

When it come to the art of story telling, there are writers I admire but I really don’t see a direct influence on my story telling style – writers such as Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, G. K. Chesterton, George MacDonald, and Dorothy Sayers. I like their stories very much, but I can’t tell stories the way they do.

I don’t try to sound like anyone, really. I try to tell a story in a way that feels right. I do see some similarities in my style with Roald Dahl and R. L. Stine, though.

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Amy Park’s Questions (a graduate of Wheaton College in Literature
and mother of three):

Q. How do you handle a multi-part work (when you know it will be a trilogy)? Do you know where the characters and plot will go in each book? Do you try to plant a few clues in the first books as to what will happen?

A. I work from an outline and have a pretty good idea where a story is going. I do stumble on some surprises as I write, but I don’t let the story meander. The trick is keeping the needs of the plot and the development of the characters in a mutually enriching relationship. Plots should go somewhere and characters should develop but they should not do either at the expense of the other.

Stories are not constructed like building blocks though. They are woven. In the process combinations of ideas and dialog will open up some possibilities you didn’t think of. Often the new possibilities can enrich the tale in ways you couldn’t foresee.

We’re pretty big on stories in the Clay household. Sometimes at the dinner table I will have each of my children pick a person, place, or thing then each of us must weave a story on the spot which includes each of those elements. I have also told improvised stories to my children at bedtime in serial form over the course of several days. I’ve devised little short cuts and plot structures that have helped me pull even the wildest stories together into a coherent narrative while making them up as I go.

Concerning the idea of planting things in stories that receive later development. Believe it or not, I don’t do it intentionally. Usually things are put into the story and they develop on their own, you might say. If something is truly important at one point in the story, it will be later on – but it may be in ways you couldn’t see when you first introduced it.

Q. Where did you come up with some of your names (specifically, Epictetus, Paracelsus, and Icabod)?

A. Naming characters can be tricky. Sometimes it is obvious to me what someone should be named. “Maggie” just felt right, at the same time I knew her real name was Abigail. Some names go through several generations. “Mother Root” was originally “Mother Blackberry,” then she was “Mother Wildberry” – finally I determined it should be “Mother Root.” Mother Root is definitely the right name for her.

Epictetus was easy. I’ve taught philosophy at the undergraduate level for years. Epictetus is my favorite Stoic philosopher. I really modeled the character on him. Paracelsus was a real alchemist – so he was easy.

Icabod was different. At first I wanted him to be a source of wisdom, so his original name was Aristotle. But as I told the story I saw that I was just reinventing Epictetus – and there was only room for one Epictetus in the story. I also grew in my understanding of just what the Guild was and of the crisis that lurked in the background and just who this character was in relationship to that crisis.

That’s when I realized that this character was not wise – quite the opposite – he represented lost wisdom, or forgotten wisdom. Then naming him Icabod was simple. In fact, I don’t think there is a better name I could possibly have given him.