An Interview with Zoey Abbott Interviewed by John Repplinger July 19, 2023 Zoey Abbott is a children’s book author and illustrator who lives in Portland, OR. She loves her dog, Carrots, and her family too. She also loves writing books for kids and for herself. For Zoey, making stories is an indulgence, a spiritual practice, and a way to sort out things that make no sense. Zoey is the author of four books, one of which (Pig and Horse and the Something Scary) was recently named a finalist for an Oregon Book Award and is also a Powell's Books Bestseller. Zoey's work is consistently described as "weird" which she takes as a compliment. Icebreaker: If you could choose to be any fruit or vegetable, what would it be and why? I like the vegetable, okra, because it is green, soft yet crispy, and also slimy - if you blanch it just right. It’s surprising and fresh and the seeds pop when your teeth crunch down. I love my dad’s mulberry tree. The berries taste the best when they look the worst. Many authors have people or events in their lives that inspire them to write a book. What inspired you to start writing and illustrating children’s books? As a default, I’ve always liked playing with bits of stories in my head, noticing things that come together in interesting ways but I never knew what to do with it. And I’ve always loved making little cards and books for family and friends. When I moved to Japan in my 20’s, I couldn't speak the language very well so I would make drawings for the people who welcomed me into their homes, taught me their language, culture and how to eat a whole fish with chopsticks, for example. A friend liked my cards and introduced me to an amazing Sumi-e painting teacher. She became a dear friend and mentor. Shortly after I moved back to the States I made a hand-bound book with little stories and episodes for my mom’s birthday. She opened the gift when she was getting her haircut and the stylist later contacted me and asked me to make a book for her sister. It was the first time I saw there was a way to make this kind of art into a “job”. I spent a number of years making simple illustrated books on commission for clients based on interviews and reference material they provided. I got to help propose to two women this way - a ring hidden in a cut out in the back of a book once. How fun is that? Years later I took a children’s book illustration night class with Victoria Jameison at PNCA. I loved her class so much I think I ended up taking it 3 times. She is the one who demystified the publishing industry and shared her own path for making work. There are a lot of us illustrators in Portland who owe our careers in some way to Victoria. Can you explain what the writing process is like for you? Do your illustrations influence your storylines? I think we all collect things from daily life, what we read, see, who we meet, landscapes, interactions, dreams, memories etc. If we are lucky, some of these things combine in interesting ways and we are inspired to make something new from it. Some of my book ideas start with words and others with pictures. When I’m working on an idea. I like to toggle back and forth between the two. Switching can help me get unstuck. Working on multiple stories at a time is also good for keeping things fluid and flowing. My first two publishing jobs were for illustration. When you receive a manuscript you can’t just illustrate what is said in the text. This would be redundant and boring - nobody would read that book. You’ve got to find the spaces between the text and find a secondary visual narrative. With a good manuscript there will be all this airyness - all kinds of space for you to do your work. Things won’t be said explicitly or fully resolved in the text. The illustrator has to solve these puzzles in a fun and unexpected way. I think the same thing goes when you are illustrating your own book. The illustrator-self gets to take the story and make it her own. Hopefully the writer-self is amused and surprised. What is most challenging for writing and illustrating children’s books? At the beginning, I would say learning the craft was the most challenging. I had to put in the time and teach myself how to draw better - to be able to make my ideas make sense visually and be consistent. Then I had to study the format, rules and particular qualities of a picture book, learn about pacing, page turns and stakes. You have to read a lot. A picture book is an object in space, held in a person’s hands with pages that turn. Learning how to exploit and not squander all these amazing physical qualities of a book in a story is challenging and exciting. Also, making picture books is collaborative. Finding trusted people to share your work with (at the right time) and learning how to critique well with others is very important. It requires time, energy, mutual trust and vulnerability to seek and find critique partners - to learn how to give good feedback and how to receive it as part of one’s process. When you find your people, the work is so much better - more fun and done with more ease. For a long time I would feel too shy or embarrassed to share my work and would often ‘pass’ when it was my time to