Wordcraft blog by Avi

Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 1, The True Confessions
of Charlotte Doyle

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This summer and early fall, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

We’ve come to #1. Does it surprise you that the most-read of my story behind the story is The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle? It was my 22nd book and a Newbery Honor winner in 1991. 

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The True Confessions of Charlotte DoyleI began the last story about a story by telling how book A (Something Upstairs) led to book B (The Man Who Was Poe). Here is the story how the Poe book led to Book C, The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle.

Poe is generally credited with having invented the detective tale with his short story, Murders in the Rue Morgue. (1841) That story, profoundly influential, also came to be known as a “Locked Room Mystery.” Which is to say something happens in a room that is presumably inaccessible.

Well, I thought, living as I was on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, what could be more of a “Locked Room” than a sailing ship at sea?

If you turn to page 129 of The Man Who Was Poe, you will find these words by a character named Captain Elias:

“Now, Master Edmund, if you’ve time to hear a good yarn, I’ve one for you. You see, The Lady Liberty had a sister ship. Seahawk, her name was—”

When I wrote those words, it was the beginning of my thinking of The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle: I would write a “locked room” mystery set on a 19th Century sailing ship. I even signed the contract to write a book which, for the moment, was called The Seahawk.

But I didn’t begin the book. The first problem was that for about eight months, I moved to Venice, Italy. My wife had a sabbatical; and a former editor of mine offered a Venetian apartment. I could not resist.

Indeed Venice was a fabulous experience.

However, I had not reckoned on two things. Being surrounded by the Italian language (or the Venetian version of it) meant that I was, to my great surprise, radically hampered in my writing. It crimped my rhythms, made my English excessively formal and ornate, and stunted my vocabulary. Also, this being in the early days of portable computers, my access to a printer was once a week. A key part of my writing process was missing.

I stopped writing the book. All I could do was think about it.

Only when I returned to Providence did I resume writing and by then the book had become The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle. It also began as a mystery, and while it has elements of that, it traveled on to become something rather different.

The book was done (I thought) when editor Richard Jackson called. “I’ve been thinking,” he said. “We missed something. When Charlotte leaves the boat after the voyage, she doesn’t say goodbye to the crew. That’s out of character.”

Which is to say, since I had written the ending, I knew she would return to the ship. But at the narrative moment, she did not. Only then did I write that farewell scene on page 199. When the character Ewing says, “You’re my mermaid now,” I had tears in my eyes because like so many readers, I too had fallen in love with Charlotte ,,, but it was time for me to say “bon voyage.”

But wait! That was not the end of The Seahawk. She reappears in another book! Beyond the Western Sea.

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questionMost often asked question:

Will I write a sequel? The short answer is, no. My reason: Countless readers have told me how important Charlotte has been to them. The importance has to do with Charlotte’s growth and move toward independence. If I said what Charlotte did with her life, I think it would diminish her release to an open world. I’d rather let every reader choose what Charlotte does, even as I hope they will choose what they do with their lives.

Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 2, Nothing But the Truth

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This summer and early fall, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

As we continue our countdown, Nothing But the Truth is #2 on the most-read list, my 24th book and a Newbery Honor winner in 1992. Although it was written 26 years ago, many people tell me that it is especially relevant today.

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Nothing But the Truth

Nothing but the Truth came to be written because of a series of seemingly unrelated experiences.

To begin: In my college playwriting days I became very interested in a Depression era play form called “Living Newspapers.” These were theatre pieces which, for a plot, tried to teach the audience about something, mostly the current events of the day. The productions used all kinds of teaching/theatre techniques, memos, speeches, charts on screens, trying to inform the audience as to what was happening. They were, if you will, documentary plays.

I even tried to write a living newspaper. About education. Not very good.

Now jump to my interest in games, board games, which I played with my boys. Monopoly® comes to mind. And in particular the mystery game, Clue®.

I was also reading and writing mystery fiction. No More Magic and Emily Upham’s Revenge had been recognized by the Mystery Writers of America.

