I also did not say a word about it to Susan Hirschman before I turned it in because I think all it would have taken was for her to look at me hard and say, "You can't do that," and I would have caved. And I wrote and polished that book to a far more finished degree than The Thief. It requires readers to intuit more things about the story and that, perhaps, requires a more mature reader.Īlso, The Queen of Attolia contains one of the most upsetting first chapters I've ever read. I have been surprised when friends have said, "We're reading The Thief to our 10-year-old," because I was afraid the next thing they would say is, "And we're going to read Queen of Attolia next." It's hard to say to anyone they are not ready for Queen or King (of Attolia) but in those novels a lot more happens offstage. There are certain readers at 12 who are going to enjoy them, others, at 18. The age of the reader is not the best predictor as to whether they are going to enjoy the books. The Thief has always seemed to me to be written for a younger audience than the books that followed it, including A Conspiracy of Kings. My husband said, "If it's going to be one baby per book, I think we're done now." When Instead of Three Wishes came out, I was pregnant, and when The Thief came out I was pregnant a second time, and I had my third baby the week after I turned in the final draft of The Queen of Attolia. I was very surprised that they wanted to publish them. By the time I finished, I had an idea for a novel, so I sent the stories, sort of as a writing sample, to Greenwillow. I also thought those stories would go into a drawer and never see the light of day. I had been a bookseller and I chose short stories because I thought I could probably get one done. That was the year Mark had a Guggenheim Fellowship at UC-San Diego and that was the year I sat down to write. Was that a deliberate evolution?Īctually, I wrote those short stories about six blocks from where I'm living now. You began your writing career with a book of short stories ( Instead of Three Wishes, Greenwillow) and now you are working on a series that is epic in its sweep. I'm calling it "the year without baked food." I crave lasagna but the rent is low. However, the house we rented has almost no hot water, no central heating, and no oven. But here we are four blocks from the beach.
We live in Shaker Heights and kids play flashlight tag outside until 11 o'clock at night in the summer all by themselves.
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