CHANGELING
Aug. 14th, 2006 11:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellenkushnerWild anticipation! Delia's new novel comes out this THURSDAY!!
Changeling's narrator, Neef, first appeared in Delia Sherman's 2005 story "CATNYP" in The Faery Reel (reprinted in Year's Best Fantasy & Horror - 17th Annual Collection, and in The Year's Best Science Fiction and Fantasy for Teens). Changeling, the novel, will be on the stands (Viking Children's hardcover, edited by the one and only![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sdn) on August 17th, and is also an August selection of the Science Fiction Book Club. (So if you've already gotten and read your bookclub copy - what did you think? Delia staunchly refuses an LJ account, but she reads over my shoulder a lot.)
Delia did a terrific interview with the SFBC; if you're a member, I guess you can see it here. Maybe you can even comment there - I don't have an SFBC password, so I don't know. For the rest of us, here's
An exclusive interview with Delia Sherman
Science Fiction Book Club's contributing writer Edith Cohn had the pleasure of interviewing Delia Sherman, author of Changeling.
Q. Neef, the protagonist in your latest fantasy novel, Changeling, is an eleven-year-old girl who lives among a colorful cast of mythical creatures. What provided your inspiration for Neef?
A: Being an adopted child, I've always found the idea of changelings fascinating. The thing is, most of the traditional changeling stories center on the fairy children abandoned in the mortal world and I was more interested in the mortal children the fairies stole. What kind of child would they steal? What did they do with them? How did the mortal children deal with living among immortals? These are the kind of questions that lead to novels.
Q. There are so many interesting characters in Changeling. Other than Neef, who is your favorite and what insight can you give us about this character?
A: I love them all. Really. If I didn't love them, I couldn't write about them. Still, I have to admit to a particular fondness for the vampire Honey, who looks eight years old, but is actually closer to 80. She is the only ex-mortal Neef meets in her travels who actually remembers living in the mortal world, and is able to tell her things about being a human being that nobody else can. She's had an interesting un-life, and some time I'd like to write a story just about her.
Q. Do your own life experiences relate to Changeling in any way?
A: I lived three blocks from Central Park when I was growing up, and spent a lot of time there, sailing toy boats at the Boat Pond and rowing on the Lake with my father. The North Woods were the wildest forest I'd seen until I went to Europe when I was 10. And, like Neef, I was brought up by someone who wasn't my mother. Masako-san lived with us and took me to the park and told me stories about the Funny Man who lived on top of the Carlyle Hotel and would come and get me if I didn't go to bed before my mother came home. There's a lot of her in Astris.
Q. You also write adult novels. What brought you to YA?
A: I never stopped reading YA, not even when I was high school and was also reading adult books. I always wanted to write a YA book. Several years ago, I actually wrote a historical about antebellum Louisiana that is sitting in my desk drawer. Then Terri Windling asked me for a story for a young adult anthology she was editing, which is when I first discovered New York Between and Neef and all her friends.
Q. I read that you taught a class called Fantasy as Literature at Northwestern University and that you are still teaching fantasy and science fiction at various universities. What value do you think fantasy and science fiction as genres bring to students?
A: What I love about fantasy is that it deals with things that are true, even if they aren't factual. The best fantasy encourages the reader to look under the surface and beyond appearances to the true nature of a person or a situation. And it does it without preaching, indirectly: showing, not telling. Folklore-based fantasy in particular demonstrates that it's dangerous to break a rule without understanding it and that actions always have consequences, which are both very important things to know. As for science fiction, it is the most hopeful of genres. Anything set far in the future promises that there will be a future, even if it's a difficult or challenging one. And in an age of terrorists and fear, this is a good thing to contemplate.
Q. You say that you prefer writing in cafes over your home ("they bring you things to eat and the phone's never for you"). What is a typical day of writing like for you?
A: I am an afternoon writer. Mornings, I usually exercise and attend to the business of living: email, laundry (I love doing laundry-folding time is good plotting time), desk work, editing. At three, I set out for my favored cafe. I just moved from Boston to New York, so I'm looking for a new one. It needs to be at least a 15 minute walk away, since I use the walking time to plan out what I'm going to write next. I usually write for about 3 hours, or until my hand gets tired (I write longhand. I can't write dialogue on a computer, or even a typewriter. It comes out all stiff and awkward.) and then I come home and type it in, making any changes that occur to me. When I'm really cooking on something, I do this every day, Saturdays and Sundays not excepted. I try and write when I travel, too, but I don't always succeed.
