The results are in from contest judge, Anna Olswanger. Thanks to all of you who submitted your artwork to The Whole Megillah Illustration Contest. Judging criteria included the ability of the illustration to:

• Tell a story
• Hold a young reader’s interest through vibrancy, nuance, and medium

Mazel tov to everyone!

Grand Prize Winner

Ann Koffsky

Ann will receive a copy of The Snowy Day and the Art of Ezra Jack Keats by Claudia J. Nahson.

Runners-up

Ann Koffsky — “Nose”

Olga Bukhalova — “Venezia”

Honorable Mention

Judy Dick — “Moroccan Scene”

The Whole Megillah (TWM): When did you first believe you were a writer?
Leslea Newman (LN): I’ve always believed that I was a writer, ever since I was quite young. My first validation came when some of my poems, written as a teenager, were published in Seventeen Magazine. I actually got paid for them! I knew then that I was on my way…

TWM: What inspires you to write?
LN: Life inspires me! My own experiences, stories I hear or read about, my dreams, my hopes, my fears, my imagination. And since I make my living as a writer, a dwindling bank account is always very inspiring!

TWM: What is special about writing on Jewish topics for kids? For adults?
LN: When I was growing up, I never read a children’s book that had any Jewish content or featured any Jewish characters. That felt very alienating to me. Why wasn’t there a picture book about a family like mine? As an adult, I could do something—write books—so that Jewish children can see themselves and their families in works of literature. That is very gratifying. For children and for adults.

TWM: What are the greatest challenges?
LN: The greatest challenge comes from not feeling “Jewish enough.” In other words, I have very little Jewish education (though I did become a Bat Mitzvah at the age of 48) and I often feel like I don’t know enough to write about Jewish life. Luckily I have many experts to call on to check my work and make sure I am not making any errors.

TWM: The greatest satisfactions?
LN: When a child comes up to me and says that one of my books is his or her favorite book, that is the greatest feeling in the world.

TWM: You’ve used Yiddish in your children’s books. Please tell us about your own introduction to Yiddish and what led to using it in your books.
LN: “Yinglish” or English sprinkled with Yiddish phrases and Yiddish syntax is the language I grew up hearing in Brighton Beach (a section of Brooklyn, NY). It is the language of my grandmothers. The poet Czeslaw Milosz said, “Language is the only homeland,” and I agree. When I hear Yiddish words or phrases, I feel home in a way I don’t feel at any other time. When I use Yiddish words or phrases, I am writing from my deepest authentic self.

TWM: What similarities exist between writing picture books and writing poetry?
LN: Both forms use economy of language. Neither form allows for one wasted word. You have to say a lot in a very short time. And a lot of the same literary devices are often used such as rhyme and repetition. Most importantly, when I write poetry or picture books, I have to dig deep down into my emotional core and write from the heart.

TWM: Do you have a preference for any particular form of writing?
LN: Poetry has always been my first love. These days I’ve taken to writing formal poetry: sonnets, sestinas, pantoums, villanelles. But I enjoy writing prose as well. As long as I’m writing, I’m happy!

TWM: You’ve published more than 20 picture books, many of them involving Jewish holidays, and you have a new book coming out about holidays. Please tell us more about that.
LN: Here Is the World: A Year of Jewish Holidays is a picture book that starts with welcoming a child into the word, and continues through a year’s cycle of Jewish holidays. It’s told in verse and contains an explanation of holidays as well as a craft or recipe for each one. It is forthcoming from Abrams Books for Young Readers.

TWM: Please also tell us more about October Mourning, your novel in verse in response to the murder of Matthew Shepard. Why a novel and why verse? What were your greatest challenge and your greatest satisfaction in writing this?
LN: In 1998, Matthew Shepard, a gay college student was kidnapped, robbed, brutally beaten, tied to a fence, and abandoned. He was found 18 hours later and brought to the hospital. He died five days later with his family by his side on Monday, October 12 which was the start of Gay Awareness Week at his school. I was the keynote speaker and I arrived on campus the day he died. I made a vow to his friends that I would do something to carry on his name. Since the case has been documented very well (by the New York Times and other newspapers) I didn’t want to write a journalistic account. As a poet, I felt I could use my imagination to access the voices of the silent witnesses such as the fence Matt was tied to, the stars that watched over him, a deer that kept him company all through the night, and others. What could I learn from writing in these voices? October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard answers that question. (See the book trailer.)

TWM: What is your greatest learning as a teacher of writing?
LN: That there is always more for me to learn!

About Lesléa Newman

The Whole Megillah

The Whole Megillah (TWM): What was your motivation for approaching the topic of hating the Holocaust?
Leanne Lieberman (LL): Like Lauren Yanofsky I too was sick of hearing about the Holocaust. I had read enough books, seen enough movies and felt there were other aspects of my Judaism that I wanted to explore. I declared myself “done with the Holocaust.” Then, a grade six student of mine made a swastika armband during a French class I was teaching. I was really taken aback. The student knew that the Nazis had fought in World War Two but didn’t know about the atrocities they had committed against Jews and many other people. The student apologized for making the armband and I tried to forget about the incident, but I was still troubled on many levels. It bothered me that this boy didn’t know about the Nazis, and it also bothered me that I let this get to me. Did everyone need to know about the Nazis, even eleven year olds? Ultimately I knew I would have to write a book to sort out my feelings about the Holocaust.

