That Middle-Grade Voice by Kell Andrews

The long and the short:
Character sketch for a chapter-book-
turned-picture-book-turned-
middle-grade story

By the time I was middle-grade age, I wanted to be a writer, but for grownups. It was only as a grownup that I found my voice writing for middle grade.

I've been thinking about that since a tweet from agent Sarah LaPolla (whom I've never queried but I like her Twitter feed):

Observation: The line between Adult & MG is much blurrier than the line between Adult & YA. The POV & writing style seem less rigid in MG.
— Sarah LaPolla (@sarahlapolla) May 16, 2014

It's not a coincidence I moved from writing for adults straight past YA to middle grade. Those were the books that made me love reading, and it turned out that I have a middle-grade voice.

Not-blurry middle-grade voice

So what's middle-grade voice? It's elusive -- one of those "you know it when you see it" things. You know it whether it's Lemony Snicket's wry, formal omniscient or Rachel Renee Russell's effusive, run-on first person. And while the lines might be blurry, middle-grade voice itself never is. It's crystal clear and succinct -- no words wasted, whether lyrical or comedic, prose or verse.

And once you have that voice, it's a bit persistent.
 

The long story of a short story

Once I decided to write middle-grade, I wrote two novels. (The second written  turned out to be Deadwood, which releases June 24 from Spencer Hill, and the first of which has not yet decided what it will turn out to be). Then I had a great idea for younger story -- a chapter book featuring second-graders. The draft was 6,000 words, and I loved it. But I was between agents, and my querying efforts yielded exactly zero agent requests -- chapter books are not great agent bait. My single request, actually, was from an editor in an early reader/chapter book imprint who found the voice (third person, whimsical) to be charming but the story too thin for 6,000 words.

I realized that my chapter book wasn't really a chapter book -- it was a picture book. I started with a blank page, chose first person, present tense, changed the age of the characters to first grade, and wrote the story in 850 words. Still loved it -- my favorite story that I'd written.

This time when I queried the story as a picture book, I got an agent offer of representation. On the phone, I told her about my middle grade novels too. She said, "I can tell. Your picture book kind of sounds middle grade."

I chose a different agent and we subbed a different book. But I didn't forget my favorite story. Eventually I rewrote it featuring third-graders and finally sold it as an early middle-grade short story. Which is what it was meant to be all along.

Middle-grade voice is varied. It isn't a length or a genre -- it managed to assert itself as strongly in my 1,000-word contemporary story as in my 60,000 word fantasy/mystery. And if I ever write for grown-ups again, I'm going to have to hope they're looking for a little bit of (not-blurry) middle-grade whimsy. 

Villains and Not-Quite-Villains

The late, great Sid Fleishman said, “The stronger the villain, the stronger the story.” 

Some of the Project Mayhem bloggers have been touching on villains and heroes (click on the "Heroes & Villains in Middle Grade Literature" link down in the right-hand column for more posts). I thought I'd share some thoughts on villains and not-quite-villains.

Use Your Villain

On the surface, this may sound obvious. The whole point of a villain is to make your hero’s life difficult, right? But I’ve found that it’s sometimes easy to forget about the villain when you’re focused on the hero’s actions. The villain sets something in motion and then disappears.

If you get stuck in your writing and can’t figure out what happens next, try checking in with your villain. Is he sitting around, waiting for your hero to act? No! He should be actively trying to thwart your hero, plotting new complications and distractions. Realizing this can be the push you need to get past a slow spot.

I found this helpful for my middle grade historical mystery, The Eyes of Pharaoh. The heroine, Seshta, had done everything she could to track down her missing friend. I couldn't think of a thing for her to do next. But she had tipped off the bad guy while hunting for him. When I realized that would mean the villain was actively plotting against her, I had the inspiration for several big action scenes leading to the dramatic climax.

Not every book has an actual villain, of course. But if you don’t have one, consider adding one. Even if it’s not necessary for the main plot, a villain could add drama as a subplot.

Example: In the Haunted series, each book’s main plot involves Jon and Tania trying to help the ghosts. In book one, I created a minor secondary character, a fake psychic who calls herself Madam Natasha. In The Riverboat Phantom, Madam Natasha figures out that Tania can see ghosts – something Tania desperately wants to keep secret. Madam Natasha uses the secret as a threat, as she demands that the kids share information about the ghosts and give her credit for helping them. In The Knight in the Shadows, the kids go to war with Madam Natasha, determined to expose her as a fraud. This is still secondary to trying to help the ghost, but it adds challenges and emotional drama.