Q. Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?
A: Plots. I'm much more interested in characters and dialogue than in incident. Making up people (or Folk) and having them talk to each other is fun and easy. Making up what they do is much harder, which is why I frequently base my plots on fairy tales and folklore. Even so, I have to ask my friends for ideas and rewrite several times before I come up with the final plot.
Q. You are also an editor for Tor Books. How do you juggle writing with editing? Do you ever find that one inspires the other?
A: I'm not doing as much editing as I was because I'm doing more writing-both things take time and attention, and I don't like to skimp. But I found that, for me, editing was like playing scales on a piano: I got to think about craft-structure and pacing and narrative and characterization-without having to make up anything. So when I got to my own writing, I was all warmed up and able to concentrate on it.
Q. If you had to choose, which writer would you consider a mentor?
A: Jane Yolen has been my mentor from the beginning. In a week-long course in Northampton, MA, she gave me the confidence and support I needed, not only to write, but to submit what I'd written to editors. And she has been a good friend and good editor ever since.
Q. What can you tell us about current projects?
A: I'm working on the sequel to Changeling, called Airboy, and I'm also writing a couple of short stories to submit to anthologies for younger readers. One is likely to be a story of New York Between (although Neef won't be in it), and the other is a straightforward historical piece set in New York during the Great Depression.
* * *
There's also a fine review up on Green Man.
Changeling's narrator, Neef, first appeared in Delia Sherman's 2005 story "CATNYP" in The Faery Reel (reprinted in Year's Best Fantasy & Horror - 17th Annual Collection, and in The Year's Best Science Fiction and Fantasy for Teens). Changeling, the novel, will be on the stands (Viking Children's hardcover, edited by the one and only
sdn) on August 17th, and is also an August selection of the Science Fiction Book Club. (So if you've already gotten and read your bookclub copy - what did you think? Delia staunchly refuses an LJ account, but she reads over my shoulder a lot.)Delia did a terrific interview with the SFBC; if you're a member, I guess you can see it here. Maybe you can even comment there - I don't have an SFBC password, so I don't know. For the rest of us, here's
An exclusive interview with Delia Sherman
Science Fiction Book Club's contributing writer Edith Cohn had the pleasure of interviewing Delia Sherman, author of Changeling.
Q. Neef, the protagonist in your latest fantasy novel, Changeling, is an eleven-year-old girl who lives among a colorful cast of mythical creatures. What provided your inspiration for Neef?
A: Being an adopted child, I've always found the idea of changelings fascinating. The thing is, most of the traditional changeling stories center on the fairy children abandoned in the mortal world and I was more interested in the mortal children the fairies stole. What kind of child would they steal? What did they do with them? How did the mortal children deal with living among immortals? These are the kind of questions that lead to novels.
Q. There are so many interesting characters in Changeling. Other than Neef, who is your favorite and what insight can you give us about this character?
A: I love them all. Really. If I didn't love them, I couldn't write about them. Still, I have to admit to a particular fondness for the vampire Honey, who looks eight years old, but is actually closer to 80. She is the only ex-mortal Neef meets in her travels who actually remembers living in the mortal world, and is able to tell her things about being a human being that nobody else can. She's had an interesting un-life, and some time I'd like to write a story just about her.
Q. Do your own life experiences relate to Changeling in any way?
A: I lived three blocks from Central Park when I was growing up, and spent a lot of time there, sailing toy boats at the Boat Pond and rowing on the Lake with my father. The North Woods were the wildest forest I'd seen until I went to Europe when I was 10. And, like Neef, I was brought up by someone who wasn't my mother. Masako-san lived with us and took me to the park and told me stories about the Funny Man who lived on top of the Carlyle Hotel and would come and get me if I didn't go to bed before my mother came home. There's a lot of her in Astris.
Q. You also write adult novels. What brought you to YA?
A: I never stopped reading YA, not even when I was high school and was also reading adult books. I always wanted to write a YA book. Several years ago, I actually wrote a historical about antebellum Louisiana that is sitting in my desk drawer. Then Terri Windling asked me for a story for a young adult anthology she was editing, which is when I first discovered New York Between and Neef and all her friends.