One day, while wandering through a flea market I came upon a unique boxed mystery game. In the box was all the evidence for a murder case. Detective reports. Photographs. Transcripts of interviews. And so on. There was even an envelope which contained a cigarette stub with lipstick on it! The idea being you went through all this evidence (what lawyers call “discovery”) and then you tried to figure out who the criminal was. A sealed envelope was included which gave the villain’s name. Very cool, indeed.

A few years later I came across the same game, but now, all the evidence was put together in book format. There even was an image of that cigarette stub. This showed me that one could put that entire “discovery” file together so that it made a book. The narrative was merely the sequence of documents.

At the same time I was, in my capacity as an author, making many school visits. Spend a lot of time in a school that way, and you pass a fair number of hours in the teachers’ room. Amazing what you hear there, especially since not everyone knew who I was.

Finally, I read a newspaper story about a kid who refused to sing The Star Spangled Banner in a schoolroom, and the local uproar it caused.

Put all this together, and I hope you can see how Nothing But The Truth evolved. Not beside the point, the original title of the book was Discovery. And the half title of the book was: A Documentary Novel.

The book was written very quickly, much faster than my normal time. I wrote it so fast that I wondered if it was making any sense. That’s why I sent the first half of it to my editor, Richard Jackson. I asked him if the book was working and should I continue.

“Working fine,” he said. “Keep going.”

I did.

That said, I knew it was quirky. Would anyone read it?

So when I got the call that The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle had won a Newbery Honor, my first thought (truly) was, “Oh, good. Now folks will read Nothing but the Truth.

They did.

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questionMost often asked question:

When the book was first published time, and time again, different teachers would take me aside and ask: “Did you write Nothing but the Truth because someone told you what had happened in my school?

Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 3, Something Upstairs

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This summer and early fall, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

As we continue our countdown, Something Upstairs is #3 on the most-read list, my 20th book.

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  1. Something UpstairsI was living in Los Angeles, one of the USA’s newest cities. I moved to Providence, Rhode Island, one of the USA’s oldest cities. The city is like a museum of early American architecture. It was rather like traveling back in time.
  2. The Providence house I moved into was a charming old one, built in 1835.
  3. The top floor was an attic that had been converted into an apartment. It had old wooden floors, and in the back was a small room. It had a stain on the floor.
  4. I began to wonder who had lived in my house a long time ago.
  5. I started to read about Providence history.
  6. I was visiting a school somewhere. A teacher took me aside and said, “I have a student who says it’s urgent that he talk to you alone. I don’t know what it’s about. But he’s very insistent. Could you spare a few moments?”
  7. My curiosity piqued I said, “Sure.” I was led into a small office and there was a boy sitting there fiddling with a key chain. I sat down, introduced myself, and said, “I understand you want to talk to me.” He said. “I just wanted to say hello.” That was it. He had no more to say. But the moment becomes a key part of my book. It’s very believable because, in part, it is true.
  8. I put all of this together and wrote a ghost story set in the house.
    See point 3.
  9. I had written the book, but had no title. On another school visit, I read the beginning of the book to a class. They liked it. Then I said, “I have no title for it. Anybody have a suggestion?” A girl raised her hand. She said, “Why don’t you call it Something Upstairs?”
  10. Done.

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questionMost often asked question:

“What parts of the story are true?”

If you would like to see the house where I set this story, go to Google Maps, and request a look at 15 Sheldon Street, Providence R.I.

Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 4, Who Stole the Wizard of Oz?

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This summer, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

As we continue our countdown, this book is #4 on the most-read list, my 11th book.

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Atlas of FantasyMany people are fascinated by maps. I knew a serious book collector who built a large library of books which were selected because they had maps in them. For example, Treasure Island, famously, has a map in it. Indeed, it’s said that Stevenson drew the map for his step-son first, and then wrote the book.

I too like maps, and so, back in the day when I working as a librarian, I was intrigued when a new atlas came into the reference collection. To my great delight it was an atlas of fantasy lands. A wonderfully clever idea, it was fun to see maps of, not just Treasure Island, but the lands of Oz, the Thousand-acre Woods, and so on.

