Chapter 41 - AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Kurtis Scaletta

This week's Debut Author Spotlight is Kurtis Scaletta, who will debut his first book "Mudville" in February 2009!

Okay, so let's get the preliminary questions out of the way: What is your book called? When is the release date? What is it about?

Mudville

February 24, 2009

Welcome to Moundville, where it's been raining for longer than Roy McGuire has been alive. Most people say the town is cursed—right in the middle of their biggest baseball game against rival town Sinister Bend, black clouds crept across the sky and it started to rain. That was 22 years ago . . . and it's still pouring.

Baseball camp is over, and Roy knows he's in for a dreary, soggy summer. But when he returns home, he finds a foster kid named Sturgis sprawled out on his couch. As if this isn't weird enough, just a few days after Sturgis's arrival, the sun comes out. No one can explain why the rain has finally stopped, but as far as Roy's concerned, it's time to play some baseball. It's time to get a Moundville team together and finish what was started 22 years ago. It's time for a rematch.

Do you have a website and/or blog we can point people to?

http://www.kurtisscaletta.com/

How long have you been writing? When did you know that wanted to be an author? When/Why did you decide to try getting published?

I've been writing since I was six years old, and being a professional writer was always my dream. I got serious about that a few years ago, when I got to an age where I had to stop dreaming and become what I wanted to be when I "grew up."

Ha, ha, ha! I still wonder sometimes what I'm going to do when I "grow up"!

Can you briefly explain your path to becoming a published author and any obstacles you had to deal with in that process? Was there something you feel like you did absolutely right or absolutely wrong along the way?
My biggest obstacle wasn't getting published, it was sitting down and writing a manuscript that was good enough to get published. It took me a long time to really crack down and get serious: writing a complete manuscript, revising it, getting feedback, revising some more. If I did anything absolutely wrong, it was letting myself get so discouraged by conventional wisdom about how hard it is to get published that I didn't get serious sooner... or maybe it was just being lazy, and I'm casting about for excuses.

I am amazed at how "challenging" the road to getting published is, so I guess that's why you hear the advice so often to just write for the love of writing.

How much control do you have over your book once you get an agent and/or editor? What happens if you don't like the suggested edits? Title? Cover? Jacket blurb? etc.
I get feedback and advice from my agent and my editor, of course, but I don't think about that in terms of "control." They're both good readers, their feedback is really helpful. I just think about it as all three of us having the same goal, which is me putting the best book out there that I can.
Knopf asks for my feedback, too, for example on the cover and the jacket copy, but I'm not as good at giving feedback. I just said "I love it."

Where did you get the idea for "Mudville"?
The premise occurred to me during a rain delay between the Twins and the Rangers. I wondered what would happen if it just kept on raining for years and years. Another inspiration is a line from the Robert Frost poem, "Birches," which is one of my favorite poems -- Frost describes a "boy too far from town to learn baseball." It's a poignant line, and that is more at the heart of the book, these kids who just want to do something most American kids take for granted.

That line from the Frost poem just smacks of something fundamentally wrong! I grew up playing t-ball and softball, and it just seems like a crime that a kid (boy or girl) might grow up without the opportunity for that experience! Baseball and Apple Pie, right?

Who is your favorite character in "Mudville" and why?
Sturgis is really the main character to me. Roy is more like a Dr. Watson, a good natured guy who tells a story about someone way more talented and interesting and messed up than he is.

What is your favorite line or quote from "Mudville"?
I was stuck, so I asked my wife for her favorite. She has two: "Remind me to beat you up later," and "It's a lucky kid who makes it through life whole."

Fun! I never really zeroed in on favorite lines from books I read in the past, but lately I'll find myself bookmarking pages with great passages! Those are 2 good ones that will probably make the cut when I read the book.

Do you have more books planned for the future? Do they follow this same story or is it something completely different?
My next book is called "Mamba Point." It's about an American kid living at a US Embassy in Liberia (in West Africa) who befriends one of the deadliest snakes in the world. It's very loosely based on my own experiences. I did live in Liberia as a kid, that is, but I never knew any snakes! I'm really excited about it, because I've wanted to write a book about Liberia for over 25 years. I'm a little bit scared, too, because I really want to get it right.

Sounds interesting!

What do you love more - reading or writing?
That's a really good question! I think at this point the honest answer is writing. I don't read as much as I'd like to, and when I do, I'm usually critiquing the book too much to enjoy it. I'm either thinking, "I could do better than this!" or "Oh no. This is way better than anything I could do."

Has becoming a published author made you a more forgiving or a more critical reader?

I think I'm both more critical of books but also more sympathetic to writers. I know how hard they've worked. Sometimes with really successful writers, I'm more critical if I think they're just phoning it in, publishing stuff that would never make it past an editor if they weren't already famous. I'm not going to name names, here, but with one writer I might just think, "the early books were tighter," and with another, "this writer isn't even trying anymore."

Who is your favorite author(s)?
I have a lot of favorites, but two writers I loved as a kid are Daniel Pinkwater and Betsy Byars.

What author are you reading right now?
I'm reading two grown-up books right now: One is David Carr's The Night of the Gun, and the other is The Mission Song by John Le Carre. The similarity of names is a coincidence I just noticed now: Carr/Le Carre.

What author are you most excited about reading next?
M. T. Anderson's The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves. It comes out in about 2 weeks, and I'm really excited about it. I think Anderson is brilliant. Definitely one of those writers that makes me think, "This is way better than anything I could do." Also high on the list is Corey Doctorow's novel, Little Brother.

If you could meet any author, who would it be? Why?
Neil Gaiman. He seems like a nice guy to hang out with, and he's another writer who makes me think, "Oh no. This is way better than anything I could do." Also, he lives in Minneapolis, so we could be pals.

I'm pretty sure once you became a published author that you get your membership card which enables you to contact/hang out/become best friends with other famous authors. Ask you agent or publisher about it - maybe your card got lost in the mail! Or maybe you have to wait until your book is released.

Is there anything you want us to add to this Q&A that we didn't already ask?
You didn't ask me about pets. I have four cats: Torii, Bertie, Lucy, and Pippi. If my wife and I had it our way, we'd have dogs, cats, rabbits, hedgehogs, hamsters, otters -- you name it. We both love animals.

Thanks so much for taking the time answer some questions for us! I've heard great things about "Mudville" from those who have already read it. I loved baseball as a kid and was completely fascinated with books and movies about it! This definitely sounds like an interesting take on America's Favorite Pasttime!