Once Upon a Bookshelf

We Canadians who are big readers have things good. We’re right next to the USA so get most books published in the States as they’re published, without having to wait before they come out in our country. We get certain books from elsewhere in the world long before those in the USA (thinking of Catherine Webb’s Horatio Lyle books here among others), plus we have some positively fabulous Canadian authors ourselves.

One of those many talented authors is Maggie L. Wood, author of the Mistolear trilogy. Willow is just an ordinary 14-year-old girl in our world when the first book (The Princess Pawn) starts out, but soon is brought to Mistolear - the land that she learns she is originally from. What Willow soon realizes is that it’s up to her to save this realm she didn’t know really existed, as well as a royal family she didn’t know she had, from an evil elf who has enchanted Mistolear into a magical chess game.

In The Princess Mage, Willow is again playing games with the elves - but this time on their turf. For breaking one of the rules to the Elf Council, Willow is forced to into a game with the Goblin King, if it can be called a game when not everyone participates freely of their own will. It is, once again, up to Willow to keep Mistolear safe from the unfair games of the elves.

Maggie is currently working on The Princess Heir, the third book in the trilogy.

For the O’ Canada One Stop World Tour, Maggie has allowed me the opportunity of interviewing her.

Where did you get your inspiration for your trilogy?
The inspiration for the first book “The Princess Pawn” came to me while looking at an “Eyewitness” book on knights. I came across pictures of the Isle of Lewis chess set (where the pieces are carved to represent actual chessmen) and was just mesmerized by each piece’s wide-open eyes. I couldn’t seem to look away and kept returning to the picture to study it. I kept thinking the pieces’ eyes looked alive and next thing I knew I was playing the what-if game. What if someone was playing a magical chess game? What if people could get trapped inside the pieces? What if … What if … Next thing I was writing a book.

Did you have an idea of where each of the books was going before you started writing the trilogy, or have you just been letting your story take you where it will?
A little bit of both, actually. I always start out with an idea of where I want the story to go, but it’s usually pretty vague. For instance, in the second book “The Princess Mage,” I knew I wanted Willow to go to the faerie world of Clarion, but until I started writing the story, it was a mystery what would happen to her there. For me, letting the story take you where it will is one of the greatest pleasures of writing. Every day the excitement is tense and fresh, because it feels as though I’m living the adventure right there with my characters. (Of course, the pot load of green tea could have something to do with it too. Heh. Heh.)

Any word on the progress of the third book? Can you give us any hints as to what is happening in this installment?
I’m in the home stretch of “The Princess Heir,” as I’m starting to see glimpses of how it will end. Hints to what’s happening? Hmm. Well, this book is definitely different than the first two. The conflict in the first two books has been more outside Willow in the form of magical games, elves, goblins, etc. This third book, though, the conflict is more within than without, with Willow having to battle a terrible disease that makes her a pariah on Mistolear and mentally unhinges her. The disease, though, ends up being the key to how she can fight the Balance. But, it also becomes a light that shows Willow the inequality of power on Mistolear that, in being a protected princess, she has not noticed before. Honestly, I’m very excited to see how it’s all going to end. I have vague pictures of it, and I think it’s going to be satisfying.

If you could spend the afternoon with any one of your characters, which one would it be and what would you do?
What an interesting question! Who would I want to spend an afternoon with and what would we do? Hmm. Well, of course, I love Willow and Brand, but I feel like I already know so much about them. I think I would spend time with a lesser known character. I’m really intrigued by the faerie twins Dacia and Theon. There’s so much back story with them concerning their nefarious brother Nezeral that I would like to know more about. Yep, I think I’d take them both to a Starbucks and sit and chat about their sibling rivalries.

After this trilogy is done, what do you have planned as far as other books go?
Once this book is done, I am all set to start a new series. My two favourite genres are fantasy and historical, and this time I’d like to write a story that lets me explore both these passions. So think lush Italian Renaissance backdrop. Think brooding artists and powerful Medicis. Throw him some romance and a pinch of religious fervor. Then drop in a gypsy/angel girl and, voila, a recipe for an I-can’t-wait-to-write-this-book idea!

Did you always know you wanted to be a writer? And not just any kind of writer, but specifically a fantasy writer?
As a kid, I wanted to be a comic book artist. I drew and wrote my own comics all the time, but the art to me was always more important than the words. It wasn’t until I was 28 that I knew the words were going to be more important. My stepson and I liked to play/read the “Fighting Fantasy” game book series, which is sort of like a “Choose Your Own Adventure” where all the paragraphs are mixed up in the story/game. After playing about 40 of the game books, the thought just struck like lightning that *I* could write one these. And that’s exactly what I set out to do. So the first two books I wrote were game books that never got published. But a couple of editors said they liked my writing and if I wrote a ‘regular’ fantasy they would take a look. Oddly enough, though, the first novel I tried to write was a middle grade murder mystery, as, at the time, fantasy was not a very popular genre for most Canadian publishers, and I thought I’d have a better chance at getting published if I wrote more to what the publishers wanted. This, of course, did not work out at all, as I have no passion for murder mysteries. So, when that novel garnered enough rejections, I decided to write what I love best, which is fantasy, and “The Princess Pawn” was born.