As I was going through the book I realized an important map was missing: the chessboard from Through the Looking Glass, by Lewis Carroll. That was the beginning of my thinking of the book which became Who Stole the Wizard of Oz?

Who Stole the Wizard of Oz?My notion was to write a mystery in which the essential clues were to be found in the maps of well-known children’s books—books which had been stolen from the Checkertown, Ohio Library. When I first wrote the book it was to be a sequel to my first novel, No More Magic. It didn’t quite work, so I revised it heavily, and it became this book.

When an innocent Becky has been accused of stealing The Wizard of Oz, she and her twin brother Toby need to track down the real thief, and find a hidden treasure, using story maps as essential clues. (Hint: a checkerboard and a chessboard are identical) And, if it brought my readers to The Wind in the Willows, Winnie-the-Pooh, the Oz books, Treasure Island, and Through the Looking Glass, so much the better.

In short, Who Stole the Wizard of Oz? is a book about books brought into my head by yet another book. That’s what happens when the writer is also a librarian.

Curious fact: There is a moment in the story when Becky and Toby are in the library and become frightened when someone suddenly appears. As written, Toby stands behind Becky. This was the moment the publisher chose for a cover illustration, but they put a much older looking Toby in front of Becky. When I complained, subsequent editions shifted the characters’ positions.

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questionMost often asked question:

“Were you thinking of a real library when you wrote this book?”

Yes: the Floyd Memorial Library, in Greenport, NY.

Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 5, The Man Who Was Poe

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This summer, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

As we continue our countdown, this book is #5 on the most-read list, my 21st book.

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The Man Who Was Poe

Sometimes Book A leads to Book B. Such was the case for The Man Who Was Poe.

My post, about Something Upstairs, mentions how I moved to Providence, Rhode Island, and how, once there, I began to read about local history.

While doing that I learned that Edgar Allen Poe had important connections to the city: He was trying to get married. Indeed, there is a photograph of him-often replicated—that was taken in Providence. The moment is a key part of the book.

When I first wrote Something Upstairs, which deals with time travel, I had my hero travel back to different moments of Providence history. At one such moment, he meets Poe. That multi-time plot structure however, did not work well, and I discarded the multiple times, and kept the story in one time zone.

Nevertheless, I had, so to speak met Poe. Moreover, he was (is) fascinating.

Therefore, when Something Upstairs was completed, I turned to Poe. It was enormously helpful that many of the places that Poe visited when he was in Providence, still stand. I could not just visit them, but walk the story almost in its entirety. You too, can do that, too.

Odd Fact #1. Part of the story involves a coded letter. Poe, who had been an editor, used printer’s marks for the code that appears in his book, The Gold Bug. I used the same code for an important moment in my book. When the printer of The Man Who Was Poe saw that code, he thought it was gobbledy-gook, and stripped it from the book. I discovered this when looking at the first printing of the book. I called my editor (Richard Jackson) Stop press!

Edgar Allan Poe The Gold Bug code

Edgar Allan Poe’s code derived from printer’s marks for The Gold Bug

A new page had to be printed, and the entire first printing was recalled and had a new tipped in page with the correct code.

Odd Fact #2. By the time this project first was put together, I had become friends with the artist, David Macaulay, the illustrator and writer. A Providence resident, he was teaching illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design. I asked him if he would do illustrations for the Man Who Was Poe.

Initially he agreed, but subsequently changed his mind. It is fun to think how the book would have looked if he had done illustrations.

But never mind, Mr. Macaulay won’t disappear from these stories. Stay tuned.

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questionMost often asked question:

“How much of the story is true?”

Poe was in Providence, Rhode Island at this time, and he was courting a woman whom he hoped to marry. He did have his photograph taken as related in the book. Whenever you see a photo of Poe, it is that image you are seeing. It’s the only one there is.

Most Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 6, The End of the Beginning

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This summer, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

This book is #6 on the most-read list, my 2nd book.

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The End of the Beginning

To understand this story about a story you need to know that my birth certificate name is Edward, though other than signing a credit card I never use it.