TWM: The relationship between Lauren and Brooke feels typical of a best friend relationship in high school where each girl develops her own interests. Can you please describe how you came up with Brooke and how you developed her as a character?
LL: Brooke started with an anecdote I remembered from high school about a girl I knew who put sugar in her dad’s gas tank to mess with his car after her parents divorced. She was actually a good girl, but a lot of her friends had a rougher side to them, and the character of Brooke developed out of that story, about a girl whose parents get divorced and who starts hanging out with a rougher crowd of kids. Brooke is important in the book because as you say teenage friendships often change very quickly and Lauren finds her friends’ changing interests to be challenging.

Leanne Lieberman

TWM: Similarly, the relationship between Lauren and her brother, Zach, is very tender and his story makes for an endearing subplot. How did you develop Zach and his story line?
LL: The story of Zach’s bar mitzvah was an integral part of the book because I wanted Lauren to have another path into her Judaism. Since Lauren isn’t very interested in being Jewish, it had to come through her family. When I started the book and I was thinking about a sibling for Lauren, I remembered a story about my younger brother hiding under the bima from the rabbi during his bar mitzvah lessons. That anecdote, of a young boy hiding from the rabbi, wove its way into the story and then I started asking, why is the brother hiding? It became clear to me that Zach had a lot of quirks and special needs.

TWM: Let’s talk about Jesse, Lauren’s love interest. How did you develop him?
LL: Jesse was first modeled on a cute boy I remember from high school who played basketball and sat near me in biology. I sometimes begin a character based on someone I know and then as I develop them, they take on their own personality and traits. I didn’t really know that boy in high school, so I had to imagine him. In my mind, as I imagined him talking, he became the cocky character of Jesse.

TWM: What was the rationale behind using first person for Lauren’s voice?
LL: I wrote Lauren in the first person because I wanted that intensity of her voice and to show the process of her decision making. As soon as I started writing her character I could hear her voice in my head and I wanted to share it with readers.

TWM: What was your goal with this book?
LL: My goal with this book was to think about Jewish identity and what affect the Holocaust has on Jewish teens today. Lauren is an extreme example because her father is a Holocaust historian and her life has been more immersed in Holocaust education that most teens. Still, standard Jewish education has a strong emphasis on Holocaust history, often at the risk of short-changing other interesting time periods. I wanted to think about what happens to a Jewish teen when there is too much emphasis on tragedy and how that can overshadow other aspects of Jewish heritage.

TWM: What emotions did you want your reader to feel?
LL: I wanted readers to feel Lauren’s conflict, to understand what it feels like to want to fit in and then have to stand up for your religion or culture. Lauren is sick of hearing about the Holocaust, but she doesn’t want the Holocaust to be belittled either. I think a lot of teens (and adults too) feel a tension between their cultural and secular lives.  This tension can obviously be negative, but it can also be fascinating and I wanted my readers to experience these emotions along with Lauren.

TWM: The narrative has a soft side, e.g., Lauren’s relationship with her brother, and a hard side, e.g., cutting school, drinking and smoking, setting fire to the book about Mengele’s twin experiments. Was this mix intentional? If so, why?
LL: Yes, this mix of hard and soft sides of Lauren was intentional because Lauren is a multi-dimensional character and she has a pretty complex life. She’s a teenager exploring her boundaries, experimenting with alcohol, but she also cares for her family.

TWM: What challenges did you encounter in concepting and writing this book?
LL: The book was originally longer and Lauren had a greater obsession with fire. My editor worried that Lauren sounded like a pyromaniac. I had to cut a lot of it out as it was too heavy-handed, and also a little hard to believe.

TWM: What satisfactions did you feel as a result of writing this book?
LL: I was really pleased that I was able to wrestle some of my conflicting feelings about the Holocaust and Jewish identity into a novel. I was especially pleased that my father liked the book. Although he is not a Holocaust historian like Lauren’s father in the book, he reads a lot of Holocaust books and it was important to me that I wrote a book that he was proud of.

TWM: Now let’s turn to Leanne’s editor, Sarah Harvey at Orca. Hi, Sarah. What attracted you to Lauren Yanofsky Hates the Holocaust?
Sarah Harvey (SH): I was attracted to LYHH by the quality of the writing, the originality of the story and the strength and humour of the main character. Also, I like working with Leanne.

TWM: What appeal do you think the book has to mainstream readers?
SH: If by mainstream readers, you mean non-Jewish readers, I think that LYHH has broad appeal in that it deals with issues that many teens can relate to—changes in friendships, new love, family problems, bad hair days—as well as the larger ethical and moral issues that arise because of Lauren’s heritage.

TWM: Were there any particular challenges in developing/publishing the book?
SH: We were always aware that some of the subject matter might be controversial (Leanne doesn’t shy away from that, and neither does Orca) so there was quite a lot of discussion, with Leanne and in-house, about making the book as appealing as possible to a wide range of readers, without diluting the powerful material. That said, we all did what we always do—made the book read as well and look as good as possible.

The Whole Megillah (TWM): How did the opportunity to illustrate Thank You for Me! come about?

This is actually the first time I’ve ever gotten a job through my website, and not through me proactively harassing, I mean, pitching publishers so that was kind of amazing.

TWM: How was illustrating someone else’s work different from illustrating your own?
AK: Collaboration. When you are collaborating with yourself, there is the fun advantage of being in total control, and being the total boss. But there is the disadvantage of not having additional input that pushes the project to the next creative level. Rick was really great at that—he had thoughtful and excellent critique at every stage that kept making the images get better and better.

