An Inside Look with Lauren Wolk
*Season #SIX (Summer 2019)
How did you come to know Annabelle?
Wolf Hollow and its companion, My Own Lightning, were inspired by my mother’s childhood and the Pennsylvania farm where she grew up and where I myself spent quite a lot of time. My mother’s stories and my own experiences on the farm with my grandparents and uncles all helped me create Annabelle. She’s a blend of my mother, my grandmother, me, and my imagination. I call her one of my “book daughters,” a truly fictional person, but we have a lot in common. We’re family in a very real sense.
What do you think is her most admirable quality?
Her courage. As a child, I was afraid of almost everything. I worried all the time (still do), fretted about things big and small, spent a lot of time focused on threats that were beyond my control. Because Annabelle is braver than I was, she does more. She takes action. Yes, she makes mistakes along the way, but she has the courage of her convictions. And I both admire and aspire to that.
Is there anything you wish she would have changed or done differently in her story?
Great question. Since I don’t map out a story before I write it, I don’t spend time considering what a character ought to do. I simply follow her as she lives her life, building on what I discover as we go. As a result, I am complicit in her mistakes. We make them together, Annabelle and I, and we live with the consequences. Of course, I regret some of those consequences, just as she does, but mistakes and regret are part of life. My mistakes have taught me to be more thoughtful and deliberate, to think before I act, to consider a situation from all sides and carefully weigh my response to it before I jump in. But Annabelle’s quite young, inclined to leap before she looks, though she acquires wisdom every time she steps off the cliff into the unknown.
What do you think Annabelle can offer to other children that are experiencing similar situations to what she went through?
Annabelle grapples with issues that are as relevant today as they were in the 1940s. As she learns to look past the obvious to the hidden layers of a person, she realizes how complicated we all are and how unwise it is to rush to judgement. She comes to understand how difficult it is to be a fair and kind person in an unfair and often unkind world, but that it’s worth the effort. Worth the work. I think young readers benefit from role models who are honest and brave about difficult issues, willing to put in the work to solve their problems, and strong enough to admit when they’ve been wrong.
How did you research Annabelle and the circumstances she found himself in?Wolf Hollow and My Own Lightning are set in a place and family history I know well, and I was fortunate to have a primary source – my mother – to provide information I needed to make the stories accurate and authentic. But I relied on libraries to provide what I didn’t know about the science of lightning strikes, interspecies communication, and the inhumane treatment of dogs. That sounds like an odd trio of topics, but they’re connected, through Annabelle and her story.
Do you and Annabelle share any similarities?
Annabelle’s a good girl. Really decent. She’s a better person than I am, but if effort counts (and it does), I can say that I gain a lot of fullfilment by trying to be more like her. We both come from and strive to build strong families. And we both have a deep respect for and connection with the natural world.
What was the hardest scene to write about her?
Without giving too much away, I’d say that the scene in which she puts herself in harm’s way was the most difficult to write, not because she gets hurt but because it’s difficult to write dramatic scenes well. I like understatement, but sometimes a scene calls for something … louder. I struggle with getting that right.
Who do you think was her biggest supporter and why?
Annabelle is always her own best supporter. She has great parents and grandparents, and her brother Henry is certainly a powerful ally in My Own Lightning, but Annabelle always finds her own way. I love that about her.
Why do think young people and animals have such a strong connection?
Young people, like the young at heart of any age, have plenty of imagination, faith in possibility, and an innocence that allows them to believe what others disregard as impossible or silly. And children are closer to the time when they could not yet use formal language to communicate. When they relied on different ways of connecting with others. Just as animals do.
What do you think Annabelle is doing as the present time?
Annabelle is watching the world. Listening. Learning. She’s a curious creature, and a thoughtful one, constantly exploring, especially her own self and the gifts she has not yet unwrapped. I can only imagine what she’ll do with her life when she opens them.