Once upon a time I had a good friend, since passed, who was a writer. Avon actually published a number of fine non-fiction books along with his wife who was a professional photographer. They lived in rural North Brookfield, Massachusetts, the setting for another book of mine, Emily Upham’s Revenge.

Now the truth is, as a writer, Avon talked his craft very well, with wonderful wit. Indeed, he was a wonderful storyteller, with many a good tale to tell. That said he was a very, very, very slow writer.

Years ago, I went to visit him and spent a week with him and his wife. Even back in those days I was always writing something. Indeed, while I was visiting, I took the time to put in my daily stint. Avon, however, did not write one word.

“Avon,” I said, “I’m going to write a book that exposes you for the slow-poke you are.”

“Dare you.”

That was the origin of a book originally titled Snail Tale. It features a hyper-active ant named Edward and a snail by the name of Avon, who does things very, very, very slowly. It concerns their mock-epic adventures along one branch.

The legendary editor Fabio Cohen took the book.

“Does it need any more work?” I asked.

His answer was perhaps one of the most astonishing I ever received from an editor. “It needs,” he said, “about eight adjectives.”

He was right.

The book was published very modestly. Years later, another editor (from a different publishing house) read it, liked it, and wanted to republish it. She did suggest more revisions. Done. It was reissued with vastly superior illustration (by Tricia Tusa) and a new title: The End of the Beginning.

For some of my readers this version of the book remains their favorite of my writing.

Moral: Sometimes writing a good book takes a very, very, very long time.

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questionMost often asked question:

“Did you intend the book to be philosophical or silly?”

The best answer to this is to suggest the real inspiration for the book is very much Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. Which is to say Lewis Carroll was both a brilliant thinker and capable of being exceedingly witty. I lay no claim to being brilliant, but I hope I’ve been funny.

Most Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 7, Poppy

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This summer, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

This book is #7 on the most-read list, my 30th book.

PoppyPoppy

For about eight months I lived in Corvallis, Oregon because my wife had a semester’s visiting professorship at Oregon State University.

The university had a bookstore and one day I was browsing among the remaindered books. One book caught my attention. It was written by a naturalist who worked in a forest. One day he discovered a barely alive owlet on the forest floor. He rescued it, restored it to good health, and taught it to become wild again. The book was full of information about owls. I found it fascinating.

(Oh, how I wish I could find the title and author of that book! I had given it away and I have never been able to track it down.)

In any case, I decided it would be fun to write a book about owls. If you know Poppy you will notice that it begins with Mr. Ocax, the owl. That’s because he was to be the primary subject of the book. But-very typical of the way I write—I got much more interested in the mouse he was going to eat-a creature I named Pip. Indeed, the book came to be called Pip.

Pip?

Fast forward. I had finished an almost final draft of the book. Back in Providence, Rhode Island, I invited myself to read the book to a 5th grade class at the Moses Brown School. I had done a couple of sessions when a boy approached me with a book in hand. “Avi,” he said, “is this where you got the idea for your book?” He handed me a small, Canadian book that was titled: Pip: The Story of a Mouse.

Understandably, I felt a need to change the name of my character, and the book’s title. Hence, Poppy. So, it was.

I am often asked about the character Ereth, how did he come about? The best I can answer is that he was built in opposition to the character of Poppy. She is gentle and kind. He is rough and grumpy. And so forth. As for the way he talks? It just came to me. Dear friends, take it from me: writers don’t always know what they are doing. Sometime we just get lucky.

But—the book was originally published by Orchard Books. At the time, two things were happening at that publishing house. It was in fact foundering—a story too complicated to explain here—and at the same time it had changed its computer-driven sales program and its warehouse. Though the book had gotten good reviews I was getting calls from book stores and libraries telling me that the book was impossible to get. It was being listed as “out of print.” It was, in short, rapidly disappearing.

In the proverbial nick of time, the book won the Horn Book Award for fiction. People sometimes ask what is the impact of awards. I have absolutely no doubt that the award saved Poppy. Saving it meant all the other Poppy books would be written. But that-as we say—is another story.

Stay tuned. 

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questionMost often asked question:

“Will you ever write another Poppy book?”

