As her launch week for A Difficult Boy comes to an close, we're getting ready to bid a fond farewell to M.P. Barker. She'll still be in class with us. Natch. She'll just be moving over to make way for our next debut author launch.
Before leaving, M.P.'d like to talk to us about setting. And who are we to argue with a published author?! Take it away, Classmate!
Since my book is set in an imaginary town, the best I can do is give you a tour of a similar imaginary town—Old Sturbridge Village, where I worked as a costumed interpreter during the 1980s and 1990s. (For those of you non-New Englanders, Old Sturbridge Village is a re-created early 19th-century (circa 1830-1840) New England village.) That was a real stroll down memory lane. I had to dig through my attic to find photos of my days at OSV. Oh, my!
Actually, I didn't start out working in costume at OSV. I began working here.
Yes, my first job at OSV was as a horticultural assistant working behind the scenes in the greenhouses and planting all the modern ornamental gardens at the entrances and around the visitor center, etc. I had one of the best bosses ever, got a great tan, and was probably in the best shape I’d ever been in by the end of the summer.
The next year, I went from wearing shorts and working in the flower gardens to wearing this.
And working in gardens...
If I thought I worked hard the summer before…well, there’s nothing to get you buff like digging, weeding, milking cows, making cheese, chopping kindling, hauling wood and water…
Not that I’m complaining. It wasn’t always down and dirty. I also got to...
Sing…
Dance…
And run around with men.
One of my co-workers used to say that even back then the guys with the wheels got all the women.
I got to play with my food…
Okay, I’m being facetious…but only a little. One of the perks was getting to eat all the food that we cooked, which included our own chicken, turkey, beef, and pork. Okay, maybe I could have done without making the head cheese…with a real head. It’s a seriously scary recipe that begins with: Boil one pig’s head until the eyes fall out… Better than cleaning sausage casings, though, I’ll tell you that. You haven’t lived until you’ve sloshed a couple miles of pig intestines through a pan of salt water.
My favorite time of year was the spring, with all the new baby animals. During my time there, I got to see two calves born, including this one. (He was given the not particularly period-appropriate name of Fred A. Steere…)
The weird thing is that I swore I’d never write historical fiction because after working at OSV I realized just how many details there were to get wrong—and how much work it is to get it right.
So what did I end up writing? Yeah, that’s right. And in spite of getting my manuscript reviewed by no fewer than five Village people (hey, we had the name before YMCA!), now I live in terror that my former co-workers will catch all the mistakes I missed…
M.P. Barker, thank you, thank you for spending your launch week with us! We're so proud of you! And we wish you the absolute best.
Oh yeah, besides being a
time traveler, M.P. is also a blog hopper. You can catch an interview with her today over at
Nineteen Teen, a fantastically informative blog about being a teen in the nineteenth century.
Thanks again, M.P. You're a published author now! Go forth and prosper!
Please welcome M.P. Barker, debut young adult author of A Difficult Boy.
M.P. is a very interesting and unique member of the Class of 2k8. And we wish you all got a chance to hang around her the way we do. But since you don't, we're doing this interview to help you get to know her.
Best of all, M.P. is letting us give away her biggest secret.
Here goes ...
M.P. Barker is a TIME TRAVELER!
M.P. Barker: Actually, I'm an archivist and historian. Which, I guess, is sort of the same thing.
2k8: But you worked in nineteenth-century rural New England, right?
M.P. Barker: I was a costumed historical interpreter at Old Sturbridge Village. I milked cows, mucked out barns and found inspiration for my historical novel, A Difficult Boy.
2k8: That mucking out of barns sounds ewwww. But the rest sounds very cool. Are you still time traveling?
M.P. Barker: Well, I work now as an archivist at the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. This gives me the opportunity to read other people's diaries and letters and snoop through their photo albums.
2k8: Love it! Old-time gossip! What else do you do?
M.P. Barker: I'm also a freelance historical consultant. I've written exhibit text, scripts for historical dramatizations, nominations to the National Register of Historic Places, fundraising materials, and planning studies.
Thanks, M.P. And, now, onto A Difficult Boy. First off, here's the wonderful cover.
cover art credit: Marc Tauss
And here's the flap copy:
It's 1839. Nine-year-old Ethan doesn't want to be an indentured servant. But his family has no other way to pay off their debt, so Ethan must work for Mr. Lyman, a wealthy shopkeeper in their Massachusetts town. At first, Ethan tries to make friends with the Lymans’ other indentured servant, Daniel, a moody Irish teenager. But Daniel, as everyone says, is a difficult boy, and wants nothing to do with him. Then Ethan is shocked to see Mr. Lyman beat Daniel. Soon, Ethan, too, is suffering Mr. Lyman’s blows. Self-preservation finally drives the two boys together, and they begin to form a friendship, but when the boys discover a dark secret about the patron, their lives may be changed forever.
2k8: How in the world did you ever come up with this fantastic idea for a book?
M.P. Barker: I was cataloguing some documents in the archives and came across a 275-year-old bill that an indentured servant’s master had sent to the boy’s mother, charging her for the cost of finding and bringing back her runaway son. That got me thinking: Why did the boy run away? What would happen if his mother couldn’t pay the bill? What kind of crummy cheapskate was that master?
photo credit: Connecticut Valley Historical Museum, from their archives
2k8: And how did the bill become your novel?
M.P. Barker: Well, the document was still on my mind when I went to my weekly writing group. So I began doing a few character sketches. Since I didn’t know as much about the 1770s as I ought to, I transferred the time to the 1830s, which I did know about from working at Sturbridge Village. Once the characters started growing, they began to take on their own lives, as characters have a way of doing, and I sort of lost control. My first draft was 700 pages! Luckily for readers, the published version is now just shy of 300 pages with two discontented indentured servants (one of them Irish), one cruel master with a closet full of skeletons, one son of said cruel master with a deep, dark secret of his own, one dairymaid with a serious crush on the master’s son, and one mysterious peddler who wanders in and out inadvertently stirring up trouble.
2k8: Those characters sound fascinating!
M.P. Barker: Thanks! Turning that material into historical fiction was an adventure and a challenge. I wanted to create characters that readers could identify with, while allowing them to see that those characters aren’t merely modern people wearing funny clothes and living without indoor plumbing. Daniel’s and Ethan’s thoughts and beliefs are very different from ours, yet they grapple with familiar problems: prejudice, abuse, poverty, grief, and loneliness. And they cherish the same things that matter to kids and adults today: loyalty, kindness, trust and most of all, friendship.
2k8: Congratulations, M.P. You are a published author now! And, hey, don't forget you're featured on our blog this entire week. So, make sure you time-travel your little self back here for Tuesday's interview.
Sing…
Dance…
I got to play with my food…
My favorite time of year was the spring, with all the new baby animals. During my time there, I got to see two calves born, including this one. (He was given the not particularly period-appropriate name of Fred A. Steere…)
Loving all the photos! I've learned a lot about you this week!
Love these photos! M, it's like you have a double life in two different centuries. Super cool and interesting. I'm loving the bonnet. :)
Thanks for the delightful post today, to end a great week. I can tell how passionate you are about your book and that makes me want to read it even more! Zu
Got your arc at TLA and look forward to reading about the backward times in your book. Historical fiction is the best!
congrats
Thanks everyone! It was a fun job--not too many places you get to play make-believe for a living and get a historical education at the same time!
MPB