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“I've found that incorporating my own life experiences into my writing gives it more soul.”

                                                          ---Laura Resau 

Day One with Laura Resau

A little about Laura….

          Laura Resau has a background in cultural anthropology and ESL-teaching and has lived and traveled extensively in Latin America. Her first book in a new travel-adventure series, The Indigo Notebook (available October 13, 2009), has been heralded as "a poignant, thoughtful novel filled with cultural details" by Kirkus Reviews. Her previous novel, Red Glass, won numerous awards, including the IRA YA Fiction Award and the Americas Award, and was selected as an Oprah's Pick.

          Acclaimed for its sensitive treatment of immigration issues, a starred review from Publishers' Weekly calls Red Glass a "vibrant, large-hearted story." Resau's award-winning debut novel, What the Moon Saw was praised as "a powerful, magical story ... a rare glimpse into an indigenous culture" in a starred review from Booklist.

          Resau now lives with her husband, toddler, and dog in Colorado. She is donating a portion of her royalties to indigenous rights organizations in Latin America.

          Laura, Congratulations on the October 16 launch of Indigo Notebook! the first book in your new series. You also have a book for younger readers, Star in the Forest, coming in Spring 2010.

 
          Thanks, Zu!  And thanks for inviting me here—this blog is an amazing resource for writers… I'm honored to be a guest!

          You’ve said that you see your fiction “as a mosaic, bits of life, myth and dreams pieced together that hopefully tells an engaging story and speaks to deeper truths.” Can you talk about how life, myth and dreams come together in Indigo Notebook and Star in the Forest?

          I've noticed that my writing is much stronger—and resonates with readers more deeply-- when it has a mythological underpinning, usually a mix of the universal, cultural, and personal.  For example, in Star in the Forest, a girl whose father has recently been deported to Mexico believes that the abandoned dog she befriends in the junk yard is her father's spirit animal.  In this way, she feels some sense of comfort and control in a situation apparently out of her control.  While living in southern Mexico, I heard many variations of nahual (spirit animal) stories, which to me, seemed to speak to some deeper truths about the human psyche.

          Many bits of folklore appear in The Indigo Notebook as well, based on tales I've heard—some unique to the Otavalo region and some which are told all over Latin America.  There's the man rumored to have made a pact with the devil, the cave of treasures hidden inside tunnels in the mountain, the rich man's hacienda drowned in a lake, and others.

          I think that we all have our own personal mythologies, too, which can be treasure chests for writers.  In The Indigo Notebook, there's a recurring image of a blind beggar who carries a blue wooden chair with him so he'll always have a comfortable place to feel at home.  This character was inspired by a man from the town in Oaxaca where I lived.  His blue chair became a rich metaphor for me.  I've thought of it often over the past ten years, and finally found a good place for it in this book.  

          I also borrow from my friend's personal mythologies.  A good friend from southern Mexico grew up in a Nahuatl community, where he would get up before dawn as a young child and walk through the forests to gather firewood for that morning's tortillas and tea.  It was cold and scary in the dark, and he found that his "star friend"—a special star that he felt a bond with—would comfort him.  During the daytime, too, his star friend was up there watching him, even though he couldn't see it.  The "star friend" idea comes up in The Indigo Notebook as a metaphor for Wendell's birth family thinking about him throughout his life, even if he hasn't realized it.

          I love listening to people's real life experiences and weaving variations of them into fictional stories.  One major plotline in The Indigo Notebook was inspired by my indigenous Otavaleno friend's experience of discovering a biological half-brother he never knew existed.  The boy had been adopted as a baby by foreigners, and he returned a teenager to the Otavalo region to find his birth family.   

          I've also found that incorporating my own life experiences into my writing gives it more soul.  As I was writing The Indigo Notebook, I was in the process of adopting my own son from Guatemala, often wondering how he might feel about his adoption at different stages of his life in the future.  This helped me get inside Wendell's head and heart.