TWM: What process did you use to illustrate the text? (creating the dummy, discussions with publisher/author, etc.)
AK: Rick’s song has beautifully imagery, but not a story, per se. I decided to create a very simple story with a  beginning, middle, and end:  Boy goes to bed, boy falls sleep, boy wakes up. Then, I drew up some character designs for Rick’s approval. Once Rick approved those, I created a sketch dummy which we went back and forth on a couple of times until we got it just right. Once those were set, I proceeded to color finals.

TWM: How did you decide on medium and color palette?
AK: Because this is a story of night and day, I  really wanted color to almost be like a character in the book. So through color, the reader gets a sense of the sun setting, and the room becoming darker and darker with purples and blues, then lighter in the morning with yellows and pinks.

TWM: Did the music on which the text was based factor into your art? If so, how?
AK: I’m not sure how directly it influenced me, but I know I was humming it the whole time I was working! So on a subconscious level I know it impacted the final book.

TWM: What was the greatest challenge?
AK: In every book I do, I  always find making sure the character looks like the same person in each spread to be the biggest challenge. Lots of fussing to get it right.

TWM: What was the greatest satisfaction?
AK: Going to Rick’s concert for the first time, hearing him sing that song and knowing

Rick Recht

that I am now a small part of the history of that beautiful piece of music.

TWM: What advice can you offer up-and-coming illustrators?  
AK: Get yourself out there! Meet people shake hands, show your work, share your work, give some away to good causes. Staying home and hoping someone will find you can get very lonely very quickly.

For more about Ann and the Thank You for Me book trailer, click here>>>

Thank You for Me! is a PJ Library selection.

The Whole Megillah (TWM): What attracts you to Jewish themes?
Lois Barr (LB): They are never easy.  There are no easy answers.  I was raised in a mixed up household, Kosher when my Bubby was with us and very Southern trayf when she was not.  I didn’t learn Hebrew as a child but as an adult I’ve studied both Hebrew and Yiddish.  The Bible gives us tough questions.  Why oh why did Abraham take his son up the mountaintop, and why did he listen to Sarah and send Ishmael and Hagar off into the desert?

Marcia Berneger (MB): One of the first things people tell you is to “write what you know best.” My Jewish heritage is an important part of me. I also teach religious school at my synagogue, where I share our traditions and the wonderful stories that explain them. Many times ideas come to me while I’m teaching: Sammy spider talks about the holidays, Feivel talks about the old country. What kind of story might the frogs who lived in Pharaoh’s Egypt tell?

Joan Seliger Sidney (JSS): My Jewish heritage and background: Although my parents came from Orthodox Jewish families in Zurawno, Poland—a paternal great-uncle was a shochet—at fifteen, my father rebelled, cut off his peyes and when he married, refused to let my mother keep kosher.  Nonetheless, my parents sent me to a local Talmud Torah, which fed into Marshalliah Hebrew High School, three times a week besides regular high school.  Ultimately, in summers I worked at different Camp Ramahs (Hebrew-speaking); also, during my first year and a half in college, I attended classes very part-time at the Jewish Theological Seminary.  But for the most part, my Jewish-themed writing has been inspired by my mother’s stories of growing up in Zurawno, my parents’ three-month adventure from Yugoslavia to America during the Holocaust, and other Holocaust testimonies.  At the same time, I write to keep my mother’s world alive and to bear witness to the Holocaust.

Dede Fox (DF): There are many skilled writers hoping for publication. When I ask myself what’s unique about me, what do I have to offer that no one else can offer, I always come back to my experiences as a Jewish Texan. Really, how many Jewish writers have daughters who raised pigs for Future Farmers of America (and donated to a food bank)?

TWM: Why you choose to write in the genres you choose; how does writing in one genre affect the other?
 LB: I choose fiction when I have lots of time to develop things and when there is a strong element of plot although sometimes I do narrative poems. I choose poems when the language or images are most important to the piece.

I hope that I am more careful about language in my stories because of all the editing and workshopping I do with my poems. Of course, I bring the adage of “show don’t tell” to my poems when they tell stories.

MB: I write picture books, both secular and Jewish-themed. I also have a transitional chapter book mystery series and an early middle grade Jewish-themed mystery. I don’t really choose the genres. Once an idea pops into my head, I write its story down. I just keep writing until I’ve finished. Only then do I know which genre it belongs to. I was a teacher for 34 years, so many of my picture books are about young children (ages 5-7) and the problems that affect them. Sometimes they are Jewish-themed, sometimes not. I also love writing fractured fairy tales. So far the only real cross-over between genres is my Jewish Gingerbread Man (The Hamantash Mensch).

JSS: Mostly, I write poetry because it’s my greatest challenge and seems most naturally to take me where I need to go, though my best writing in other genres is always a process of discovery, too.  I began writing picture books after the birth of my first granddaughter—I now have five adorable granddaughters, from eight to twenty-one months!—and completed the first post-MFA semester in picture books at Vermont College (2008) to learn more.  Poetry is really the language of picture books, too, through its images, rhythms, and concise language.  I also have written a memoir essay and a few short stories.  No matter the genre, writing is an ongoing quest for emotional truth.

