Episode 53: How Do You Create Such a Long Book? -with Ellen Oh
Hi! Welcome to another episode of Kids Ask Authors where we are so lucky to have author Ellen Oh visiting with us today.
TRANSCRIPTS:
Grace Lin: Hello, I'm Grace Lin, children's book author and illustrator of many books, including the middle grade novel, When the Sea Turned to Silver, and the picture book, A Big Mooncake for Little Star. Today, I'm here with Ellen Oh, the author of the Spirit Hunters middle-grade novels, and the Dragon Egg Princess, also a middle-grade novel. Hi Ellen.
Ellen Oh: Hi Grace, how are you?
Grace Lin: Good. How are you?
Ellen Oh: I am as fine as I can be.
Grace Lin: Well, I hope you're fine enough to answer today's question. Are you ready for today's question?
Ellen Oh: Would love it. Yes, thank you.
Grace Lin: Okay, today's question is from a person named Nathan and Nathan asks-
Nathan: How do you create such a long book?
Grace Lin: How do you create such a long book? I can create a book, but not nearly as long.
Ellen Oh: What a great question. Well, first of all, I actually think that writing picture books and short stories are the hardest things in the world. For me, it is so much easier to write a novel because I have so much room to write everything I want to about the story. When you are writing a picture book and a short story, you have to be still concise in how you're telling it. Although I do think of myself as a writer who isn't very wordy, I do need that space to be able to create my world. What I find is when I try to write a short story, it is so much harder to really find the exact way of telling the story that would be most effective for me. It can be done, of course, and people write amazing short stories and picture books. One day, I too will write a picture book, but not yet because it is an art form. It's a craft, and I haven't quite learned exactly how to get my words that precise.
Grace Lin: I like how you say-
Ellen Oh: That as why-
Grace Lin: I like how you say, someday.
Ellen Oh: I'm sorry, what?
Grace Lin: Oops, sorry.
Ellen Oh: Yeah.
Grace Lin: I was saying I like how you say someday I will write a short book.
Ellen Oh: Yes, exactly. Someday I will write a short book because that is what I do aim to do. Because I feel that by that time, I will have actually become such a strong writer that I can tell my story in the least number of words, right, but that is not that day yet. I do need all my words.
Grace Lin: Well, I can understand why Nathan gets ... is asking this question though. Because when you think about, you're going to write a book, when you see the size of your Spirit Hunters books, and you're like, oh, you wrote all those words. I think when you start with the blank page, I can see how that can be really daunting. Do you have a routine or something to get so many words on a page, or to get to so many pages?
Ellen Oh: What works for me is the fact that I am a very serious outliner. I mean, I really outline everything. If I think something's going to happen in 10 chapters and something, I outline it. I know exactly how my story is going to unroll, right, before I start writing it. So that's the first step for me. I write my conclusion first because that's how I know where I'm going to end up, and in all my books, my conclusion has never changed. So that really works for me, yeah. However, that doesn't mean that I stick to my outline because it changes so much, right? You start writing and your character, [inaudible 00:03:44] no, no, I'm not going to do that. So the outline is sometimes really just an idea, but what it does do is help me. When I stare down that blank page, I have an idea of what I want to write.
Grace Lin: So how detailed are your outlines?
Ellen Oh: I write two. I write one that's more of a synopsis, and then I write a detailed outline that can run from 10 to 20 pages.
Grace Lin: Wow, so these have each chapter, like chapter one, so and so is going to jump in a hole, chapter two ... so as detailed as that?
Ellen Oh: Not quite that detailed, but pretty much the whole story is written up. So it is like a very, very thorough, detailed outline of a book, a little bit less than what would be a cliff note, right?
Grace Lin: Oh, wow. That's really exciting to hear. That's a lot of work, just the outlining. That's before you even write a page of the actual book?
Ellen Oh: Yes. Yeah, because I can't actually write. I mean, the whole idea of staring at a blank page is absolutely frightening. But for me, if I've got a whole outline out, then that blank page is just where I start the story that's already been mapped out in my head.
Grace Lin: That makes sense. Yeah, that does make a lot of sense. I do something similar where I do have sort of an outline. It's like these little scrawls that I write on Post-it Notes. I'll be like, scene one, chapter one, maybe this happens, chapter two, maybe this happens. Then I move the Post-it Notes around, but like you, I do know the conclusion. It's always like the end is going to be like this, and that post it note always stays there.
Ellen Oh: Right. Yeah, no, my conclusion never changes, which is ... I actually think that that is a really good piece of advice to give kids who want to write a book or a story, is that if you know how it's going to end, write that conclusion out, and then you have some place to write towards. It's like your finish, it's your goal.
Grace Lin: Yes.
Ellen Oh: It's your finish line.
Grace Lin: Exactly, and I think ... I mean, the truth is that there's no real magic way to write a long book except little by little. It's like that. There is a proverb that's like, "How do you eat an elephant?" It's like, you have to eat an elephant one bite at a time. So it's the same thing.
Ellen Oh: No one eats elephants. They're beautiful, wise animals.
Grace Lin: Yes. Instead, just write about them.
Ellen Oh: Yes.
Grace Lin: So thank you very much, Ellen, for your lovely, lovely answer, and thank you, Nathan, for asking your question.
Ellen Oh: Thank you, Grace. Thank you, Nathan.
Grace Lin: Bye.
Ellen Oh: Bye. Bye.
Today’s BOOK REVIEW is from Summer. She is reviewing “Lunch Lady and The Schoolwide Scuffle” by Jarret J. Krosoczka!
The book I am reading right now is Lunch Lady and the Schoolwide Scuffle by Jarrett Krosoczka. It's about the new superintendent of the school being bad and Lunch Lady has to stop her. I liked this book because it is exciting.
Thanks Summer!
More about Today’s authors:
Ellen Oh is the author of the Texas Bluebonnet Award nominated middle grade novel Spirit Hunters and its sequel, The Island of Monsters, the upcoming middle grade fantasy Dragon Egg Princess, as well as the highly-acclaimed, young-adult Prophecy trilogy (Prophecy, Warrior, and King). She is the editor of the middle grade anthology Flying Lessons and Other Stories and the YA anthology Thousand Beginnings and Endings. She is also the co-founder of We Need Diverse Books, the groundbreaking, grassroots non-profit organization.
It was a 2000 article in Time magazine about Genghis Khan that jumpstarted Ellen’s writing career and ignited her obsessive fascination with ancient Asian history, especially Korean history. Ellen loves martial arts films, adores K-pop, thinks Avatar: The Last Airbender series is the best animated show ever created, randomly quotes lines from The Princess Bride, and knows that Krispy Kreme doughnuts are her kryptonite.
These days, she lives in Bethesda, Maryland, with her husband and three teenaged children…who she loves to scare. It’s her favorite thing to do!
Grace Lin, a NY Times bestselling author/ illustrator, won the Newbery Honor for Where the Mountain Meets the Moon and her picture book, A Big Mooncake for Little Star, was awarded the Caldecott Honor. Grace is an occasional commentator for New England Public Radio , a video essayist for PBS NewsHour (here & here), and the speaker of the popular TEDx talk, The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child’s Bookshelf. She is the co-host of the podcast Book Friends Forever, a kidlit podcast about friendship and publishing (geared for adults). Find her facebook, instagram , twitter ( @pacylin) or sign up for her author newsletter HERE.
Special thanks to the High Five Books & Art Always Bookstore, Ms. Carleton’s 2nd grade class at Jackson Street School for their help with our kid questions and reviews.