SEASON #SIX (Summer 2019)
Interview #122 with Tamara Bundy (Author of Pixie Pushes On)
Interview #123 with Lindsay Lackey (Author of All the Impossible Things)
Interview #124 with Tae Keller (Author of When You Trap a Tiger)
Interview #125 with Jamie Sumner (Author of Roll With It)
Interview #126 with Hena Khan (Author of More to the Story)
Interview #127 with Phil Bildner (Author of A High-Five for Glenn Burke)
Interview #128 with Leslie Connor (Author of A Home for Goddesses and Dogs)
Interview#129 with Gillian McDunn (Author of Queen Bee and Me)
Interview #130 with Jody J. Little (Author of Worse Than Weird)
Interview #131 with Jenn Bishop (Author of Things You Can't Say)
Interview #132 with Kaela Noel (Author of Coo)
Interview #133 with Rebecca Stead (Author of The List of Things That Will Not Change)
Interview #134 with Gae Polisner (Author of Jack Kerouac is Dead to Me)
Interview #135 with Emily Blejwas (Author of Like Nothing Amazing Ever Happened)
Interview #136 with Joy McCullough (Author of A Field Guide to Getting Lost)
Interview #137 with Kim Baker (Author of the Water Bears)
Interview #138 with Erin Entrada Kelly (Author of We Dream of Space)
Interview #139 with Jess Redman (Author of Quintessence)
Interview #140 with Melanie Conklin (Author of Every Missing Piece)
Interview #141 with Lindsey Stoddard (Author of Brave Like That)
Interview #158 with Rebecca Ansari (Author of The In-Between)
Interview #159 with John David Anderson (Author of One Last Shot)
Interview #160 with Tracy Holczer (Author of Brave in the Woods)
Interview #161 with James Bird (Author of The Brave)
Interview #162 with Marcella Pixley (Author of Trowbridge Road)
Interview #163 with Barbara O'Connor (Author of Halfway to Harmony)
Interview #164 with Alan Gratz (Author of Ground Zero)
Interview #165 with Lisa Fipps (Author of Starfish)
Interview #166 with Ann Braden (Author of Flight of the Puffin)
Interview #167 with Kimberly Willis Holt (Author of The Ambassador of NoWhere Texas)
Interview #168 with Elana K. Arnold (Author of The House That Wasn't There)
Interview #169 with Erin Soderberg (Author of The Great Peach Experiment)
Interview #170 with Donna Gephart (Author of Abby, Tried, and True)
Interview #171 with M. Evan Wolkenstein (Author of Turtle Boy)
Interview #172 with Lindsey Stoddard (Author of Bea is for Blended)
Interview #173 with Jess Redman (Author of The Adventure is Now)
Interview #174 with David Levithan (Author of The Mysterious Disappearance of Aiden)
Interview #175 with Chris Grabenstein (Author of The Smartest Kid in the Universe)
Interview #176 with Ali Standish (Author of The Mending Summer)
Interview #177 with Holly Goldberg Sloan (Author of The Elephant in the Room)
Interview #178 with Jeff Zentner (Author of In the Wild Light)
SEASON #ELEVEN (Fall/Winter 2021)
Interview #179 with Katherine Applegate (Author of Willow)
Interview #180 with Padma Venkatraman (Author of Born Behind Bars)
Interview #181 with R.J. Palacio (Author of Pony)
Interview #182 with Kyle Lukoff (Author of Too Bright to See)
Interview #183 with Barbara Dee (Author of Violets are Blue)
Interview #184 with Anne Ursu (Author of The Troubled Girls of Dragonmir Academy)
Interview #185 with Margaret Finnegan (Author of We Could Be Heroes)
Interview #186 with Jasmine Warga (Author of Shape of Thunder)
Interview #187 with Joseph Bruchac (Author of Rez Dogs)
Interview #188 with Kathryn Erskine (Author of Lily's Promise)
Interview #189 with Elly Swartz (Author of Dear Student)
Interview #190 with Heather Clark (Author of Lemon Drop Falls)
Interview #191 with Veera Hiranandani (Author of How to Find What You're Not Looking For)
Interview #192 with Elizabeth Eulberg (Author of The Best Worst Summer)
Interview #193 with Cathy Carr (Author of 365 Days to Alaska)
Interview #194 with Carol Cujec and Peyton Goddard (Authors of REAL)
Interview #195 with Gillian McDunn (Author of These Lucky Stars)
Interview #196 with Alyssa Colman (Author of The Gilded Girl)
Interview #197 with E.L. Chen (Author of The Comeback)
Interview #198 with J.M.M. Nuanez (Author of Birdie and Me)
SEASON #TWELVE (Winter/Spring 2022)
Interview #199 with Jamie Sumner (Author of One Kid's Trash)
Interview #200 with Chad Lucas (Author of Thanks a Lot, Universe)
Interview #201 with Jenn Bishop (Author of Where We Used to Roam)
Interview #202 with Rebecca Caprara (Author of Worst-Case Collin)
Interview #203 with Leslie Connor (Author of Anybody Here Seen Frenchie?)
Interview #204 with Caroline Gertler (Author of Many Points of Me)
Interview #205 with Margaret Finnegan (Author of Susie B. Won't Back Down)
Interview #206 with Shawn Peters (Author of The Unforgettable Logan Foster)
Interview #207 with Aisha Saeed (Author of Omar Rising)
Interview #208 with Adrianna Cuevas (Author of Cuba in my Pocket)
Interview #209 with Jennifer Swender (Author of Stuck)
Interview #210 with Brenda Woods (Author of When Winter Robeson Came)
Interview #211 with Danya Lorentz (Author of the Book Of a Feather)
Interview #212 with Saadia Faruqi (Author of Yusuf Azeem is Not a Hero)
Interview #213 with Ellen Hopkins (Author of What About Will)
SEASON #THIRTEEN (Summer 2022)
Interview #214 with Nora Raleigh Baskin and Gae Polisner (Authors of What About the Octopus)
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