DF: Turning my attention to poetry in 2006 has improved my prose because my writing is now more lyrical, concise, and subtle. I pay more attention to connotation and the sounds of words. When I write non-fiction, I focus on personal interviews and recording factually accurate content. Those practices provide context for my other writing. Sometimes I’ll pre-write in one genre and move into another genre. Going back and forth between genres helps me to find The Place My Words Are Looking For.

TWM: What insights have you gained as you write about your Jewish heritage?
 LB: I’ve learned a lot of Jewish history. I learn history best when I have to research it and when I ask questions as to how characters would feel and behave under certain circumstances. For example, I was working on a YA novel about a young girl whose family is among the first to go farm the land in Argentina. Despite the fact that I’ve read all the Argentine writers who came from the Jewish Colonies and visited Moisesville, I’ve had to do a lot more reading. I’ve studied flora and fauna to get a sense of how they would plant, what birds she would see and hear. I’ve read folklore from the time to get a sense as to how the locals would have reacted to their new Jewish neighbors. I’ve read military journals about exploration in Argentina in the 19th century and found some interesting anecdotes and information about the terrain.

I’ve worked out issues in my mind about my identity.  My poem, “Bialystok Impasse,” published in the New Vilna Review, dealt with my ambiguity about going back to see where my ancestors lived.

MB: When I explore a story idea with a Jewish theme, it expands my knowledge about that particular topic. For example, I often have to research the details that go into my stories. I might have to analyze what’s going on to flush out a character’s personality and/or motivation. And I love putting myself into my stories to feel what it must have been like, living long ago in Modin or in Pharaoh’s time.

JSS: The more I write about my Jewish heritage, on an emotional level, the closer I come to knowing the world that’s vanished, including the grandparents I never met.  This may sound bizarre, but at times while writing I’ve actually felt the presence of my deceased maternal grandmother as well as my deceased parents channeling me information, which made me realize how connected I am (and probably we all are) to my ancestors, that they really do continue to live through my writing, even the ones I never met.  The older I become, the more I’m drawn to my Jewish heritage as well as the stories of Holocaust survivors.

DF: I have gained so many insights by writing about my Jewish heritage that I have expressed them in multiple ways, including a new YA manuscript called Emet and a creative nonfiction called Confessions of a Jewish Texan which Poetica Press will publish in June 2013.

TWM: What have been your greatest challenges in writing on Jewish themes?
LB: There is no right or wrong on many issues, but people have very strong reactions to anything having to do with faith and ritual.  I have a poem about Elijah which is almost a rap poem and I am not certain I ever want to see it published.

MB: These themes have been around for hundreds of years. When writing about a holiday or even a Jewish twist on a contemporary theme, it has to be unique. Creating characters with their own distinct voices telling their own versions of a story is quite the challenge.

JSS: Since much of my material is a mix of memory and creative imagination, it’s frustrating when a prospective publisher turns down my picture book, saying “It’s too old-fashioned for today’s market” or “You start in the present but go back to the past then return to the present.  That’s too hard for young readers, they need a simple chronology.”  Or when my character brought back something from the past, the editors said, “You’re confusing reality for the reader.”  Editors have also told me, “We’re not interested in Holocaust books any more.”  Evidently, I haven’t found the right editor.

DF: My greatest challenge to writing on Jewish themes is the same as my greatest challenge to writing on any theme—finding enough time and energy to care for my family, manage a household, work as a full time librarian, and write.

TWM: What have been your greatest satisfactions in writing on Jewish themes?
LB: Any time I write about my grandmother and my mom and their issues, I have lots of success.  And, of course, I’m always honored when asked to write a Dvar Torah.

MB: I love it when I’ve finished a story (including its countless revisions) and it came out the way I hoped it would. Of course that’s true for all stories, but I usually read my Jewish-themed ones to my students. It’s fun to watch their reactions. I now have a story about Rosh Hashanah, one for Passover and one for two for Purim. My little Gan-Alef students performed my Purim story (The Hamantasch Mensch) for our congregation this year Purim. That was incredible!

JSS: Writing books that really matter to me, that I look forward to sharing with readers of all ages, have brought great satisfaction.  Although I’m still looking for a publisher for my non-fiction biography of a local Holocaust survivor, many readers of the manuscript have been very moved by both the story and my writing.  My most recent satisfaction was to win the grand-prize in the 2013 Whole Megillah Picture Book Contest, which I hope will lead to publication.  My story, Elsa’s Pillow, is a fictionalized version of my mother’s journey from Yugoslavia to America.

DF: What I’ve discovered about my family enhances my commitment to being an active Jew. My relatives sacrificed a lot to insure our family’s survival and provide for our religious freedom.  I’ve also learned many Jews are truly People of the Book, talented wordsmiths.

TWM: Where do you gain your inspiration? 
LB: My grandmother, who adored me as the first born grandchild, until I hit puberty and became a “snake in the grass,” is a fountain of stories and strong sensory memories.  I remember her noodles hanging from the kitchen chair. I remember her telling me that beef fry tasted exactly like bacon, and I remember telling her she said that because she’d never tried bacon. Now I obey the laws of kashruth, at least I’ve eliminated pork, shellfish, bottom feeders and mixing milk and meat.  But my bubby’s strong faith, her attachment to ritual, and her ability to survive continue to amaze me.   Because of my Bubby and my parents I celebrated Passover with family and friends and I waited with great joy to open the Passover order.  The tin chest of Svetochne Tea went to my dollhouse and I remember delicious jams that we only had at that holiday.  Of course my bubby and my mother did all the work.  When I order my fish already chopped from the market, I am aware how easy I have it. I complain about opening the blender when I make the chrain but they grated the horseradish by hand. These and other strong memories and struggles and my adult’s sense of gratitude all inform my writing.