share work in our group. Learning how to share has been key for me. The moment you send a draft into the world you see it differently even if someone else doesn’t open the email. Other eyes and ears on the work keeps it moving and flowing and growing. The same goes for finding an agent and editors who resonate with your stories. When I’m at an impasse, my agent somehow gives me just exactly the notes I need. And the editors are the same. One person’s name might end up on the spine of the book - but really there could be a dozen, at least. Finding the right collaborators is the thing. What art mediums do you use? For Pig and Horse and the Something Scary I used pencil, colored pencil, gouache and then some sumi-e ink for the manifestation of Pig’s fears. I have tended to use some combination of these materials in most of my books. My most recent book, Banana, however, is a combination of pencil line art and color printing. I made textures and patterns in various mediums, scanned them in and risograph printed them at OUTLET PDX. I combined these with the line drawings using photoshop. You mention having children and a dog (Carrots) on your website bio. How do you balance writing and illustrating with other aspects of your life? When my kids were young it was harder to make time to work, but they were also infinitely inspiring which was a real gift. Now my kids are teenagers so parenting is a little less intensely hands-on. I think being a parent of humans and dogs (or any kind of pets) can be great inspiration for books. Location is an important element of a story, and you have a variety of scenes throughout your books such as where the wolves live in Over the Moon, Clementine’s house, and the banana store. How do you select your locations and scenes? For I Do Not Like Yolanda, I heavily relied on memories of my neighborhood growing up (and also some reference photos provided by my dad) of our local post office and businesses like Happy Donut, Shufat’s Market and neighborhoods. I tend to use real places in memory as a starting point for locations - not for any reason except that they are readily available. Do you base any of your characters on people you know? I might not set out to do this intentionally but I definitely end up seeing friends and family in my characters. In retrospect, Horse is definitely my best friend, Veneta, who has a big, beautiful mane of hair, a huge smile and is full of insight and loving support. I am Pig, nervous and worried and pink. It seems like my dad ends up in a lot of my books– if you see a bearded man—that might be him. Prickly Aunt Mildred was inspired directly by my Grandmother, Joan, who wore a black pant-suit with palm trees almost every day. Mildred’s one line in the book is something my grandmother actually said to me over dinner. She was never boring, that’s for sure. Your stories touch on certain themes. Pig and Horse and the Something Scary, for example, touches on facing fears and anxiety. Why did you choose to write a children’s book on these topics? How do you select themes for your books? Honestly, I don’t really think about themes while I’m writing and I might not even know what the book is ‘about’ until the book is done and someone(s) tells me. To me a story is a conversation and exploration and a discovery. The reader gives a book its meaning, if it has any. What do you hope readers will take away from your books? If you could talk directly to your readers, what would you say? Reading a children’s picture book is often a shared experience between an adult/reader and a child/pre-reader. I hope kids enjoy reading the book (on their own or with someone), laugh a little, and find some part of it that maybe resonates. Maybe they use the story as a jumping off point for their own stories. I’ve seen that before. A kid will say as an example, “Well, I think you should have made the banana do this!” Then they go off and draw their idea and make it their own. I like to go to school visits and see what kids are writing and drawing. I think kids are better at this job than we are—they are the ones who are swimming in the subconscious. They have unfettered fun and delight and don’t hold back. That’s where the good stuff lives. Do you have any new books or projects that you’re working on that you’d like to mention? I am currently working on the final art for A Kite Story to publish with Kids Can Press in 2025. This Year a Witch! will also publish in 2025 with Caitlyn Dlouhy Books/ Atheneum, an imprint of Simon and Schuster. Graham Salisbury is an American children's writer. His best-known work is Under the Blood Red Sun, a historical novel that features a Japanese-American boy and his family during World War II. He was a pop musician in the late 1960s under the name of Sandy Salisbury. His first novel, Blue Skin of the Sea: a Novel in Stories (1992) received many awards, including Best Book of the Year by School Library Journal, Best Books for Young Adults by the American Library Association, Parent's Choice Book Award, Bank Street Child Study Book Award, Oregon Book Award, the Judy Lopez Memorial Award for Children's Literature (Women's National Book Association), NCTE Notable Trade