I’m used to visiting magical worlds in my head, but while vacationing in the wintery Okanagan Valley this past week, I felt as if I had visited Whoville.
The heavy snowfall made all the trees bend and round, just as if they had been drawn for a Dr. Seuss cartoon, making the scenery appear truly magical . . .
It all just goes to show that no matter where you go, or what you do, you can find inspiration—I’m pretty sure some of these vistas will end up in a future story.
Today we toured the gingerbread display at the Hyatt Hotel in Vancouver. Check out all the great gingerbread art; my favourite is the Wizard of Oz one. Look closely, and you will also find the Grinch and a display from the movie Up.
With all the recent hype surrounding the theatrical release of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, I find myself recalling my early inspirations for Kendra Kandlestar and the Box of Whispers. It was ten years ago and I had just finished writing my first published book, Corranda’s Crown (thankfully now out of print!). I wasn’t sure what I would write next, so I just ended up doing a lot of painting. One of the pieces I produced was this one:
This painting clearly riffs on The Hobbit, a story that has fascinated me since I was a boy. Truth be told, my first connection to Tolkien’s world was not through his books, but through the wonderful animated version of The Hobbit that was made in the 1970s. Over the years, I was exposed not only to the books, but to all of the wonderful artwork that was produced of Middle Earth.
As an interesting side note, the premier illustrator of Tolkien’s world, John Howe, is Canadian by birth and, in fact, spent some of his youth in the same rural community—Keremeos—that my mom grew up in. If you want to explore Howe’s visionary take, then I encourage you to find a copy of the wonderful book, Myth & Magic: The Art of John Howe.
In any case, at the time I produced my humble painting, I had just re-read The Hobbit, so images of Middle Earth were vividly dancing in my imagination. Of course, at the time, I wasn’t thinking that my painting would lead to a book; I was just painting for fun. Don’t ask me how or why I chose the particular characters who are sneaking past the dragon. I just followed my whimsy and ended up with this peculiar gang of misfits.
When the painting was completed, I hung it on my studio wall, as is my custom, and left it there for a few weeks to see if I liked it. Funny thing is, I found myself concocting a little tale in my imagination to go along with it. I began asking myself, “Who are these characters?” And, “What’s inside that mysterious box?”
Well, the next thing I knew, I was answering these questions in my sketchbook. Then, to cut a long story short, I ended up writing Kendra Kandlestar and the Box of Whispers. 
Not all of these original characters survived my writing process to make it into the final book. You can probably guess that the rabbit became Kendra Kandlestar, but I wonder if you can find the precursors of Uncle Griffinskitch or Professor Bumblebean?
I never thought about my audience at the time, but Kendra Kandlestar has ended up being a sort of Hobbit for kids. The publisher thought it would be ages 8-12, but really, it’s turned out to be more for 7-11, with many parents and teachers reading it to their five- and six-year-olds. I suppose it’s all of the illustrations that call down to those younger kids.
There have been comparisons to the later books in the Kendra series to Lord of the Rings (I think Agent Lurk and Trooogul obsessing over the shard from Greeve has something to with that). Personally, I tend to think those books owe more to Star Wars than anything else . . . but I’ll leave you to be judge of that.
I just wrapped up a few creative writing classes in which we were studying the Origami Yoda books. For the uninitiated, these are fantastic middle-grade books by author Tom Angleberger. There are three books so far: The Strange Case of Origami Yoda, Darth Paper Strikes Back, and—the latest—The Secret of the Fortune Wookie (featuring my all-time favourite character).
Speaking of fortune, I’ve had the great joy to meet Tom Angleberger in person. He is certainly full of the Force, which you can tell if you listen to the interview we did in 2011.
One of the best things about the Origami Yoda books is that they offer teachers lots of great hands-on activities, foremost of which is Star Wars Origami. I thought I would post some pictures of some of my students’ creations.
By the way, I hope the next book involves Boba Fett (or whatever the origami equivalent of his name will be)!
I just finished my first complete version of my manuscript for Kendra Kandlestar and the Search for Arazeen, start to finish.
I actually completed it a few days ago, then woke up in the night and decided to rewrite the critical end scene. I worked on it for an afternoon, decided to go back to my original—and then rewrote it again to create a sort of hybrid for the two different versions. I’m still not sure about it, but I’ve left it with my “trusted others” to see what they think. Personally? I feel like the end is a bit like a Shakesperian play, with this character and that all entering and exiting the “stage” at one point or another. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not.
There has been a lot to accomplish in this last book in the series. I want to make sure that all the favourite characters have their moment in the spotlight, and I want to also make sure we (the readers and me) are able to bade farewell to certain settings or elements of the series too.
Of course, it would be wrong to say that I’m finished the book. There will be many edits and perhaps some major rewrites of certain scenes. And there are many illustrations to do as well . . . over a hundred!
Nonetheless, a certain milestone has been reached, so I get to celebrate Ald Meryn’s Eve with a certain peace of mind.