Which authors have been the greatest influence on your writing?
Content-wise and genre-wise, I would say my biggest influences would have to be fairy tales and Sword and Sorcery comic books. Both these story mediums enthralled me as a child and seeded my love for reading fantasy-adventure type books. Style-wise my greatest influences would have to be contemporary writers. I remember when I first started to write seriously (with an eye to being published), the books I wanted to emulate were written by Canadian YA authors like Kit Pearson’s “A Handful of Time;” Welwyn Wilton Katz’s “The Third Magic;” Margaret Buffie’s “Who is Frances Rain;” and Martine Leavitt’s “The Dragon’s Tapestry.” I loved the immediacy and the realism of the main characters’ voices and the thrill of their adventures. For some reason, I don’t remember regular novels as being that exciting or as relevant to my own experience when I was growing up, which may be why I chose to read comic books more so than novels. But when I read those YA books, I knew that *that* was how I wanted to write.

And because this interview is in honour of the One Stop World Tour, it would seem silly to have it without a few questions about Canada. How do you think being a Canadian and living in Canada has had an effect on your writing?
Being Canadian hasn’t really affected my writing (yet). I think it’s because of the fantasy aspect. I actually avoid mentioning specific locations in my books, as I feel Willow could be any girl in North America and not just a Canadian girl. And it looks like my next books won’t have any Canadian content either. Maybe because I’m so used to living in such a wonderful country, I’m not as eager to write about it. Instead it makes me curious to explore others that may not be so wonderful. Hmm. Maybe being Canadian has affected my writing after all.

Why do you think, when we in Canada get so much exposure to American authors, is it so much harder for Canadian authors to penetrate the US market?
Numbers. The fact of the matter is that American authors and the American population in general so outnumber us that we’re like little sharp needles in vast haystacks. The Canadian authors that penetrate the U.S. market have American agents and sell simultaneously to American and Canadian publishers. But even that’s no guarantee of success. They still have to write books with broad marketing appeal, and, for a lot of writers that means taking out or diminishing their Canadian content. I’m not sure why this is so, as the American YA market seems to like other country’s stories (Australian and British spring to mind) but not so much Canadian stories. The only YA exception I can think of off the top of my head is Susan Juby’s “Alice, I Think” books, which, despite their *so* Canadian Smithers, B.C. location did quite well in the States.

Any other awesome Canadian authors you recommend us to read?
There’s so many! I love, of course, Susan Juby. I love Kenneth Oppel, Barbara Haworth-Attard, Martine Leavitt, Janet McNaughton, Karleen Bradford, Arthur Slade, Alyxandra Harvey-Fitzhenry, Carrie Mac, Richard Scrimger and Tim Wynne-Jones to name a few. I know there are a lot more too. Those are just the ones I can see on my book shelf at the moment.

Siblings and co-authors of Camp Creepy Time: The Adventures of Einstein P. Fleet, Gina Gershon and Dann Gershon were kind enough to answer a few questions about monsters, camp experiences, and their writing process.

I was a camp kid myself, so I want to say, firstly, how much fun it was to relive those summers through this book. Sadly, though, I didn’t go to a camp where we got to dress up as monsters. Were there any specific experiences from camp that you drew on for this novel?

DANN: Everyone has fond memories of spending a summer at sleep over camp. This wasn’t one of them. Stanley Ranch Camp, the model for Camp Creepy Time, wasn’t far off from the description in the book. It was located in the middle of the Mojave Desert. It was one hundred degrees in the shade during the day and freezing at night. The swimming pool was filled with algae, the facilities were rotting, and the infirmary was the only place with air conditioning. They did have horseback riding for a week or two and then the horses suddenly disappeared. I’m not sure what happened to them, but we seemed to have a surplus of hamburger after that. At night we sat around a roaring campfire, singing songs and roasting marshmallows. The desert was filled with rattlesnakes, so the sticks came in handy. We drew on several of these experiences in writing the book, although I made up the part about the monster theme camp. The rest of it is all true, I’m afraid.

GINA: Dann is older than I am, so we didn’t go to camp at the same time. He told me stories about Stanley Ranch, some of which we used in the book. “Capture the Flag” was played during the middle of the day as described in the book, with the campers falling like flies. Salt tablets were prescribed for dehydration, which we decided to use as the catalyst for the aliens turning the campers into monsters.

If you were to attend Camp Creepy Time, what cabins would you have been put in? (And, consequently, what kind of monster would you turn into?)

DANN: The real camp didn’t have cabins, so we slept outdoors surrounded by several large trees that were filled with wasp’s nests. We slept on old wire cots that were probably salvaged from a WWII prison camp. If we had cabins, I would have been requested the mummy section. A little extra padding would have come in handy.

GINA: I’d want to bunk with the vampires. Sleep all day, party all night. That’s the life. Maybe I am a vampire!

The two of you are siblings - did you find that made it easier to write this book, or harder due to the fact that most siblings are constantly squabbling with each other?