Book in the Language Arts (National Council of Teachers of English), and the Pen/Norma Klein Award for emerging voice of literary merit among American writers of children's fiction. Two years later, he published Under the Blood Red Sun (1994) which received eighteen award nominations across the nation. It is now a movie made available on Amazon. He wrote three additional titles in that series. He authored seven middle-grade books and nine books in the Calvin Coconut children's series, all of which were similarly well-received and nationally praised. Salisbury became a well-known songwriter and musician from the late 1960s. Under the performing name of Sandy Salisbury, he is best known for being a member of Curt Boettcher's groups The Millennium and The Ballroom, whose 1966 album remained unreleased until 2001, before attempting a solo career of his own. He performed on many hit recordings from bands such as The Association, Paul Revere and The Raiders, Tommy Roe, and many others. Salisbury was born in Philadelphia. He grew up in Hawaii and lived in Kailua, Oahu. Later he attended Hawaii Preparatory Academy in Kamuela, Hawaii. He lives with his family in Lake Oswego, Oregon. Content and image source from: Graham Salisbury's website and Wikipedia Rosanne Parry grew up in Oregon loving its rainy days, wild places, and many libraries. She is the author of seven novels for young readers, including the NY Times best sellers A Wolf Called Wander and A Whale of the Wild which have been translated into more than 14 languages. Her first picture book is Big Truck Day! Her next novel will be A Horse Called Sky. Look for it in the fall of 2023. Rosanne is a bookseller at legendary bookstore, Annie Blooms. She lives with her family in an old farmhouse in Portland and writes in a treehouse in her backyard. Ten things to know about Rosanne Parry: 1. I was born in Oak Park, IL and lived just a mile or so from the childhood home of the author Ernest Hemingway. His house is more than twice and big as the one I lived in when I was little but mine is closer to Longfellow Park which was my favorite place to play. I moved away from Oak Park when I was five. 2. I grew up in Portland, Oregon where I live now with my family in a farm house that is more than 100 years old. Sometimes I have chickens and sometimes I have rabbits and always I have a very weedy garden. My summer office is in a fir tree. I have many cherry, plum, and pear trees, a walnut tree, an apple tree and a very peculiar-looking peach tree. 3. I have also lived in Spokane, WA, Taholah, WA, Ft Huachuca, AZ, Aschaffenburg, Germany, and Ft Hood, TX. I have visited all but 8 of the states in America so I’m definitely looking for an excuse to visit North Dakota, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and Maine. 4. My favorite job, besides writing, was being a summer camp counselor. I worked at Camp Howard which is on the slope of Mt. Hood. I still go camping there every year if I can. Here is a view of Mt Hood from Trillium Lake. 5. I can play the violin, and I can juggle, and I am learning to play the harp, but I cannot throw a frisbee to save my life. 6. My grandfather lived with my family when I was growing up. He was born in Berlin. He immigrated to this country when he was a teenager in 1905, and he lived to be 96 years old. 7. I have a brother and a sister who are twins, four children who are not twins and more than thirty nieces and nephews. Mark Twain said, “A man with a big family stands a broader mark for sorrow, but he stands a broader mark for joy as well.” I have found that to be true. 8. Research is one of my favorite things about writing. Sometimes I research in the library but sometimes I research while camping in the mountains or canoeing on rivers and lakes. I go to museums. I go looking for whales in a kayak. I take pictures of plants and animals and listen to birds and the sound of the wind. I swim in the ocean and listen to people sing and learn how to dance. And best of all, I talk to interesting people from all over the world. 9. When I am not writing, I like to ride my bike, hike, make music, climb trees, dance, go to the beach or the mountains, and read books. 10. Lots of really great children’s authors and illustrators live in Portland. My favorite thing about being a children’s writer is the friends I have made. These are some writers I know from Portland: Susan Blackaby, Carmen Bernier-Grand, Carolyn Digby Conahan, Virginia Euwer Wolff, Trudy Ludwig, Susan Hill Long, Fonda Lee, Heidi Schultz, Barry Deutsch, Emily Whitman, Susan Fletcher, Emily Winfield Martin, Graham Salisbury, Laini Taylor, Dylan Meconis, Kim Johnson, and Heather Vogel-Frederick. I hope you read and enjoy their books too. Content and image source from: Goodreads and Rosanne Parry's website. Joe Sacco was born in Malta on October 2, 1960. At the age of one, he moved with his family to Australia, where he spent his childhood until 1972, when they moved to Los Angeles. He began his journalism career working on the Sunset High School newspaper in Beaverton, Oregon. While journalism was his primary focus, this was also the period of time in which he developed his penchant for humor