CANSCAIP News Fall 2019 V2
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Volume 41 Number 4 Fall 2019 ISSN0708-594X • Introducing HEATHER SMITH • AMANDA WEST LEWIS – The Smile of the Cat • SEAN CASSIDY – Illustrator’s Sketchbook + Congratulations, Noteworthy, President's Message, Welcome, News Roundup, & Business Briefs Logo variation by Sean Cassidy Introducing... Heather Smith By Jennifer Maruno Heather Smith and I had to meet before the end of June as she planned to be out of the province until September. She has spent every summer in her home town, St. John’s, since she left the island over twenty years ago. Heather says, “It wouldn’t be summer without Newfoundland.” Besides catching up on family news, Heather will visit her local coffee shop each morning to write. The Newfoundland Tourist Board says, “Every trip you take leaves you with at least one story.” That must have been written with Heather in mind for this is exactly how she will return to her second home in Ontario. Heather didn’t leave Newfoundland with writing in mind. With her husband, they formed a company writers-in-residence program at Kitchener Public that took them to first to Aberdeen, Scotland and Library. She presented her first attempt to Red is Best then Las Vegas, Nevada. Not wishing to raise a family author Kathy Stinson, who although she gave “very in Las Vegas, they settled in Ontario. In 2002 sharp feedback,” found value in her storytelling Heather took advantage of the abilities. Kathy Stinson says, “Heather wrote a first-person adopted once her children headed off to school. She account about a girl fishing with her dad. She grew doesn’t define writing as always being at a desk, up in Newfoundland and I did not suspect for a pounding out a manuscript, as much as spending moment that what she’d written was pure fiction. time thinking. Sometimes it takes her a couple of Heather had never gone fishing with her dad. She was weeks to mull over a single idea. When she puts her that good a writer, even then.” story to paper, she starts at the beginning. The first Heather then participated in a series of writing page is written many times over until it is perfect workshops with Kathy, along with Nan Forler before she moves on to the next. She does this as a (Trampoline Boy, Tundra Books, 2018). daily practice, writing in short Eventually Donna Grassby (Kate’s [Heather] tells reluctant chunks. For, as she says, ‘I like to Ring, Red Deer Press, 2019) joined readers, “It is a good thing have my writing tight.” them. Kathy said, “There came a to read picture books if One unique writing ritual is point when I thought, “I’d rather be novels are too much. running with her son. “Physical getting their feedback on my work Picture book illustrations activity,” she says, “spurs on ideas.” than their money, and I loved the are works of art that are Heather admits she often thanks him things they were writing, too.” They beautifully emotional. You at the end of a run for listening to “went from being workshop leader can get everything from the her “gobble-de-gook.” and participants to fellow members pictures that you can get At one time though, most words of a writing group.” Heather, Nan, from the words. They are were gobble-de-gook for Heather. I Donna and Kathy have met to really satisfying.” asked her why she defined herself as exchange feedback for several years reluctant reader. She said, “There now. were too many words on the page and I was overwhelmed.” Newfoundland is a province of interesting It wasn’t that she didn’t like to read. As a child she dialect. When asked about using this part of her had been gifted a subscription to the little hard- heritage in her novels Heather replied. “Many people covered Disney Golden books and waited anxiously judge one’s level of intellect by the verbs they use, like each month for the new one to arrive. Heather loved the phrase, ‘I knows’.” Because of this, she says she the pictures more than the words and when doesn’t go “whole hog” with dialect but allows it to be presented with books that had only words on the a small part of a character’s composition. pages, she declined to continue. Newfoundland is also a province of interesting names. Family names like Fizzard, Fudge, and It was Judy Blume, (Are You There God? It’s Me, Inkpen are not uncommon, and uncommon names Margaret, Bradbury Press, 1970), one of the most play a big part forming Heather’s narratives. Names controversial children’s writers, who helped Heather like Jett, Poppy, Miracle, and Bun come into turn the page, so to speak, and read nothing but Heather’s mind before character development as if words. Blume’s contentious topics and her honesty in the character has to earn the name they have been addressing the anxieties that haunt everyone’s given. teenage years, instantly appealed. Heather then went to the library with her friends spending her time at Heather writes all day every day, from the time the teen rack “flipping and ditching,” until she found she gets up to about three p.m. It’s the schedule she something that she really wanted to read. She admits 2 CANSCAIP NEWS Fall 2019 she is still ruthless about what she reads. Strange, (Kids Can Press, 2018) agrees: “What’s a comic if it’s quirky, unexpected events are what draw Heather not a book?” into a novel. If a book doesn’t catch her interest in Ebb and Flow the first few chapters she rejects it. began with a Perhaps this is why Heather talks about rejection small piece of sea of her own work with such ease. It never causes her glass Heather to stop writing or question her motives. If she is found along the going to create a manuscript, she says, “I might as Atlantic shore. well send it out. If it comes back then I must make it She marvelled at better.” Heather says she will always write and get how a sharp shard rejected. She will get good reviews and bad ones. She could turn into doesn’t keep them or worry about them. something so beautiful. “Now Life is like the tides. look at it—what In and out. was once a piece Back, forth. of broken glass is Push, pull. now something High, Low. better—it’s a You just have to go with the flow, you know? gem.” Unlike her other novels written in chapter form, The reviews Heather thinks are most important each page of Ebb and Flow is a piece of free verse with come to her from her readers or the parents of her imagery so powerful your heart will ache as you read readers, like the emails she recently received from it. the girl who turns to Baygirl (Orca Book Publishers, Jett is sent to spend the summer with his 2013) each time she felt like harming herself, or the Grandma for another chance at self-identification. mom whose son saw himself in Angus All Aglow (Orca His anger at his father’s imprisonment had repressed Book Publishers, 2018), the story of a little boy who his true self, which Heather reveals as Jett and his was teased for wearing his grandmother’s sparkly Gran walk the beach searching for sea glass, or necklace to school. visiting her down-and-out friends. Ebb and Flow, for Heather treasures picture books. She tells all ages and stages in life, was shortlisted for the 2018 reluctant readers, “It is a good thing to read picture Governor General’s Literary Award. books if novels are too much. Picture book Heather takes accolades and awards with the illustrations are works of art that are beautifully same kind of aplomb she does reviews. She feels emotional.” Heather also tells young readers, “You lucky for the number of nominations she has can get everything from the pictures that you can get received. “As clichéd as it may sound,” Heather from the words. They are really satisfying.” admits, “winning isn’t the important thing, I am She also has great respect for graphic novels and happy just to be nominated.” She is thrilled to be wishes they had been part of her life growing up. She considered as good as the other authors, thinking it thinks she would have been more of a reader had “almost surreal.” Once again she values most the they been accessible. Jett’s Grandma in Ebb and Flow opinions of the young readers who put her on the CANSCAIP NEWS Fall 2019 3 stage at the Forest of Reading Ceremonies. When it The Agony of Bun O’Keefe is packed with came to the announcement of the nomination for the information that every kid needs to know about life, Governor General’s Award, she said “the excitement suicide, molestation, pedophiles, and AIDS. It also was so great I couldn’t imagine winning being paints a portrait of motherhood that is less than anything but just a little bit greater.” idealized. Bun’s mother neglects her. Big Eyes’ mother refuses to believe she is being abused by her The Agony of Bun O’Keefe (Penguin Teen, 2017) own uncle. But Bun is both philosophical and wise, demonstrated Heather’s amazing ability not only to telling her new-found roommate that “TV moms are conquer words way better than real moms.” but emphasize The people who take Bun in and care for her are their origins fleeing from their own damaged lives but it is far and meanings.