MB: The inspiration for my picture books has definitely come from my teaching religious school. But my latest project, my early middle grade mystery, was written entirely during the Whole Megillah’s NaNoWriMo ["Write Your Own Megillah"] this past winter. I was terrified to write such a long (18,000 word) manuscript but kept at it, with lots of encouragement, and finished it. Very inspiring!

JSS: As I’ve already said, my inspiration comes from my mother’s stories, in addition, imagined or channeled stories, plus lectures, interviews and videos of Holocaust survivors.

DF: Inspiration is everywhere, but my interest in people—their motivation and histories—is a catalyst for much of my writing.

The Barn – the Conference Center for Highlights Foundation workshops

TWM: Why did you sign up for the Highlights workshop?
 LB: I wanted to write children’s books and I had a book about a child from a mixed marriage wanting to invite the baby Jesus as a guest to a sukkah. Needless to say, the story shocked some and interested others.  It did not please the visiting editor. I had begun to write (and continue to write) books for my granddaughter. Neither she nor the few publishers who take unsolicited manuscripts have been terribly impressed so far, but I’ll keep trying.

MB: I had been playing around with a few Jewish-themed ideas and the workshop appeared just at the right time in my writing career. I wanted to learn all I could about writing for the Jewish market. I did — but took home so much more than that.

JSS: I wanted to meet other writers and editors of Jewish-themed children’s books, to get their feedback on some of my manuscripts, and make connections which could lead to a published book.  I also wanted more information on what editors were looking for.  Lastly, I hoped an ongoing community of writers would emerge.

DF: Because I have attended the Highlights Summer Workshop at Chautauqua, I knew the quality of any Highlights program would be exceptional. The foundation hires the best teachers and encourages an egalitarian atmosphere that brings out professionalism in all participants. Also, I met Barbara Krasner, at Chautauqua. She introduced me to other Jewish writers and was generous with her time and expertise. Although far from home, I always feel very much at home at Highlights’s events.

TWM: What did you get out of it — how did it help?
LB: I got lots of ideas for poems and other stories. I had truly memorable time getting to know such different and interesting writers.  I felt I gained a lot of background and grounding in children’s writing from Barbara and the guest editors and writers.  The most important thing I gained was a support group of writers whose work I love to read and who are very generous about reading and critiquing mine.

MB: Well, of course I learned so much about the market for Jewish-themed writing. I was able to chat with editors and with fellow writers. We (the writers) formed a support group that continued for most of the year. The Highlights workshop encouraged me to expand my writing for the Jewish market, working with themes from many genres covering picture books through middle grade. Prior to the workshop I’d written a few Jewish-themed stories. Since then, I’ve added six more picture books with Jewish themes and my middle-grade mystery (plus the start of two other middle-grade novels) to my repertoire. At least two of those picture book ideas popped into my head during the workshop. You really started the ball rolling for me!

JSS: The workshop was a very enjoyable experience with fellow writers giving constructive feedback.

Although one of the editors really liked one of my picture books, her colleague turned it down after overlooking it for half a year and ultimately needing her nudge—his was the chronology comment.  This was an obvious disappointment after all the enthusiasm everyone showed but it’s my problem, not the workshop’s.

The experienced guest editor, who critiqued my verse novel-in-progress, gave me a very different perspective on audience, characters, plot.  She suggested writing for a young adult reader, not middle-grade, introducing contemporary themes like incest, which she saw as potential in my story.  Unfortunately, instead of exploring her advice, I was so taken aback by her different vision that I abandoned the project.  This interview is making me realize it’s time to go back and see where the novel wants to go, not where I was leading it.

DF: Where do I begin on what I learned?

• We studied the Jewish market and needs of various publishers.
• We learned about exceptional children’s books for Jewish readers.
• We shared our writing in read-arounds, which helped with revision.
• I began a lengthy “to do” list for writing and submitting
• We wrote down personal goals for the coming year.
• I enjoyed the camaraderie of writers with shared beliefs and experiences, a bonus for a Jewish Texan since we make up only.6% of the total state population.
• I learned more about targeting submissions to fit the needs of Highlights readers. I have a non-fiction “What the Pros Know” article coming out in the July 2013 issue and have sold a Jewish-themed craft.
• Several participants continue to support each other online; we offer suggestions for revision and kvell at each others’ successes.

About Lois Barr

A professor of Spanish, Lois Barr chairs the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Lake Forest College.  Her poems, essays and stories have appeared in zines, literary reviews and anthologies around the country.  She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize in fiction and poetry. She has written extensively about Latin American Jewish Literature and was co-executive producer of a documentary, “Isa Kremer: The People’s Diva,” which aired at festivals around the world and on public television around the country.

About Marcia Berneger

Marcia is married and the mother of two wonderful sons. She has a houseful of pets including two small dogs, a cat, and a bearded dragon. She has retired from a long and much-loved teaching career, teaching first/second grade and working with children who had learning challenges. She now has time to devote to her passion, writing stories for children. Marcia’s work has appeared in Boys’ Life Magazine and Highlights for Children. Her picture book, Buster, has just been acquired by Sleeping Bear Press.