As part of my “Picture Perfect” class that I’m teaching this term, I recently rolled out an interesting activity to help my students understand the creative process.
The focus of the program is to find inspiration for creative writing through a study of art history. During our unit on Impressionism, I asked my students (ranging in age from 9-13) to choose a personal photograph and then produce a painting in the style of Impressionism. I was surprised to see that they found this difficult. Many of them love Impressionist art, but their instinct and desire was to paint realistically. I kept asking them to break free from this constraint and to stop painting what they saw, but what they felt.
This caused a lot of frustration and more than one student completely painted over the canvases they had just spent a long time labouring over. Personally, I loved witnessing this. It reminded me of the writing process, of ripping a page out of notebook and throwing it away (unfortunately, hitting the “delete” button on a keyboard these days isn’t quite as satisfying). The point is this: Just because you spend a long time on something doesn’t mean you should keep it. For younger students, this is a difficult concept to grasp. Mostly, I find they assume that you achieve success in writing by spending an allotted amount of time on a piece. But, of course, when it comes to art—whether it be writing, painting, acting (you name it)—this isn’t true. There is not magical equation of time for achieving artistic greatness.
As an illustrator, I’ve completely scrapped drawings and done them over from scratch. As a writer, I’ve written entire scenes, chapters, and sections of a book that must be deleted because, even after all those hours of work, they just don’t flow with the overall narrative. I’ve learned to detach myself from the time part of the equation. I just worry about making sure I’m satisfied with the end result. (Though, I suppose, I’m never completely satisfied—but that is a subject best pondered later, at another time).
The other interesting aspect of this painting activity is that it allowed my students to write an interesting story in which a character is described in the act of painting. Having the experience of painting themselves, my students could describe the act with more truthful description and emotion.
And, of course, the paintings turned out well too, as you can see below.
This weekend is the annual “Yoda Yulefest” party we host each year. Authors, artists, actors and all those otherwise creatively inclined will descend upon our merry little home to celebrate the season. In advance, the Padawans and I have been busy making preparations, baking cookies and decorating the house.
Here’s this year’s edition of Santa Yoda cookies:
Our tree features many Yoda decorations, including this, the ultimate tree-topper.
Plus, we have some fun dioramas. We figure Jawas and Ewoks are pretty much the Star Wars equivalent of Santa’s Elves . . .
The night will feature some Star Wars holiday music and, as is tradition, the annual reading of ‘Twas the Night before Yulefest, which you can read here by clicking on my post from last year.
Happy Yoda Yulefest to one and all!
This past two weeks I’ve been working on updating the map of Een. The interactive version in colour has now been updated on kendrakandlestar.com. It now features some new links, including Fledgling Wood (which will play an important part in Kendra Kandlestar and the Search for Arazeen) and the house of fan-favourite, Honest Oki.
I thought I would post the short piece below from one of my long-time students, Rachel Kim. She has been with me for a few years now and currently she’s working on an interesting novel about a character who lives in an oppressive society. The best parts of Rachel’s book—the parts I’m really enjoying—are these short interludes in which her protagonist converses with her own inner soul in a sort of metaphorical prison.
Here’s an excerpt from the most recent scene Rachel shared with me. Oh—by the way, I should add that Rachel is only twelve!
* * *
An excerpt from Trapped (temporary title)
“I see you have made a quite good progress,” the soul complimented as she settled herself on the windowsill.
“Thank you,” I replied, quickly adverting my eyes from the sun’s radiance. “It wasn’t without pain, though,” I whispered as I unconsciously fiddled with the dent on the chain.
“You have often repeated this quote yourself: ‘No pain, no gain’,” the soul replied curtly. “Though I believe this could have gone with rather less pain, save your frequent outbursts to your Educator,” she added with a hint of a smile upon her marred lips. But something about the soul was reforming. Her grievous appearance seemed to be lightened by a mysterious cause and she was less aggravated.
“Well, I believed he deserved it, but after a few weeks of my defiance, he was surely more irritable and cross than usual.” I smiled at the memory of the weariness of the Educator as he was forced to face my colorful tunic, which I had continued to wear, even after my punishment. In fact, days had passed since I had first donned it.
“He will be crosser, and he would not be the only one, as the manacles are more marred,” cautioned the soul. “But if you truly want freedom, that is a trifle of a sacrifice.”
“And I truly want freedom,” I replied confidently, as I once again took up the dagger and began to saw.
It’s been a busy week writing, teaching, and presenting at two different schools . . . but still, somehow, I found time to work on a new version of the map for Land of Een. I was never quite happy with the one I’m currently using. Now that we’re producing brand-new editions of the series (and preparing for Book 5) I thought I would redo the map. In particular, I wanted to add labels to a few different locations, some of which are important to the new book.
Here’s a look at it so far . . .
What do you think? I think it still needs a few tweaks.
Eventually, I’ll update the one that you can currently find on kendrakandlestar.com, with all of the interactive buttons to the different locations in that land tucked between the cracks of here and there.
Between the Cracks of Here and There 