and satire. He graduated from Sunset High in 1978. Sacco earned his B.A. in journalism from the University of Oregon in 1981 in three years. He was greatly frustrated with the journalist work that he found at the time, later saying, "[I couldn't find] a job writing very hard-hitting, interesting pieces that would really make some sort of difference." After being briefly employed by the journal of the National Notary Association, a job which he found "exceedingly, exceedingly boring," and several factories, he returned to Malta, his journalist hopes forgotten. "...I sort of decided to forget it and just go the other route, which was basically take my hobby, which has been cartooning, and see if I could make a living out of that," he later told the BBC. He began working for a local publisher writing guidebooks. Returning to his fondness for comics, he wrote a Maltese romance comic named Imħabba Vera ("True Love"), one of the first art-comics in the Maltese language. "Because Malta has no history of comics, comics weren't considered something for kids," he told Village Voice. "In one case, for example, the girl got pregnant and she went to Holland for an abortion. Malta is a Catholic country where not even divorce is allowed. It was unusual, but it's not like anyone raised a stink about it, because they had no way of judging whether this was appropriate material for comics or not." Eventually returning to the United States, by 1985 Sacco had founded a satirical, alternative comics magazine called Portland Permanent Press in Portland, Oregon. When the magazine folded fifteen months later, he took a job at The Comics Journal as the staff news writer. This job provided the opportunity for him to create another satire: the comic Centrifugal Bumble-Puppy, a name he took from an overly-complicated children's toy in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. But Sacco was more interested in travelling. In 1988, he left the U.S. again to travel across Europe, a trip which he chronicled in his autobiographical comic Yahoo. The trip lead him towards the ongoing Gulf War (his obsession with which he talks about in Yahoo #2), and in 1991 he found himself nearby to research the work he would eventually publish as Palestine. The Gulf War segment of Yahoo drew Sacco into a study of Middle Eastern politics, and he traveled to Israel and the Palestinian territories to research his first long work. Palestine was a collection of short and long pieces, some depicting Sacco's travels and encounters with Palestinians (and several Israelis), and some dramatizing the stories he was told. It was serialized as a comic book from 1993 to 2001 and then published in several collections, the first of which won an American Book Award in 1996. Sacco next travelled to Sarajevo and Goražde near the end of the Bosnian War, and produced a series of reports in the same style as Palestine: the comics Safe Area Goražde, The Fixer, and the stories collected in War's End; the financing for which was aided by his winning of the Guggenheim Fellowship in April 2001. Safe Area Goražde won the Eisner Award for Best Original Graphic Novel in 2001. He has also contributed short pieces of graphic reportage to a variety of magazines, on subjects ranging from war crimes to blues, and is a frequent illustrator of Harvey Pekar's American Splendor. Sacco currently lives in Portland. Content and source image: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/32468.Joe_Sacco Emmett Wheatfall lives in Portland, Oregon where he writes, records, publishes, and performs poetry. Fernwood Press, an imprint of Barclay Press has published 3 books of Emmett's poetry. His collection titled As Clean as a Bone was published in May 2018. As Clean as a Bone was a 2019 Eric Hoffer Award Finalist as well as a da Vinci Eye award finalist. Our Scarlet Blue Wounds was published in November 2019. Our Scarlet Blue Wounds examines American “Exceptionalism” in light of political, social, and economic constructs in America. Published in June 2022 is his most recent poetry book titled With Extreme Prejudice: Lest We Forget. This new publication recalls and examines the early days of COVID-19. Emmett has recorded one non-lyrical (without music) poetry CD titled I Speak and four lyrical poetry (with music) CDs. They are When I Was Young (2010), I Loved You Once (2011), Them Poetry Blues (2013), and Welcome Home (2017). These CDs feature some of Oregon’s most gifted and talented jazz, blues, and gospel musicians. Somebody Told Me (2020) is his first lyrical poetry gospel single. Following it up is Amazing Grace featuring LaRhonda Steele (2020). His new single is What A Friend We Have In Jesus (2022) and features some of Portland, Oregon's finest gospel musicians and vocalists. These releases can be viewed, heard, and or downloaded from major online music sites such as Amazon Music and Spotify, including a host of other such download sites. Since 2014, Emmett has served on the Nomination Committees for the selection of Oregon Poet Laureate Peter Sears, Elizabeth Woody, Kim Stafford, and Anis Mojgani. The Oregon Poet Laureate fosters the art of poetry, encourages literacy and learning, addresses