GINA: We didn’t have a lot of fights while we worked on the book, but the ones we did have were easy to work out. The fact is that, because of our work schedules, we were rarely in the same room.

DANN: It’s hard to strangle someone who’s living on the opposite coast.

Can you tell us a little bit about the process you went about writing this book together?

DANN: I worked on plot and story line, along with character development. Gina drew on her years of acting experience to punch up the dialogue and make sure that the characters stayed in character. Since we were rarely together, we worked mainly by e-mail, phone, and the occasional text message. It was very modern and extremely inconvenient.

GINA: My brother loves sci-fi and serial killer stories. Sometimes, the story line would cross those boundaries and I’d have to reel it in a bit. The concept for the story is really an adaptation of the old monster movies. After the studios ran out of Wolfman, Dracula, and Mummy scripts, they did these wild combinations with everyone and the kitchen sink. Most of the publishers we spoke with didn’t think that the idea for the book was workable. They didn’t think that you combine ghosts, werewolves, mummies, vampires, and aliens into a cohesive piece where all of the elements worked. The funny thing was that, not only was the idea workable, it was already a proven formula from the same period that we based the “Earth Stories” in the book.

DANN: The idea was that the aliens would be viewing movies fifty years after the fact, which is a scientific theory that I learned during an episode of Star Trek.

Camp has a habit of throwing a person in situations that would never happen under normal circumstances, and using those experiences to change a person. I imagine that it would happen to an even greater degree in this book. (I have to admit that I would totally have loved to be turned into a monster at camp for a little while!) How much of an impression do you think turning into a monster had on these kids? Is it something that could have a lasting effect on them?

GINA: That’s a fantastic question! And, it’s one that plays a big part in the sequel, so it’s going to have to remain a secret for a bit.

DANN: Actually, we liked the idea so much that we decided to open a camp just like the one in Camp Creepy Time. The first one will be built smack dab in the middle of the Mojave Desert. It’s part theme camp, part survival training. If it goes well, we’ll franchise.

One of the requirements for the kids getting accepted into Camp Creepy Time was that they watched a lot of monster movies. What are your favourite monster movies?

GINA: I love all the Frankenstein movies. Bride of Frankenstein was one of my favorites. So was Young Frankenstein. It was a great tribute to all of the Frankenstein flicks from the fifties, with a twisted sense of humor. I guess I’m abby-normal.

DANN: All of the old black and white horror flicks from the 50s are great, especially the ensemble pieces that Gina was talking about. They even added Abbott and Costello to the mix. My favorite movie is Army of Darkness from the Evil Dead series. It’s not out of that period, but it’s a riot. I think I’ve seen it at least a couple hundred times.

GINA: You’ve seen all of these movies a couple hundred times. You need to get out more.

Continuing on the topic of movies, word on the street is that DreamWorks has acquired the rights to this novel - does that mean we can 100% expect to see Camp Creepy Time being made into a movie?

GINA: DreamWorks acquired the film rights before the book was published and partnered with Nickelodeon. Richard LaGravenese was hired to adapt the book into a screenplay and the producers are both top notch. It’s a real dream team. In Hollywood, you never know what will happen, but the studios seem very serious about making the movie, so I hope that it happens.

DANN: I’ll believe it when I’m sitting in the theater, drinking a coke and eating a large tub of popcorn — or when the check clears. Seriously, the people working on the film are all amazing. When Gina told me that Steven Spielberg called, I thought she was playing a joke on me. It’s still hard to believe.

You’ve left the end of this book open for a sequel. Any hints as to what we can expect to see from Einstein P. Fleet in the future?

DANN: The book was written in two parts. Camp Creepy Time was part one of the story, which takes place on Earth. Mucho’s Monsters, the sequel, is the conclusion to the story in which Einstein ventures into space to help Roxie find her brother. We hope to have it finished sometime next year, barring fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, or anything else that disrupts phone and e-mail.

GINA: The sequel is a lot of fun, maybe even more so than the first book. Dann created several new characters that blog on The Smoking Peashooter, which is Einstein’s blog site in the first book. We thought it would be fun to take the story to an interactive level, so we built www.campcreepytime.com. Check it out. It’s lots of fun.

What are some of your favourite novels, and what would you recommend to someone who enjoyed Camp Creepy Time?

DANN: Confederacy of Dunces is one of my favorites. There is a lot of Ignatius in Einstein. Depending on the readers age and reading level, that’s a book that I would highly recommend.

GINA: Camp Creepy Time is kind of like a Bugs Bunny cartoon. A lot of the humor is targeted at an adult audience. My favorite book that I would recommend to someone who liked Camp Creepy Time is The Hobbit. Bilbo reminds me of Einstein sometimes. The grouchy hero.

Lastly - what kind of advice would you have for someone who was in danger of being abducted by a gang of aliens that were looking for humans to exibit in a space zoo?

GINA: Make sure to pack the right clothes for the trip.

DANN: Don’t let them go when no man has gone before and, if they do, it’s okay to scream.