Jan is Jan Fields, moderator of this interview/workshop, and Web Editor of the ICL Web Site. While red signals our guest speaker's responses. Green shows names or usernames of people and the questions they asked of our speaker.

Jan: Welcome to our July workshop with author Debby Garfinkle about the importance of understanding and respecting your reader. How to know if you're being condescending or just "out of it." How to reach young people by relating and remembering. How to learn the difference between real young people and what you might be imagining about them. Since editors complain that many beginning writers talk down to kids or turn books and stories into lectures, this is an important topic for your publication career.

D.L.Garfinkle: Thank you very much!

Louisa: What do you mean by "respecting the reader"?

D.L.Garfinkle: To me, "respecting your readers" means writing good quality books that children and teens will enjoy. More specifically, it means that you don't try to teach them a lesson or write to please their parents or teachers or librarians. You try to entertain them with a well plotted and well paced book with interesting characters, just like you'd try to entertain an adult reader if you were writing an adult book. You try to give them something to think about and open up their worlds a bit, but you don't preach to them.

D.L.Garfinkle: It means you might have to research things like how do teenagers communicate with their friends these days (texting, emailing, IMing?), what does a child learn in second grade, or how do ten-year-old boys talk to each other, so your book seems authentic to your intended readers. It means you might ask children or teens to read your manuscript and give you feedback on it. It means you might have to deal with tough issues like sexuality in a teen book or a mean parent or teacher in a middle grade book or a toddler who doesn't behave perfectly all the time in a picture book. You will present these issues realistically rather than idealistically so they will ring true to your young readers.

D.L.Garfinkle: Respecting your reader is a lot of work, but there is nothing better than getting fan mail from a child begging you to write more books, accompanied by a cute crayoned picture of a scene from your book, or an email from a teen that says, "It's like you got into my head and had your character say all the stuff I've been thinking about" or a teen driving two hours for your book signing so she can talk to you and have you sign your books for her. Just my (strong) opinion, of course!

Jan: I run into a lot of writers who want to do picture books because they think small children are adorable, precious, cute, etc. The picture books almost always reflect that itsy-cutesy view of children. I tend to recommend you not write for anyone you consider adorable. What do you think about that? Do you think you can treat an audience respectfully if you ...well, infantilize them? What's the cure, doctor?

D.L.Garfinkle: I'm sorry, Jan, the Great and Mighty Author could not be here today, but I, the Pretty Good Author, am filling in for her. ;-) That is an interesting question. I think you're right. You have to treat your readers like real, thoughtful, unique individuals, no matter what their ages.

D.L.Garfinkle: I happen to love babies and children and teenagers, and often think they're quite adorable. Even teenagers. However, I know that they all have multifaceted personalities, and are not always adorable. When my baby had colic for the longest month of my life, that was not adorable. When my two-year-old bit my friend's toddler: Not adorable. When my teen whined that our three-year-old computer was hopelessly dated: Not adorable.

D.L.Garfinkle: When I was young, my great-aunt used to pinch my cheek and say, "Isn't she a sweetie!" to my parents. I wanted to say, "Get your hands off me, don't talk about me in the third person when I'm right in the room, and how can you call me a sweetie when you don't know me at all!" The last thing readers want to experience when they open a book is a repeat of my great-aunt. In other words, don't talk down to your readers. Treat them as the smart individuals they are.

D.L.Garfinkle: I think infantilizing readers often comes with good intentions. But really, child and teen readers want and deserve similar things from books that adults want: A good story with a well-paced plot and interesting characters. Adults don't want to be preached at. Neither do children or teens.

D.L.Garfinkle: On the other hand, a book that makes one think about life in a new way and possibly teaches readers a lesson in a very subtle way rises above a book with just a well-paced plot and interesting characters.

D.L.Garfinkle: For instance, one of my favorite novels, HOLES by Louis Sachar, has great humor, a loveable, flawed main character, interesting secondary characters, and a page-turning plot. But it also makes readers think about racism and friendship and families and loyalty and other issues. It never says, "Children, be loyal to your friends." Instead, readers see the main character running after his friend to try to save him and, on their own, conclude that loyalty is important. Sachar respected his readers enough to know that they were smart enough to draw their own conclusions. Jan, I'm not sure this answers your question. And I have to say that I think it helps to love the readers one writes for. The writing and publishing process can be frustrating and even heartbreaking. But my biggest reward is the wonderful fan letters I get from teen and children readers. I love that I've made a bit of an impact on some of their lives. And I love doing author visits at schools and spending time with kids and teens there. But I think part of loving kids and teens means respecting them as people and not infantilizing them.

Jackie: I want to be respectful of my readers, but I don't know a lot of teens (and I want to write teen books). I remember what being a teen was like for me (it wasn't that long ago), but do you think that's enough? Do I need to make an effort to get to know more teens today? Is it enough for memories of ten years ago to still be fresh for me? And if I do need to know more about today's teens, how would you recommend I do that since my days are full with two toddlers in the house? Any shortcuts?