          You’ve always loved to travel, and your books and travel essays reflect a delight of other cultures, their stories and the magic of their myths. Beyond this, you seem especially drawn to speak for those who might not otherwise have a voice, such as Pablo, the five-year-old Mexican boy in Red Glass who is the only survivor of a dangerous border crossing. What is it about such characters that draw you?

          Writing about people who have been marginalized by society wasn't exactly something I set out to do.  It so happened that fortuitous life circumstances led me to friendships with people who fit that category.  Living in rural Oaxaca, Mexico, I became close to a number of indigenous families, and had the opportunity to learn about their lives and issues facing them. 

          Here in the Southwest U.S. (Arizona and Colorado), I've taught ESL for many years, which has given me a close-up view of undocumented immigrants' lives and challenges.  Many of my friends' stories are fascinating and touching and important, yet hadn't been widely heard.  I hope that my writing can generate more interest in their experiences and open another doorway for their stories to be appreciated.

          THE final day of a short stay on the California coast I was taking my last beach walk. Just off shore came leaping dolphins, diving pelicans and birds by the hundreds, their long lines wavering like blue velvet ribbons out to sea. Still, the waves had yet to give up a single, unblemished shell. So I made a wish.

          Just let me find one whole and perfect sand dollar!

          And there it was. As the water pulled back. One delicate, white, whole and perfect sand dollar. Excited by the gift, I lifted it gingerly, took a few steps and, incredible luck, found another one. I carried my little cache down the beach and stopped. Here were three more sand dollars. And here three more. And three more!

          On it went until my hands were full of delicate shells. Then my pockets. Perhaps on this beach such finds are as common as sand. But it was a thrilling few minutes for me. A gluttonous adventure. More sand dollars than I could carry!

          Back at my cabin I lined them up outside the door along a weathered redwood rail. I admired their beautiful feathered designs. Each with a sea flower delicately etched. As if some artisan lived beneath the Pacific, working shells with her tiny chisel.

          BOOKS are not unlike sand dollars. At least to those of us who cherish them, books are like treasure from the sea. We collect them. Study their beautiful designs. Admire their craftsmanship and hope, if we are writers, to carve out something just as fine. Our own whole and perfect sea flower design tossed into the sea to later be drawn in, a gift for someone else’s pocket.

          About a week ago I flew to the Midwest to speak at Oklahoma’s EncycloMedia conference with a group of fabulous authors (Suzanne Morgan Williams, Stacy Nyikos, Barrie Summy, Jenny Meyerhoff, P.J. Hoover, Jessica Anderson, Donna St. Cyr, Cynthea Liu and Eileen Cook). We were met with an equally fabulous audience of educators and librarians. Copies of our novels sold out at our signings and we were filmed for a reader’s broadcast. I went on to a packed and appreciative school visit.

          As a writer you couldn’t ask for more. It was a wonderful affirmation of the world of books, and what an honor it is to be included in this circle of writers, readers, librarians and educators who are looking for the next good read.  

          Which got me thinking. This week I want to celebrate (to paraphrase YALSA’s press on the upcoming Teen Read Week) “the possibilities that exist within a library’s doors, and within the covers of books.”

          I’m excited to have a thoughtful interview with author Laura Resau. Her newest novel Indigo Notebook is launching this October and it’s an amazing read. Resau’s writing is both beautiful and honest, and she brings that same integrity to her thoughts on the writing life, the meaning of story, and how she’s found her niche by moving between cultures.

          Then expert librarian Cathy Ensley from Idaho talks about her years in the stacks and her brand new blog. She has some surprising insights into teen readers and shares her latest venture to foster the love of books—helping rural libraries hook up with authors via SKYPE.

          And just an END NOTE to my sand dollar days.

          Isn’t it gratifying to know it’s not so out of reach—that whole and perfect shell? Something to remember if, like me, you carve your designs as you go.

          And to those of us who walk the beach waiting for what the artisan might reveal, may we find what we’ve been looking for in the sand. 

                                                                   --z.v.