central issues related to humanities and heritage, and reflects on public life in Oregon. The poet laureate is appointed by the governor of the State of Oregon. Emmett was a featured poet at the 50th Anniversary Celebration of the March on Washington (Portland Event) where he delivered his original poem written for the occasion, Miles to Go Before We Sleep. In addition, he was the keynote speaker at the screening of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech for the Oregon Historical Society’s Oregon Black History Series program, “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom Fiftieth Anniversary” on August 28, 2013. In October of 2017 and 2021, Emmett gave the keynote address at the Oregon Poetry Association's Annual Conference in Portland, Oregon. The title of his keynote address was "Can Poets Change the World?" In 2020, Corban University in Salem, Oregon filmed a 9-Part Series featuring poet Wheatfall. This series was made possible by generous grants from the Library of America and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of Lift Every Voice, a year-long national celebration of African American poetry. A Brief History can be viewed at the following YouTube link https://youtu.be/JFZM7Iqwnsg. Emmett has performed lyrical and spoken word poetry in Portland jazz venues such as Ivories Jazz Lounge and Restaurant, Tony Starlight's Supper Club and Lounge, Backspace Café (formerly), Portland's fabulous Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, and many venues in Portland and throughout the State of Oregon. Emmett has had the distinct opportunity to headline at Jimmy Mak’s; the former premier Northwest Jazz club once regarded as one of America's top 100 Jazz Clubs. Emmett has performed and recorded with world-class Jazz and blues musicians in the persons of Noah Peterson (Peterson Entertainment LLC), national and international jazz recording artist Darrell Grant, Gordon Lee, Andre St. James, Brandon Woods, John Thomas, Christ Turner, Ben Jones, Anthony Jones; Canadian pianist Gaea Shell, Eldon T. Jones, James (Jim) Blackburn, and Ramsey Embick (former pianist and bandleader for the Pointer Sisters); notwithstanding Portland's late-great and legendary bass player James Miller. The "Boss of the B-3 Hammond" Mr. Louis Pain, aka “King Louie,” as well as Carlton Jackson, Peter Dammann, Renato Caranto, and Edwin Coleman III; Salem, Oregon great Nathan Olsen, and Portland concert pianist Michael Allen Harrison. Portland vocalists Barbara Harris, including the highly regarded jazz, blues, and gospel artist LaRhonda Steele, Portia Jones, Amy Lesage, and Linda Tellis. Most noteworthy is the late great Grammy-nominated jazz, blues, gospel pianist extraordinaire, Ms. Janice Scroggins. Content and image source from: Goodreads and Emmett Wheatfall's website. Cindy Baldwin is the author of the critically acclaimed novels Where the Watermelons Grow, Beginners Welcome, The Stars of Whistling Ridge, and No Matter the Distance (a Junior Library Guild selection). She lives just outside Portland, Oregon, with her husband and daughter.
"For as long as I can remember, I have wanted to tell stories—probably because my imagination was so vivid as a child that I was convinced that the Three Bears slept on the other side of my queen-sized bed and that a volcano was likely to rupture underneath my house at any moment. When I was eight, before computers were nearly as common as they are now, I taught myself how to type so that I could get the stories in my head down faster than I could with a pen and paper. As an adult I type about 150 words per minute, so I guess it paid off! I have a genetic disease called cystic fibrosis, and my health challenges have always been both a big part of my life and a big influence on my writing. One of my first books (also written when I was about eight) was a melodrama about a princess locked in a tower that featured villains named most cleverly after two of my inhaled medications (Albuterol and Vanceril, in case you’re wondering). As a preteen, I had books stashed all over my house in case I found myself nearby without reading material. For years, I kept a book in one bathroom cabinet in particular, just on the off-chance that I was brushing my teeth or visiting the toilet without another book at hand. (I remember this book most often being either ELLA ENCHANTED by Gail Carson Levine or FAR TO GO by Noel Streatfeild.) As a grown-up, it’s my goal to write the kinds of books that kids will want to stash in bathroom cabinets. Like many of my characters, I grew up in the South (Durham, North Carolina, to be precise). I moved away after graduating high school and haven’t been back since, but my heart will always love the humidity, lightning bugs, and warm accents. These days, my home is in Portland, Oregon, which is a different kind of magic—and while I’ll always miss the South, I’m growing to love the misty winters and the wild blackberries, too! I live in a cute little house called Maple Cottage with my husband and daughter, who looks like she just might turn out to be a storyteller, too." Source: cindybaldwinbooks.com |
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