Ask the Author: Doug Wilhelm
Answered Questions (5)
Doug Wilhelm
Middle schoolers ask me about this all the time! For me, at least, the key is to understand that writing is always a process. The scary time, when people get stuck or blocked, is right before you start -- and the way through that is to give yourself permission to write badly. Tell yourself, "I'll just write SOMEthing -- I can change or fix it up (or throw it out) later." Once you start, you're okay. And because it really IS a process, what defeats people is trying to shortcut that -- to make their first draft something great or perfect. Putting too much tension on your first draft stops you from trying things; to let yourself be creative, to flow with it, you have to give yourself room and permission to make mistakes. Try to see your draft as a sketch, a beginning, not a judgment on you. Take some pressure off! Just start, and you'll be okay.
Doug Wilhelm
I suggest that you keep a writer's notebook. This doesn't have to be fancy or expensive! It should be something you can carry around, that can become a friend in your life. I think the idea of having an appointment each day with your notebook, especially when you're just starting with it, is a good idea — but you don't have to write down everything that happens to you or anything like that. What you write should be up to you. Have fun with it, but come back to it every day for a few minutes — like a musician practicing an instrument.
Doug Wilhelm
I'm currently working on a YA novel called Street of Storytellers. It's set in late 1984 in Peshawar, Pakistan, which was just then the birthplace of radical Islamic violence. My story centers on four teenagers -- an American, an Afghan refugee, and a Pakistani brother and sister -- who are drawn into the dangerous ferment in the bazaars. I'm thinking of it, trying to write it, as a thriller with much suspense -- and with meaning.
Doug Wilhelm
Up until this new book, all my novels are for middle schoolers -- and I'm generally inspired by real kids, by the things they share with me and the things they deal with. Growing up isn't easy, and the middle-school years can be the most challenging, confusing time of all. This is the period of developing, through all the turbulence and intensity, from children into young adults. A very large part of our attitudes, our values, our sense of ourselves and how (or if) we can fit in, what we hope to do and to be, are formed during these years. So I'm inspired by the challenge of writing meaningful, suspenseful stories that connect with this time in people’s lives.
Doug Wilhelm
The idea for Treasure Town -- my newest book, coming out April 20 -- came from my nephew Henry when he was little. His mom, my sister Sarah-Lee Terrat, is a working artist who was fascinated with the things Henry would say and the questions he would ask when he was very young. (He's still a unique individual.) One evening she called me and said, "I was just giving Henry a bath, and he started talking about two gold prospectors, Yuke Johnson and Butt Luck." I wrote that down! And eventually I wrote, and Sarah-Lee illustrated, Treasure Town about three kids in a Florida beach town who are obsessed with searching for the legendary buried treasure of Jean Lafitte, King of the Pirates in the 19th century Gulf of Mexico. The kids team up with Yuke Johnson and Bug (I changed the first name) Luck, two would-be gold prospectors who meant to go to Alaska to dig for gold and get rich -- but they hopped a freight train going in the wrong direction, and when the story starts they tumble out at a crossing in Sandy Beach, Florida.
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