D.L.Garfinkle: I had a similar dilemma when I wrote my first novel, Storky: How I Lost My Nickname and Won the Girl. Not only was I in my late thirties and trying to write about a teen, I'm female and the main character is male. I also had a toddler and preschooler at the time, and was pregnant with my third child while I drafted much of the manuscript.

D.L.Garfinkle: I think that teens' emotional states are pretty similar no matter what era it is. When I write, I try to remember how I felt about things like the opposite sex and my family and school when I was a teen. Inner thoughts and feelings don't depend on what year it is. I think generally, most teens are more emotional and unsure than adults are. I was lucky that I'd kept a diary through my teen years and saved it all these years. Looking back at it, I saw I was often exhilirated one day and sobbing the next, and never sure of anything. As an adult, I'm more mellow and confident. So I think the inner life of teens is much more a factor of their individual personalities and their age than the era they're raised in.

D.L.Garfinkle: But what about the outer life? Like you, I was not a teen when I wrote my young adult novel and I did not live with teens. But I used teen babysitters for my children. I didn't tell them I was writing a YA novel, but I did ask them a lot of questions when I was driving them to our house or driving them back to their house. I always volunteered to drive them just so I could sort of pump them for information about their lives (not in an overly intrusive or annoying way, though, hopefully!).

D.L.Garfinkle: We also hired my friend's teenage son for a couple of days to help us move to a new house. I drove him and our stuff from our old house to our new house, and we unpacked the U-haul together, etc., and, again, I asked a lot of questions and also just listened to him talk. It turned out that he was obsessed with cars. He couldn't wait to drive and had already researched what kind of used car he wanted and was already trying to save money for it. That was really helpful. I made my teen boy character very interested in cars too.

D.L.Garfinkle: When my kids were young, we went to food courts, bookstores, and the library a lot. These are all good places to eavesdrop on teens.

D.L.Garfinkle: Another thing I did was use the site urbandictionary.com. I still use this site. It has lots of fun teen slang words, and shows the date the slang was put on the site. Also, people (mostly teens, I believe) vote on whether the slang is good or not.

D.L.Garfinkle: When I had a solid draft of my manuscript, I gave it to my two teenage nieces and my teen nephew. I asked them if it rang true, among other things. My nieces gave me useful feedback. My nephew never got around to reading it. In retrospect, maybe I should have offered to pay them for reading my manuscript. Then I might have gotten feedback from my nephew too. Plus, it would have been a nice thing to do.

D.L.Garfinkle: I have now published five teen novels with Penguin. For every one of them, I have gotten some type of teen feedback. For my THE BAND trilogy about a teen rock band, I called my teenage neighbor all the time with questions because he was in a rock band. He was so helpful, I bought him a nice gift and named the character of the band manager for him. I also email my teenage nieces with a list of slang terms I'm not sure about. For instance, I think "sleezeball' was a word I was unsure about, and my nieces said "skank" was better. You don't want to have too much slang because it will date your manuscript, but I think a little makes the book seem more authentic. And teenagers have big b.s. detectors. One thing that doesn't ring true to them may spoil your entire book for them.

D.L.Garfinkle: My oldest is now a teenager, and she's been helpful too. For instance, she uses Facebook and IMs much more than the phone or emails to communicate with her friends. I'll keep that in mind for my next book.

D.L.Garfinkle: So, in conclusion, I think teenagers' inner selves are pretty constant over time. But to get the details of their outer lives right, it's good to ask teenagers questions and observe them, look at urbandictionary.com, and it would be really nice if you could find a teenager to read over your manuscript.

D.L.Garfinkle: I hope this helps. And I know how hard it is to find writing time when your kids are young. I tried to write 5 hours a week in those days, and it was a struggle. Believe me, it gets easier!

ColoradoKate: I write mostly contemporary realistic fiction. I have finally given in and acknowledged the fact that at least some of my MG characters will have and will be using cell phones. But I really, really don't want to have them spending their time texting and tweeting and using Facebook and YouTube and so on. Do I have to?

mmmgood: I wonder about the "dating" aspect, of technology too. Not as in boyfriend/girlfriend, but as in soon being outdated.

D.L.Garfinkle: I write mostly contemporary, realistic fiction too and I know very little about technology. So I totally feel your pain! I think if you write middle grade fiction, you don't have to show much use of technology. For instance, you mentioned texting, tweeting, Facebook, and Youtube. My 12 1/2 year old son has texted a few times, never tweets or goes on Twitter, and doesn't have a Facebook page. He does go on Youtube sometimes. My 15-year-old, in contrast, uses all of these things extensively, so you'd have to worry more about featuring technology in young adult books. If you didn't want to show any technology, you could set your story in a place with a lot of poverty. Texting, for instance, costs money and is a luxury. A lot of people can't afford a computer or can afford only dialup, which makes watching a Youtube video extremely slow. Or you could use a summer camp setting or a setting like the one in HOLES, a rural camp for alleged juvenile delinquents, or another creative setting in which technology would not be available. Or you could make your main character somewhat of a luddite. But you would have to acknowledge that she was a luddite so your readers don't just think the author didn't want to write about technology.