Whether your villain is involved in the main plot or a subplot, he or she doesn’t have to be a diabolical evil genius. He can be a bully at school, a competitor on a sports team, a nasty boss, or even a manipulative sibling or friend. Whatever the “villain” is, his job is to make your hero’s life miserable.

Exercise: look over your work in progress. Do you have a major villain? If so, is the villain as active as possible, aggressively trying to stop, hurt, or kill your hero?

Do you have secondary characters with villainous tendencies? Can you enhance these, so they cause even more trouble?

If you have no villain at all, brainstorm ways to add one.

Villains should also be well-rounded. A villain with good qualities and understandable motives creates a more subtle and complex story. Why is the villain nasty? Are they actually evil, or ignorant, or do their goals just conflict with your hero’s?

Not Quite Villains

Every novel – and most short stories and picture books – will have secondary characters. In general, the longer the book, the more secondary characters you can fit. These can be family members, friends, teachers, aliens, mythical characters, or even pets. Some will be nice. Some will be annoying. Ideally, one or more should be trouble.

Even well-meaning secondary characters can make your main character’s life more complicated. When writing for children, parents are a natural for this role. They may simply want what they see as best for their child – but if that is opposed to what the child wants, it adds complications. These could be strong enough to form the main plot, or could simply be additional challenges the child has to face.

You could have a dad who wants his son to play football, while the son wants to join the band, or parents who don’t want their daughter to date yet, when she’s fallen in love. A parent may be an even greater challenge, if he or she is an alcoholic, seriously ill, or depressed. Then, of course, there’s the issue of a divorced or widowed parent dating!

Example: Milton Hershey: Young Chocolatier (written as M.M. Eboch) is a fictionalized biography about the man who founded Hershey's chocolate company. Milton's father was a charming dreamer who had big – but not good – ideas. He was directly responsible for Milton’s businesses going bankrupt, more than once. Milton was only able to be a successful businessman when he learned to say no to his father.

Don’t forget friends, either! Friends can have their own agenda, use the main character for popularity or access to something or someone, or even secretly be trying to steal the main character’s love interest. Even good friends can give bad advice, be competing for a spot on a sports team or the school play, or have their own problems which act as a distraction.

Example: In The Genie’s Gift, heroine Anise makes a perilous journey to find the Genie Shakayak and get the Gift of Sweet Speech. She starts out with her best friend, Cassim. But when he falls into a trap and nearly gets them both killed, he’s so humiliated he acts like a jerk and demands they turn back. Anise takes off without him and has to make the rest of the trip on her own.

Exercise: go through your work in progress and list every secondary character who has a role beyond a few lines. Make a few notes on each one – what is their basic personality and role in the story? What do they want?

Then, for each secondary character, ask:

•    Could I develop this character more, to make him or her more complicated?

•    How could this secondary character be causing problems for my main character?

•    If the character is already causing problems, could they be even worse?

If you don’t have many secondary characters, consider adding some. What kind of character could add complications and drama? Make sure any new secondary characters fit smoothly into the plot, and don’t feel like they are just shoved in to cause trouble.

Chris Eboch’s novels for ages nine and up include The Genie’s Gift, a middle eastern fantasy, The Eyes of Pharaoh, a mystery in ancient Egypt; The Well of Sacrifice, a Mayan adventure; and the Haunted series, which starts with The Ghost on the Stairs.  Her book Advanced Plotting helps writers fine-tune their plots. 

Publish a Successful Book in 486 Easy Steps! by Caroline Starr Rose

The first and last time I'll ever be shelved alongside John Green

To publish a successful book, be sure you've got the following:

1. word of mouth (the everyday reader kind)

2. publisher support (this might come from a stellar marketing plan or in-house enthusiasm)

3. mysterious things out of everyone's control that are often unnameable and unknown (these also can "doom" a book, like having a release in the midst of a blizzard/flood/hurricane)

4. magic

5. great trade reviews -- I'm not convinced everyday readers even know these exist, but librarians and booksellers certainly do (and often base their purchases on them)

6. a great cover

7. a lot of reviews by "regular" people at Goodreads, Amazon, on blogs, and the like (this connects back to #1, but is less organic, more strategic, and less powerful, I think)

8. ...and to give your book a second wind, make sure it's nominated for awards

.

.

.

