Jen Downey asked Jen Swann Downey:

This question came from Louise Galveston over at the "From the Mixed-Up Files" blog: "It’s been a couple of years since the Ninja Librarians first began their adventures. What was the genesis of the idea for this series?"

Jen Swann Downey I think the seed for the series was planted when I saw the phrase “Petrarch’s Library” scrawled on a notebook I found in our never-very-organized, and always-very-clutterful house. Everyone in the family denied being the scrawler, but the phrase ignited my imagination, especially after I looked it up and found it associated with a collection of books that the 14th century humanist and poet, Petrarch, had carried around with him when he traveled on the back of a donkey. That made me laugh, because the phrase had suggested some sort of grand magnificent library. But then I thought, well, even a small collection of books IS a sort of imaginary grand magnificent place because each of the books is a doorway into a different world of ideas, and knowledge, and story.

Suddenly I was imagining “Petrarch’s Library” as a solid, if sprawling building, made out of library chambers from different times and places knitted together by magic into one incredible super-library.

Since I was a kid, I always had the feeling that librarians were masquerading at doing something mundane while actually doing something incredible, mysterious and magical. It seemed reasonable that the work of librarians who staffed the imaginary Petrarch’s Library would defend and protect the flow of information in shall we say, some additional warrior-ish direct action ways!

The rest of the interview is here: http://www.fromthemixedupfiles.com/ta... Though the giveaway on that site is over, I'm about to launch a goodreads giveaway for THE NINJA LIBRARIANS: THE ACCIDENTAL KEYHAND -- the first book in the series -- so keep an eye vaguely peeled for that....

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