I never thought I would, but, in fact, I have. In the full arc of the narrative, there is a gap: How did Ragweed and Poppy meet? I have now written that story, and it is currently being revised. Titled Ragweed and Poppy, it is scheduled to be published in 2020—twenty-five years after the first Poppy book. Brian Floca, happily, will do the art.

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Most Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 8, The Secret School

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This summer, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

This book is #8 on the most-read list, my 41st book.

The Secret School

The Secret School

The way The Secret School begins, with fourteen-year-old Ida driving a Model T Ford, but being so short her brother needed to be on the floor working the clutch and brakes, is a true tale, told to me by a bookstore owner who had gone to a one-room school house in Iowa. Though very young she had a special driver’s license which allowed her to drive-but only back and forth to her one-room school house.

I think it was hearing that story that led me to write The Secret School.

“Consolidated School District,” is a term common across the landscape of American schools. What is not always realized is that in many cases the consolidation was of one-room school houses into large school systems. It happened following World War Two, when there were massive population shifts, and car transportation became truly mass transportation. But prior to this time there were thousands of one-room school houses in rural areas. In my Colorado home area, I can identify at least seven buildings that were once one-room school houses. Though greatly reduced in number they still exist. When you learn about their architecture you can spot them everywhere.

Some years ago I also visited a small campus of The University of Montana which had the only program in the country for would-be teachers in one-room school houses. Aside from standard education courses, you were required to take classes in plumbing, accounting and other such practical skills.

One-room schools pop up everywhere in memoirs, and those who went through the systems are fiercely loyal to their schools and educators. Their strength lay in community, dedicated teachers and that students taught one another. Their weakness lay in their isolation, (physical, cultural, racial) and courses of study beyond the academic strength of individual teachers, more often than not, science. This kind of problem was remedied, in one case, by the State of Wisconsin, which broadcast (radio) classes for the scattered students.

In any case, I was fascinated by these schools and was able to interview folks who had been students in such schools. I also was able to visit some still-existing schools. There is any number of books about these schools, too.

The Secret School was originally written and serialized in newspapers for Breakfast Serials.

It can be still read in its original format (with illustrations by Brian Floca) via the internet at Instant Serials. A slightly expanded version was published and is still in print.

One of the pleasures of publishing the story came from readers who shared memories of their (or their grandparents’) one-room school experiences, including the ninety-year-old newspaper reader who corrected my placement of those Model T clutch pedals.

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questionMost often asked question:

“Would you consider writing a sequel which would tell about Ida’s high school experience?”

I have considered it, did some research and once even spoke to a publisher about such a project. The honest answer is I just never got around to it. Perhaps I will.

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Most Read Stories Behind the Stories:
No. 9, Crispin: the Cross of Lead

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This summer, I’m re-posting the 10 Most-Read Stories Behind the Stories from this blog. I’ve rewritten each essay somewhat and included the most-often-asked question about the book. 

This book is #9 on the most-read list, my 43rd book.

Crispin: the Cross of Lead

Crispin: The Cross of LeadThe story of Crispin: the Cross of Lead is complex.