486. author efforts

How much of a book's success is in the author's hands? Is it even possible to measure an author's promotional reach? The first question is easy: only the author's efforts are in her control. But do writers really live this way? The second question is the more challenging one. I know of no hard and fast evidence that shows how an author's promotional work affects overall sales, but I have to believe my one small voice doesn't have the power to influence as many people as the other things on this list.

So where does that leave me?

Strangely comforted, believe it or not. I can't make anything I write a hit. No one honestly knows how to make this happen, though we keep trying (and for those of us in publishing, it's part of our job to do so). What I can do, though, is focus on promotion that excites me and drop the need to try everything.

How much of a book's success do you think comes from an author's efforts? Anything you'd add to my list?

Lesson from a Rodent

This little critter popped his head out this hole about an hour before sunset on a well-used trail in Southern Arizona.

It kept moving more of its body out of the hole and then it would pull back and do it again.

This went for two or three minutes.

In. Out. In. Out.

I stood still. Watching. Waiting. Just happy that our paths had crossed, thinking that this creature was trying to figure out if it was safe to come out yet so it could forage for food. So it could survive.

And now, a couple years later, when I look at these pictures, I think, “I kind of do that all the time. Kind of.”

When I open the front door in the morning I look for moose. In the summer, I look for mosquitoes and yellow-jackets. In the winter, I feel the air.

Sometimes I pull back.

Eventually I advance.

Starting to write a novel can be like that too.

You get an idea for a story and you start poking your head out of the ground, checking it out, and sometimes you like enough of what you see to be encouraged.

Now, your next step, if you choose to take it, is to advance.

It’s not a life or death situation like it is every day around sunset for that rodent. But still, it is a decision. If the rodent was paralyzed with fear every time it considered coming out, it would starve to death.

The Luck of Reading The Luck Uglies: Review of an Adventurous Debut Novel by Paul Durham

There are books we all hope to find that do more than simply tell a story. These books take us with them. They take us with them on the adventure and we feel like we know the world around us when we go. And these are rare treasures we keep and pass along. Author Paul Durham’s first MG/YA novel, The Luck Uglies, is one of those rare books.

An adventure and an introduction to Village Drowning and all its inhabitants, The Luck Uglies has a timeless feel, as if it might just as believably come from the hidden library in a castle as from the work of a modern writer.  It is both clever, never underestimating the intelligence of the young reader, and exciting, never forgetting that everyone loves a good adventure.

 

We were able to catch Paul Durham in the midst of all the excitement of The Luck Uglies. While there are heaps of questions I could list, like Rye O'Chanter, we will have to be content with a few at a time:

1. Who are a few of your favorite authors and/or books (few people have just one!) that might have inspired some of your writing? 

 There are so many great middle grade authors and books it is indeed difficult to narrow it down, but I always find myself coming back to the same examples.

The Chronicles of Prydain series by Lloyd Alexander has stayed with me ever since I was a child. I’ve reread the series twice as an adult and it still holds up as compelling reading. Its five books tell a story that is timeless and epic in scope, and yet the storytelling remains intimate and accessible.

A more contemporary favorite is The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. This was one of those books that just knocked me over when I read it because it was so good. It's hard to call it a children's book because, really, it's for everybody. It is exactly the type of book that inspires me to be a better writer.

•

2. You mention that you started telling the story to your kids. Who were your first characters? 

Rye O'Chanter was the very first character to make it onto the page. This seems so fitting because she was heavily inspired by my own daughter, who prompted my to write The Luck Uglies in the first place. Of course, Rye needed cohorts, so her little sister Lottie and her best friends, Folly and Quinn, weren't far behind. 

 •

3. There is such a rich Village Drowning history the reader can sense. Can you give us a few things about the place that aren't in the book? 

That's such a great question--I often think of Village Drowning as its own "character." Like any character, there are things about it that even I haven't discovered yet, but here are two tidbits I can share. Beneath the streets of the village, there is a place even older than the Spoke that the link rats call home. Also, in addition to the bogs and river, Drowning is bordered by a brackish body of water called the Great Eel Pond. Enormous culverts drain water from the pond under, rather than over, the village. Needless to say, Drowning remains damp even under the best of circumstances. 

 •

4. Is this the beginning of a journey for Rye? Are there more Luck Ugly book coming? 

Yes, I'm happy to report that this is just the start of Rye's journey. The Luck Uglies is a trilogy, with more books to come in spring 2015 and 2016. I'm finishing Book 2 right now.

Durham weaves a tale that truly brings you into Rye O’Chanter’s strange and mysterious world. The story makes you wish the book would not end so you can uncover more secrets that promise to be hidden there.

- eden unger bowditch