Category: Wild Bird

Sic itur ad astra

Posted on by Diane Zahler

I had never had a starred review. Many of my reviews were wonderful (even Kirkus reviews, except for that really mean one). Positive. A few were almost rhapsodic. But not so much starred. So I had a thing in my head, that I wanted a starred review. That was my end-all and be-all. I was quite sure it was never happening.

To non-writers, this probably seems bizarre. What’s a starred review? you ask. Well, In the main children’s book review journals — Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, School Library Journal, Booklist, Horn Book — a star means a book is something special. Libraries and bookstores are much more likely to order starred books. It makes a difference, though many, many deserving titles don’t get stars.

And then, a month or so ago, Publishers Weekly gave WILD BIRD a starred review! It was…well, I guess I don’t quite have a word. Awesome is dumb. Amazing is overused. Startling, astonishing, staggering, stupefying. All of that.

And then a few days later, School Library Journal gave GOBLIN MARKET a starred review. Overwhelming. Shattering. Staggering. All of that.

And then, a week or so later, School Library Journal gave WILD BIRD a starred review! Astonishing, etc. Three stars in a month. After twelve years with none.

Does this actually mean anything? Has my writing improved? Or is it a longevity thing, a sort of Oscar or Rock & Roll Hall of Fame lifetime achievement award?

I prefer to think I’ve gotten better over time. Like a fine wine, or a smelly cheese. After this, maybe I’ll turn to vinegar, or develop mold. Or just fade away. Whatever. Still, I got what I wanted — more than I wanted — and not many writers are lucky enough to be able to say that.

 

Wild Bird Takes Off

Posted on by Diane Zahler

It’s been an astounding few weeks for Wild Bird!

The book has gotten blurbs from some of the best writers in middle-grade fiction: Laurel Snyder, Karen Cushman, and Donna Jo Napoli. The wonderful things these authors have said include:

“Exciting, touching, and compelling, Wild Bird celebrates the important things in life: courage, persistence, friendship, and love. It’s something special. Don’t miss it” — from Karen Cushman.

“The Sickness of Europe in the 1300s rings relevant to today’s readers, as we travel with an orphaned girl through so many losses, and witness her transform them to comfort, joy, even laughter through the truth of song. A quick-paced treasure” — from Donna Jo Napoli.

“I came away from this powerful book with tears in my eyes and a little more hope for the future. A deeply moving tribute to the power of art and memory” — from Laurel Snyder.

I was utterly floored by these reactions to a book that means so much to me.

And Wild Bird has been chosen as a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard selection!

Then yesterday, I learned that Wild Bird got a starred review from Publishers Weekly. This is my very first starred review. EVER. I could hardly believe it. The reviewer wrote:

“Zahler unflinchingly depicts a world in chaos due to disease, drawing contemporary parallels and thoughtfully highlighting issues of power structures, collective trauma, and remembrance.”

Wow.

A Long Silence

Posted on by Diane Zahler

It’s hard to write about writing when the world is falling to pieces.

There’s a pandemic. There’s a war. We’ve even been visited here by a third Horseman, Pestilence, who gifted us with a grotesque infestation of spongy moth caterpillars that dangle from trees and leave welts on the skin of the unsuspecting.

 

 

 

 

We’ve lost so much:

Time

Money

Trust

Family, friends, loved ones.

 

But writing has been an escape for me, as I’m sure it is for a lot of writers. And I’ve kept on doing it, because — well, what else can one do?

My book Goblin Market will be published in August. I’ve seen an ARC, and the cover is beautiful. There’s interior art, which I love. It’s all very Polish, because my version of the story takes place in a fantastical version of Poland — for no real reason except that I visited there and was fascinated by it, and that it has storks, which are fabulous, and that it has a long history of goblin stories.

Wild Bird, my novel about the bubonic plague, is also moving right along. Another gorgeous cover, more lovely interior art, even a map. I do love a good map.

And Daughter of the White Rose will be published in paperback in August!

 

So life goes on, regardless. I hope you are well. But if it’s all too much, then another reality — an invented reality — might help.  Open a book. Take yourself out of the here and now. Exist somewhere, sometime different for a while.

 

You deserve it.

Wild Bird Builds a Nest

Posted on by Diane Zahler

I wrote Wild Bird before Covid-19 hit. Really I did.

I’ve been kind of obsessed with the bubonic plague since I was in high school. I wrote my first research paper on it. I’ve written an entire nonfiction book about it. There’s something about the combination of the time period — the Middle Ages — and the event itself — a disaster that wiped out at least a third of the population of Europe and truly changed the course of history — that has gripped me for decades.

So a couple of years ago, I started writing a middle-grade novel about the bubonic plague. It was inspired by a story I came across while researching the nonfiction book, in which shipful of sailors found a Norwegian village where everyone had died of plague — everyone but one young girl. That girl became my main character.

When Covid hit last year, I was nearly finished with the manuscript. I got very nervous (I mean, about the book. I was already nervous about the disease, and about everything else. Everyone was. This was just a little extra nervousness).  I wondered: Would anybody want to publish a book about a plague during a plague?

Well, it turns out the answer is yes. Much to my delight, my brilliant agent sent the manuscript to exactly the right editor. She fell in love with the book, and Roaring Brook Press will publish it in 2023!

And with luck and science (neither of which they had in 1350) our current plague will be only a memory by the time Wild Bird flies into bookstores and libraries.