The Rebirth of Young Wolf

JANICE: Yes, Tom's and my Young Wolf trilogy is soon to be born again. Originally published by Random House in their Step Into Reading series, the books will be republished by Eakin Press on August 1, 2018. Tom would be so happy. We both loved Young Wolf like a son.

When we wrote and illustrated the first one, A Mare for Young Wolf, we had no idea it would be a trilogy. Later it grew into a quadrilogy, and finally a pentalogy, thanks to Eakin Press. That's what happens when you fall in love with your characters, both humans and horses.

Here's something about all five Young Wolf books. They stand alone but are best read in this order:

Young Wolf chooses a mare, Red Wind, for his first horse. He thinks she is the smartest, most beautiful horse in his father's herd. But the village bully, Little Big Mouth, makes fun of him, because Comanches believed mares were for women and children - not for warriors.

More than anything Young Wolf wants to be a man. He thinks killing his first buffalo is the way. He begs his father to let him go on the buffalo hunt, but as they start out, Young Wolf grows fearful and wonders why he begged to come.

 One night a wild stallion steals Red Wind away. Young Wolf is determined to get her back even though his father says no man can take a mare from a stallion. Young Wolf sets out to find her and finds more than he is looking for!









Now for the fourth and fifth books, published earlier by Eakin Press:

Young Wolf wants to win the horse race at the tribal fair. So does Little Big Mouth. And that is how the trouble starts. Can Young Wolf's colt, Snow Wind, run as fast as his father, the legendary wild white stallion? Young Wolf thinks so. But Little Big Mouth knows a secret about Snow Wind that could keep him from winning the race. Neither boy can imagine what he will win and lose.

And finally Comanche Song, a story for older readers:

In 1840 Tsena (Wolf), son of a Comanche chief, goes with his father and other chiefs to a peace council with the Texans in San Antonio. The council turns violent, casting Tsena briefly into white man's world, but ultimately on a warpath of revenge that leads across Texas to the Great Water.

This  historical novel tells the story of the Council House Massacre and the Battle of Plum Creek from a Comanche point of view for the first time.

These five books are Tom's and my effort to give readers a look inside another culture with empathy so that we can have peace on earth.

Connections Books Make, II

JANICE:  Researching, writing, and illustrating books make connections with people who would never connect otherwise. Our first picture book, Victoria House, is the story of a once elegant Victorian farmhouse that is eventually deserted and falls into disrepair. The cover shows her in the old days when she was lived in and loved.

The story idea came from the classic picture book, The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton. In this story a house is gradually surrounded by a city and finally moved back out to the country. As an architect and urban planner, Tom was always interested in revitalizing the central city, including our own Austin. And so we decided to reverse the idea of moving out to the country or suburbs.

Instead we moved Victoria into the "urbs" in the middle of the night.

While researching how a house is moved, we met Big Earl and his family who were house movers. We watched them take apart and move a house, the lower floor and upper floor each on a separate truck. When our book was published, they all came to our book signing at Toad Hall.

Now here she is,  moved, reconstructed,  and lived in and loved once more.

As a model for Victoria we chose a house in Navasota, Texas, that we happened to see on a trip to Huntsville. We stopped and knocked on the door. The house was being used for a writers retreat, so we were welcomed to look around and take photographs. A year or so later the house was bought by a Houston family, almost like the family in Victoria House. When they learned about the book, Tom and I were invited to visit, and we became good friends. Not only that, they hired Tom to do some remodeling of our model, a connection we never dreamed of.

Here Tom and I are standing in the gazebo.
















 Finally, one day we were driving through an inner city neighborhood in Austin and saw an old house that had just been planted in a vacant lot. Of course, we stopped and talked with the owner and gave him a copy of Victoria House. 
He smiled. "I've already read your book. It's what made me decide to move this house."
Oh, the power of books!

Victoria House is now out of print but we are hoping to bring it back in a new edition.

For more book connections see our blog for May 2010.
 

Girl Power

JANICE:  Girl power is nothing new. Way back in 1703 Antonio Vivaldi was teaching girls in a Venetian orphanage to play every musical instrument, including the bassoon. The girls' orchestra became famous all over Europe. You can read about Vivaldi and these girls who were ahead of their time in this book.

Since they were orphans, many of the girls had no last names, so they were given the name of the instrument each one played, such as Catarina of the Viola or Bettina of the Bassoon. Here they are.

Tom's illustrations are true to Venice. We made several research trips and stayed in a palazzo in the square where Antonio grew up. Tom took photos, sketched, and did some plein air painting.

Kirkus Reviews said: "Giving even Canaletto a run for his money, the illustrator sets expressive, natural-looking figures against golden-toned backdrops of 17th-century Venice's rich interiors, splendid vistas, opulent churches and serene canals . . . (A) fetching introduction to one of the great masters of the Baroque era."

By the time we finished this book I had fallen in love with Vivaldi and these orphan girls, so I wrote another book about one of them, Anna Maria.

Her father made a violin for her before he died. When she plays it, she hears his voice. At the orphanage she quickly becomes Vivaldi's favorite student, making Paolina, one of the other girls, jealous. One night she steals Anna Maria's violin and throws it into a canal. Can Anna Maria ever get it back? Read this book and find out.