About Joan Seliger Sidney

Joan Seliger Sidney’s Body of Diminishing Motion: Poems and a Memoir was published by CavanKerry Press. Her poem, “Malka at Ninety,” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.  Joan has received individual artist’s poetry fellowships from the Connecticut Commission on the Arts, the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism, the Craig H. Neilsen Foundation, the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, and the Vermont Studio Center, also a Visiting Faculty Fellowship to research at the Fortunoff Video Archives for Holocaust Testimonies at Yale University. She’s Writer-in-Residence at the University of Connecticut’s Center for Judaic Studies and Contemporary Jewish Life, and also facilitates Writing for Your Life, an adult workshop.  Her manuscript, Elsa’s Pillow, won the grand-prize in the Whole Megillah’s 2013 Picture Book Contest.

About Dede Fox

Highlights Magazine has published several of Dede Fox’s  nonfiction articles and photos. Her writing credits include The Treasure in the Tiny Blue Tin, a children’s novel listed in Linda Silver’s Best Jewish Books for Children and Teens. Dede’s poetry appears in many literary magazines and journals, including the Summer 2013 issue of Poetica, which will also publish her book Confessions of a Jewish Texan in May. A Washington University alumna and school librarian, Dede has taught with Houston’s Writers in the Schools and will present at the Association of Jewish Libraries Conference in June.

Barbara Krasner (BK): On behalf of the Association of Jewish Libraries, hello and welcome, Austin. Thanks for joining me in this cyber discussion about your second novel, In the Land of the Living.
Austin Ratner (AR): I appreciate the opportunity for an interview and for your thoughtful questions.

BK: What inspired the idea for this book?

AR: When I was in college, I consulted my creative writing teacher about a problem I imagined was unique to me: I had lost my father when I was so young I could not remember him, yet I had a recurring urge to write about him, his death, and how he lingered in my thoughts and feelings. I asked my teacher if he had any advice and I was surprised by his response. He told me that he too had lost his father in his earliest years and that everything he wrote related in some way to this loss, but he cautioned me against trying to write about it directly. As I get older and more experienced with the difficulties of writing and selling fiction, his advice seems only more sensible. Nonetheless, I could never quite exorcise the urge to write directly on this topic. That is what In the Land of the Living is about: a traumatic loss in early childhood and how it can dominate the thoughts of a person for the rest of his life.

BK: In what ways was writing In the Land of the Living different from writing The Jump Artist?

AR: While The Jump Artist also dealt with the lingering effects of emotional injury, it was in many ways a more straightforward story. It was about one discrete period of an adult man’s life. The premise of In the Land of the Living meant linking together two lives—a father and a son—that only intersected on earth for a few years. That posed technical challenges to me as a novelist.

BK: What was the greatest challenge? The greatest satisfaction?

AR: For all the lip-service paid to the importance of child development in our society, I do not find most people to be particularly psychologically literate about it or particularly interested in thinking about it. I view it as a personal victory that I was able to write directly and truthfully about the underserved theme of childhood loss and its residua, and to get it into print with a major publisher in both the U.S. and France. It’s the most civilized response I think I could mount against this particularly helpless experience. Several years ago, when I wrote about the theme more autobiographically in The New York Times Magazine, I heard from all kinds of people who felt as I did. I hope I speak for them as well as to them.

BK: What thought process did you use to set up Isidore as a knight (and the chapter headings)?

AR: Picaresque medieval romances like Le Morte D’Arthur use grandiose chapter titles that confer legendary significance upon everything the knights do. I used such titles in Part I of my novel in the same spirit that Cervantes uses them in Don Quixote: to satirize quixotic, heroic, romantic ideals—or at least to draw a contrast between them and the more sordid and brutal reality. Whereas Don Quixote often undermines the heroic ideal by comic failures, the brutal reality of what happens to Isidore undermines the heroic ideal in a particularly tragic way.

BK: The relationship between Leo and Mack fascinates me—how one event can shift the foundation of a relationship. How did this come about? Was it difficult or easy to write? What led to the choice of Leo as your protagonist?

AR: The relationship between the brothers I think is really important to help aerate the protagonist Leo’s internal warfare with his own past. With Mack in it, the narrative is not only about Leo and his past but about another person too, and Leo’s interactions with his brother are a narrative strategy for telling the story of Leo’s relation to his own past in a dynamic, living, present-tense sort of way. Brothers share a certain history, and so a brother can be a living representative of one’s own past, and a way of interacting with one’s own past in an external way.

BK: One of the characteristics I’ve noticed about your writing is your specificity, for example, the scene in the New Haven Public Library: “But this library couldn’t save him, with its shabby little collections, its early closing time, its oblivious teenage librarian doing her homework, making fat redundant loops of blue ballpoint ink on some wide-ruled notebook paper.” Does this come naturally to you or do you insert these details strategically?

AR: We recently started reading Charlotte’s Web to my younger son. Its details create a persuasive fictional dream in a way that many other children’s stories don’t. Charlotte’s Web is of course by E.B. White, the master himself, co-author of Elements of Style. That classic writing primer says: “The greatest writers—Homer, Dante, Shakespeare—are effective largely because they deal in particulars and report the details that matter. Their words call up pictures.”

BK: What do you want readers to take away from In the Land of the Living?