Q. I read that you taught a class called Fantasy as Literature at Northwestern University and that you are still teaching fantasy and science fiction at various universities. What value do you think fantasy and science fiction as genres bring to students?
A: What I love about fantasy is that it deals with things that are true, even if they aren't factual. The best fantasy encourages the reader to look under the surface and beyond appearances to the true nature of a person or a situation. And it does it without preaching, indirectly: showing, not telling. Folklore-based fantasy in particular demonstrates that it's dangerous to break a rule without understanding it and that actions always have consequences, which are both very important things to know. As for science fiction, it is the most hopeful of genres. Anything set far in the future promises that there will be a future, even if it's a difficult or challenging one. And in an age of terrorists and fear, this is a good thing to contemplate.
Q. You say that you prefer writing in cafes over your home ("they bring you things to eat and the phone's never for you"). What is a typical day of writing like for you?
A: I am an afternoon writer. Mornings, I usually exercise and attend to the business of living: email, laundry (I love doing laundry-folding time is good plotting time), desk work, editing. At three, I set out for my favored cafe. I just moved from Boston to New York, so I'm looking for a new one. It needs to be at least a 15 minute walk away, since I use the walking time to plan out what I'm going to write next. I usually write for about 3 hours, or until my hand gets tired (I write longhand. I can't write dialogue on a computer, or even a typewriter. It comes out all stiff and awkward.) and then I come home and type it in, making any changes that occur to me. When I'm really cooking on something, I do this every day, Saturdays and Sundays not excepted. I try and write when I travel, too, but I don't always succeed.
Q. Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?
A: Plots. I'm much more interested in characters and dialogue than in incident. Making up people (or Folk) and having them talk to each other is fun and easy. Making up what they do is much harder, which is why I frequently base my plots on fairy tales and folklore. Even so, I have to ask my friends for ideas and rewrite several times before I come up with the final plot.
Q. You are also an editor for Tor Books. How do you juggle writing with editing? Do you ever find that one inspires the other?
A: I'm not doing as much editing as I was because I'm doing more writing-both things take time and attention, and I don't like to skimp. But I found that, for me, editing was like playing scales on a piano: I got to think about craft-structure and pacing and narrative and characterization-without having to make up anything. So when I got to my own writing, I was all warmed up and able to concentrate on it.
Q. If you had to choose, which writer would you consider a mentor?
A: Jane Yolen has been my mentor from the beginning. In a week-long course in Northampton, MA, she gave me the confidence and support I needed, not only to write, but to submit what I'd written to editors. And she has been a good friend and good editor ever since.
Q. What can you tell us about current projects?
A: I'm working on the sequel to Changeling, called Airboy, and I'm also writing a couple of short stories to submit to anthologies for younger readers. One is likely to be a story of New York Between (although Neef won't be in it), and the other is a straightforward historical piece set in New York during the Great Depression.
* * *
There's also a fine review up on Green Man.
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Changeling
Date: 2006-08-14 06:02 pm (UTC)It's got it's own footnote in the last chapter of my dissertation.
I've ordered the hardcover, but I doubt it will arrive in time for World Con.
And umm, the Manhattan typo in the GMR review, well, that's the fault of an Internet daemon . . . or that's my excuse.
Re: Changeling
Date: 2006-08-14 08:29 pm (UTC)What's your diss. on?
Re: Changeling
Date: 2006-08-14 09:32 pm (UTC)The %&$#*# diss is titled The Games Faries Play: Otherworld Intruders in Medieval Narrative; it's about fey who hunt/seduce/take/bargain with mortals for games in medieval English and Celtic texts, all in aid of understanding Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Changling (like Thomas the Rhymer) is footnoted in the final chapter as an example of modern takes on old motifs.
Re: Changeling
Date: 2006-08-14 11:37 pm (UTC)Your diss sounds amazing!
And I meant to say (re. "Manhattan") - hey: typos happen!
no subject
Date: 2006-08-14 10:22 pm (UTC)your photo
Date: 2006-08-15 01:48 pm (UTC)(Great to hear from you, Chris - hope that skin condition clears up real soon, now. And congrats on your latest fiction!)
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Date: 2006-08-14 11:45 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2006-09-29 12:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-09-29 12:24 am (UTC)