  1. My wife and I were driving from Denver to the mountains, listening to a lecture by Dr. Teofilo Ruiz, chair of the History Department at UCLA. It was all about the medieval period. I was fascinated, and told myself that surely there was a story here, and I must do some reading.
  2. I did read a lot more—found wonderful stuff—and began to shape a story in my head.
  3. I also had a dream—I think it was a dream—and it was about an extended medieval story which I would write in four parts. The dream told me the beginning, the middle and the end. An orphan boy was in it along with a large man who befriends him.
  4. I wrote a first draft, but decided I had to go to England to do more research. When in London I went to the British Museum, the medieval section. There I saw a case of lead crosses, given to people during the period of the Black Death. Only then did I incorporate the key lead cross into the story.
  5. The story takes place when the English spoke Middle English. How to suggest a different, but readable English? The first draft was written in verse, in a form of unrhymed poetry used in 14th Century England. [Chaucer, Langland]  The resulting number of pages was much too long, so I collapsed the lines, but all the same, much of the book remained in iambic pentameter. I just never mentioned that to anyone.
  6. Meanwhile editor A at Publisher B asked me if I would publish with her. I said, yes. A contract was signed but no book was stipulated.
  7. Crispin, at the time titled No Name, was submitted to editor C at Publisher D.
  8. Editor C decided the book, in the draft I had submitted, was not what was wanted.
  9. Meanwhile, A had resigned from publisher B.
  10. No Name was offered to publisher B
  11. Since the editor at Publisher B, the one who had offered the contract, was no longer there, No Name was assigned to Editor E.
  12. The revisions were long and arduous, none more so than the opening pages.
  13. The book was published with the title Crispin: The Cross of Lead. It was dedicated to Dr. Ruiz, that fellow whose lecture gave me the idea for the book. It got fine reviews, but I am not one to have expectations about awards. In any case, I was working on another book.
  14. ALA Midwinter is when the Newbery Award committee gathers and announces the award on Monday morning. The conference is not one which many authors attend.  For the only time in my writing life (before or since) I was invited to attend to support another book of mine, the picture book called Silent Movie.
  15. At the Conference I had the worst case of flu I have ever had. I was sick to the degree that I was shivering. Whenever I could, I fled to my hotel room, got under a blanket and was sick. The worst time was sitting at Sunday breakfast with a few members of the Newbery committee, although at the time I didn’t know who they were.  I was in no mood to chat. I excused myself and flew home, changing my flight so I could leave Philadelphia as quickly as possible.
  16. Back home Monday morning at 5 AM (still ill) I was on my computer rushing to rewrite my daughter’s letter of application for a summer job, when the phone rang. It was the chair of the Newbery Committee, Starr Latronica. “Congratulations,” she said, “you have won the Newbery Award.”
  17. In truth, my first thought was, “The next book better be good.”
  18. I hung up the phone, and burst into tears.
  19. “What’s happened?” asked my wife.
  20. I said, “I won the Newbery award.”
  21. All my flu symptoms vanished.

What did I learn from all this? If you get a bad case of the flu, winning the Newbery award will apparently cure you.

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questionMost often asked question:

The Crispin series consists of three books. Was there not supposed to be a fourth, set in Iceland?

There was a fourth volume, and it was to be set in Iceland. I even began to write it. Went to Iceland. (Fascinating place!) But the series had an odd publishing history. The first and second books were published by Hyperion. Then the original editor left and went to HarperCollins. It was there that book three was published. But for whatever reasons—I was not told—they chose not to do the fourth book. I have always wished to do so, but I don’t know who would publish it, and therefore have never completed it.

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Remembering Betty Miles

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Betty Miles, author and educator

Betty Miles,
author and educator

I was deeply saddened by the death of Betty Miles, educator, editor, writer (more than thirty books), and my close friend for more than fifty years. Born of missionary US parents in pre-World War II Iraq, she never ceased being a missionary on behalf of children, and reading. As editor of The Bank Street Readers, she was the first to bring diversity to texts. Hey! I’m Reading was the first book about reading, written for new readers and their families. Among her many successful novels—The Real Me, Maudie and Me and The Dirty Book, The Trouble with Thirteen, Just the Beginning—she wrote about girls and their struggles to be themselves, with humor, clear-eyed reality, and engaging plots. Many are still in print.

I first became acquainted with her in the offices of Pantheon and Knopf Books, where we were both being published. Shortly afterward, we met again during an anti-war march in Washington DC. My friendship with her (and her husband Matt, who was himself important in the world of education reform) continued from then on.

As I knew her, she was an energetic, warm-hearted, and welcoming person, who began each day with a close reading of the New York Times so she might be informed about everything. She was a gardener and a serious amateur musician. Laughter and compassion were equal parts of her persona. Her great appetite was for people, with deep loyalty and engagement with many friends. We talked often on the phone—she lived in Vermont, I in Colorado—at which times we gossiped about the world at large, family, and life in general.

She often read my books in early drafts, provided generous critiques along with—teacher that she was—grammatical corrections. All useful, always welcome.

My oldest friend, I—and the world—shall miss her greatly.

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