AR: If I’ve emulated E.B. White’s use of detail, I couldn’t aspire to the beautiful simplicity of his story structure—and the reason perhaps goes back to the decision not to back away from a direct, realistic treatment of childhood loss despite this subject’s enormous psychological complexity. Literature has perhaps moved on from the deep introspection of modernism, but the emotional terrain of childhood loss requires such deep modernist introspection, wherein a persuasive fictional dream of inner life occupies the foreground and a diverting story the background. I hope readers enjoy the story and the humor in In the Land of the Living, but the more important thing to me is whether readers experience a persuasive fictional dream and feel they’ve encountered another real consciousness in the book. A persuasive fictional dream is always more diverting to me than a conventional story anyway.

BK: Tell us a bit about yourself. How did you go from med school to the Iowa Workshop?

AR: This question always makes me think of Gonzo in The Muppet Movie. He tells Kermit and Fozzie he’s going to Bombay, India to become a movie star. They tell him: you don’t go to Bombay, India to become a movie star, you go to Hollywood, where we’re going. Gonzo says, sure, if you want to do it the easy way. I always wanted to be a writer, but I did not take a direct path. There are worse paths, though, than the one that leads through a medical career. Somerset Maugham said that medical school was the ideal preparation for any fiction writer.

BK: What’s your typical writing schedule? In other words, how do you write?

AR: When I am not crippled by self-doubt, I write automatically, like I eat and breathe and sleep. The trick for me is to combat the doubt. Then the words come and work gets done and something gets created.

BK: Thanks, Austin, for a great interview. I can’t wait to read your next work.

For more about Austin Ratner>>>

Finally, a contest for you! Enter The Whole Megillah Illustration Contest.

How? Just send in a JPG of your finest Jewish-themed artwork and win a copy of The Snowy Day and the Art of Ezra Jack Keats. You have until May 15 to submit. Send your entry to barbaradkrasner(at)gmail(dot)com. Please use the subject line: The Whole Megillah Illustration Contest – [your name]. You can enter as many times as you wish.

Anna  Olswanger, agent at Liza Dawson Associates, will judge. The winner will be announced on or about June 15. Good luck, everyone!

Grand Prize Winner:

• Joan Seliger Sidney, Elsa’s Pillow

Finalists:

• Ellen Emerman, Where Is the Tzedakah Box?
• Michael Herman, The Secret of the Sabbath Stew

Honorable Mention:

• Deanie Yasner, Fixing Lily

The Grand Prize Winner will receive a Barnes & Noble Nook e-reader. Thanks go to judge Joni Sussman, publisher at Kar-Ben. And thanks to all of you who participated!

Maryann MacDonald is the author of the newly published Odette’s Secrets (Bloomsbury), the story of a young Jewish girl in France forced into hiding during World War II.

The Whole Megillah (TWM): What drove you to write this book in verse?
Maryann MacDonald (MM): When I first sat down to write Odette’s Secrets, I tried to write it as straight biography.  This seemed too dry.  Then I remembered that Odette loved poetry.  She believed the beauty of poetry was one of the things that helped her to survive her experience in the Vendee.  She married the poet Bert Meyers and later in life, wrote poetry herself.  So, I began writing her story in first person in free verse, trying to find the childhood voice of Odette, a poet-to-be.

At this point, since I was imagining Odette’s voice, the work became fiction, although I did not make up any of the events mentioned in the book.  What I did was add detail, such as giving Odette’s doll a name, and putting into words conversations alluded to in her memoir.

TWM: Did you feel at any time that an editor/publisher might say, “We don’t want any more Holocaust books?”
MM: Of course!  But I was convinced this was a Holocaust story with a difference.  When I learned the surprising fact that 84 percent of French Jewish children survived the Holocaust, I wanted to know how this had happened.  I learned that a majority were hidden, forced as Odette was to reinvent themselves and often “hide in plain sight” in order to survive.  How on earth were young children able to do this so successfully, I wondered?  And how did they readjust to their true identities after the war was over?  This was the Holocaust story I hadn’t heard before, the story of resourceful children displaying resilience and courage in the face of extreme danger.  This was the story I wanted to tell.

TWM: How important was it for you to be in France and retrace Odette’s footsteps?  How did a knowledge of French help?
MM: I’ve always been a Francophile.  Paris is so beautiful, yet has witnessed so much ugliness.   Many of its buildings still bear the scars of WWII.  I guess I’ve always wanted to understand better and come to terms with the evil things that took place in France during the wartime period.   So I did a lot of reading before I began writing this book, and explored the city asking questions.  I did the same after I discovered Odette’s memoir, reimagining what had happened in her life, both in Paris and in the countryside.   A knowledge of French came in handy for these tasks.  My French also helped in my research, especially in the countryside, and in talking to the Raffins, the family that had hidden Odette in the Vendee.

I wanted to see things, as much as I was able to, through Odette’s eyes.  I wanted my story to be as true to hers as I could possibly make it.  For these reasons, it helped me a great deal to be in the place where the story happened.

TWM: Is this book a departure for you?  What obsessed you so much about Odette’s story?
MM: I don’t think of this book so much as a departure as a progression.  I have always been interested in children’s responses to their difficulties.  A former editor of mine once asked me, jokingly, “Do you specialize in trauma?”  But without a problem, it seems to me, you haven’t got a story!  So all of my books, although they may perhaps on the surface seem lighthearted, are based on problems.

A few years ago I wrote (with my sister, Ann Ingalls) a book called Little Piano Girl, the story of the childhood of jazz musician Mary Lou Williams.  She was a woman who faced poverty and sexual discrimination to become the most respected female instrumentalist ever in jazz.  She transcended the pain in her life by “playing it out,” as she put it, on the piano.  I loved her response, and Ann and I thought this was a big part of what made her story worth telling.

