To change the subject a bit, your books are not “religious” books that are not quotes. But I have noticed that faith regularly comes up in them in very casual ways. Vanderbeeker’s children have a good relationship with a local pastor. They eventually form a community garden on the grounds of their church. They say grace about meals. There is a poignant scene in “A Duet for Home” where children release mice they have caught in a park and the children pray for the mice.
In your books, faith is not central to the story, but it is not absent. I found that an intriguing creative choice to have faith in the background of these characters’ lives. Can you say something about that, and how you made those choices?
The Vanderbeeker family mimics my own family. And a big part of our family is our faith, so it felt very natural to record those moments in the books. The book is not just about it, but it is part of family life. Faith instructs me as a mother and how I make decisions. Also, the things we do to help others often reflect our faith. I feel that when readers read the books, no matter what faith tradition they come from, they can recognize similar elements in their own families. In the Vanderbeeker family, the decision to incorporate elements of faith felt very natural. It didn’t even feel as complicated as technology.
I think for me as a writer, the things that compelled me to write stories is that I want to speak authentically. Like you brought up “A Duet for Home” for example, when they let go of the mice and Maybelle wants to pray for them and Tyrell feels, “Oh, we don’t have to pray about them.” But you know, she speaks authentically from her sense of care and the sense of, “I really hope these animals are okay.” And when she says that prayer, I feel like Tyrell can sense his own worries and his own sense that he doesn’t know what the future will hold. And in a way they can really relate to each other in that moment and there is a sense of vulnerability between them that came at that moment of prayer.
About four years ago, my family started reading to the family, reading chapter books together every night. We started with classics like Roald Dahl books and the Narnia series. But one day we realized we were reading mostly white male authors. I wanted to better expose our children to a greater diversity of authors. When it comes to chapter books, can you recommend books by women and people of color?
The first is that one of the best ways to get in touch with many different authors — and newer books — is through independent bookstores and libraries. They do such a great job of showcasing a diversity of books, and they are always very knowledgeable about more current books that we as parents may not have grown up with. I didn’t grow up with books of people of color and it really touched me. It made me feel like stories about people like me weren’t important and not valid, that I didn’t deserve to be a hero in a story. And I think now all of us who went through that growing up write books because growing up we felt like we didn’t have stories that we could relate to, so we want our kids to have them.