Odette’s persistent exploration of her identity, intensified by her wartime experiences, was what fascinated me about her story.  As young as she was, she observed and took in everything that happened around her, coming to her own individual conclusions.  I just fell in love with her developing intellectual and emotional honesty.

TWM: In what ways did working with Odette’s son, Daniel, help you with this book?
MM: I could not have written this book without Daniel.  He is a lovely person, a filmmaker.  But I didn’t know this when I found his number in the Paris telephone directory.  With my heart in my mouth, I dialed and left a message, explaining who I was and that I wanted to use the facts of his mother’s life to create a book for children.  Then I waited.

A few days later, Daniel called me back and invited me to lunch in his sunny apartment on

Odette with her mama

the rue Rambuteau.  He listened to my request and made his decision almost immediately.  His mother, he said, had often talked in schools and libraries to children about her wartime experiences.  He was sure she would want her story to live on.  As her literary executor, he gave me permission to write the story of his mother’s childhood.  He shared his grandmother’s autobiography (originally written in Yiddish), some of his mother’s poems, and many family photographs with me.  I was thrilled!

I also greatly appreciated Daniel’s willingness to read various versions of the manuscript and discuss his concerns with me.  In the end, I wanted this book to be one that honored his mother’s memory as accurately as possible.  Daniel helped me to do this.

TWM: Do you think it was chance to find Odette’s autobiography in the stacks?  Or was it bashert as we say in Yiddish?
MM: The longer I live the more I see something mysterious at work in my life…when I need or am interested in something, that thing often seems to find its way onto my radar screen.  Different people might call this chance, serendipity, grace or bashert.  No matter what you call it, the results are the same.

TWM: What was your biggest surprise in researching the story?
MM: The most delightful surprise was being invited into the house Odette lived in in the Vendee by Jacques Raffin, one of her long-ago playmates!  I expected to find the village, but not the exact house where Odette lived, and I certainly didn’t anticipate meeting anyone she knew.  But when my husband and I happened upon the house, Monsieur Raffin saw us from his window.  He welcomed us graciously and showed us the kitchen where the soup had simmered and the garden where the pet pigeons had cooed.  Once again, I was thrilled!

TWM: What was your biggest surprise in writing the story?
MM: I found that the more I worked on this story, the more I loved it! I never tired of it, even though I reworked the words incessantly right up until the time the final draft had to go to the printer.  I was so grateful to my editor, Brett Wright at Bloomsbury, for his unbelievable patience with me in this respect.  He is very detail-oriented himself, and this was a great gift.

Maryann MacDonald, photo taken by
Stefan Falke

TWM: What was your greatest satisfaction?
MM: My greatest satisfaction with Odette’s Secrets has been the wonderful response I have gotten to this book from readers.  I have had many great reviews, including a starred one in Kirkus, demonstrating to me that professionals understand and appreciate Odette’s story.  But one of the most meaningful responses so far has come from Odette’s sister, Anne-Marie Miller, born after the war and living in California.  Ms. Miller wrote to me and told me I had captured Odette’s voice and spirit.  Could a writer ask for anything more?

TWM: Did you ever feel at a loss as the book’s author because you aren’t Jewish?
MM: In the first flush of enthusiasm for writing this book, I signed up for the Jewish Children’s Book Writing Conference in New York.   When I got there, I discovered myself to be the only shiksa.  I did wonder then whether I my passion for this story might be considered inappropriate.

But in the seventies I remember seeing a popular advertising campaign showing people of all kinds – old and young, dark-skinned and light – eating sandwiches made with rye bread.  The slogan underneath the posters was, “You Don’t have to be Jewish to love Levy’s.”  I think this was a successful slogan because people responded to its underlying message:  “We are all human; we feel things the same way.”  Similarly, I think you don’t have to be Jewish to love Odette and her touching struggle to save herself, body and soul.

Learn more about Maryann MacDonald>>>

Moderated by Sheri Allen, the panelists included Tony Barnstone, Jacqueline Osherow, Joy Ladin, and Yehoshua November. (I should mention Alicia Ostriker, Maria Mazziotti Gillan, Laura Boss, Elana Bell, Sharon Dolin, among others, were in the audience.)

Do yourself a favor and check out the work of these wonderful poets:

Tony Barnstone is the Chair of English at Whittier College in California and also teaches in the Stonecoast MFA program (University of Southern Maine). His books of poetry include The Golem of Los Angeles and The Tongues of War. I attended a session last year where Tony was a panelist — the topic was historical sources, contemporary poetry. He blew me away with his sonnets based on interviews with World War II veterans and he inspired me to take a blasé middle-grade nonfiction manuscript and rewrite it in verse.  (Note: Tony is not Jewish.)

Jacqueline Osherow, a distinguished professor of English and director of the creative writing program at the University of Utah, is the author of six books of poetry, including her most recent, Whitethorn. She was won several awards and fellowships. I appreciate her Yiddish sensibility.

Joy Ladin is Yeshiva University’s Gottesman Professor of English and is the author of six poetry books, including Coming to Life, named of of 2010′s most important Jewish poetry books. Her poetry approaches the reader’s soul.

Yehoshua November, who teaches writing at Rutgers University and Touro College, is the author of God’s Optimism, his debut poetry collection that won a Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award. His work is visceral and provocative.