D.L.Garfinkle: But really I think with middle grade novels, you don't have to worry too much about technology. I think many kids in middle school have cell phones and play video games and visit Youtube. But I don't think many text or use social networking sights a lot. Do you know a teenager who can help you with your technology questions to make your books more accurate? Some adults are well-versed at texting, Facebook, etc., and could also help.

D.L.Garfinkle: Mmmgood (love that name!) also mentioned the fear that technologies described in a book could be outdated by the time the book comes out. That is a valid concern. For instance, Myspace was hugely popular a few years ago, but now many teens use Facebook instead. I think, though, if a young reader saw Myspace references in a book, he would just think, "Oh, this book must be set a couple of years ago." I don't think it would be much of a problem.

Yaya: Do you feel you have a natural camaraderie with your reader or is it something you had to work at very hard?

D.L.Garfinkle: I have always liked children and teens, so that's not a problem. I know that children and teens have different tastes in books, so that not all children and teens will like my work. But I want to do my best for those who like my kind of humor and writing style. The hard part for me in writing for children and teens is making my work sound authentic. I work hard at researching the lives of children and teens. All of my books have had some scenes set in school. I have had to research what children and teens are taught in school, what books they read, and where they eat lunch and what kind of food they eat. I don't text or IM, but I've had to do some research on that for my young adult novels. I'll often ask my teenage nieces whether certain slang is still used or whether they know a better way to say things. I've had to learn when teens are eligible for a drivers permit and what ten-year-old boys might do at a birthday party and many other things.

D.L.Garfinkle: So while I am quite fond of most children and teens, I have had to work at understanding the details of their lives. I hope that helps a little.

Yaya: do you have any special advice for connecting with young children and staying out of jail? I really like kids, but I surely don't want a parent to think I'm trying to 'Off' with their child. Nor am I willing to frighten some small child. Any hints? Thanks so much.

D.L.Garfinkle: Could you volunteer at the daycare of a church or temple or other nonprofit? At a children's hospital or children's museum, perhaps? Do you have a dog? When I take mine to the park, she's a little kid magnet. If you have close friends or relatives with young children, I'm sure they'd appreciate an offer from you to babysit. Another idea is to read a book like Ages and Stages: A Parent's Guide to Normal Childhood Development, which details the emotional, mental, and phsyical development of babies, toddlers, and preschoolers.

Mikki: Have you ever thought about the organization called...terrific, I just forgot the name but anyway, it's for 'older' people who want to be surrogate grandparents. They spend a couple of hours a week with small children playing games, reading to them and just giving them time and love. Most cities have this organization, but I don't know where you live so couldn't say if yours does or not. There are also the day care centers, particularly now, with school out and parents working. If you tried to volunteer at one of those, you would probably have an age range of children to observe and work with.

YaYa: Do you find it helpful to sit in classrooms and observe your target readers or, do you think that is more of a hindrance? How do you feel the students would feel about being watched for a story or book project? Thank you, in advance, for your answer.

D.L.Garfinkle: I have never actually sat in a classroom just to observe the kids. While that may be helpful to me, I think it may be a bit disruptive to the teacher and students. What I've done instead is to volunteer in my children's classrooms and done tasks the teachers have asked me to do. That way, I'm helping the teacher and students AND benefitting myself by getting to see kids in action. For many years, I've worked for an hour a week at the elementary school library. This has been terrific for me because I get to see what books the kids are checking out, get to look at children's books, and get to help the school. I think I'm a good volunteer because I know a lot about children's books and therefore can make informed reading recommendations to the children.I've also come into classrooms to read books out loud to the children. Not my books. This has been fun, and also useful to see what books and what parts of books get the best reactions from the children. Even if you don't have young children, I bet your local elementary school would love your help there.

Yaya: It sounds to me as if you prefer to be involved with those who would be the target readers of whatever you are writing. Am I wrong or, do you also have times when you feel it is more important to watch the actions from a distance?

D.L.Garfinkle: That's a good question. Yes, sometimes I think it's better to observe from a distance. In fact, I do a lot more observing from a distance than telling children I'm writing a book and asking them questions to help me in my writing. For instance, I've learned a lot about sixth-grade boys from driving my son's carpool to middle school this year. I hear what the boys talk about (mostly homework, sports, and girls) in the backseat as I'm silently driving and taking mental notes. If I ask my sixth-grade boy questions, he often clams up. But he'll go on and on with his friends. If the adult is not in the middle of things, often kids will act more natural and open.

Yaya: I am working on a story that includes giving life to an inanimate object and my character becomes extremely involved with the animated character. My main character is 12 years old and I am trying to use his age as a guideline for the level of conversation and information shared in the story. Do you feel that this would be considered 'talking down' to 12 year olds?

D.L.Garfinkle: I think it can be done well. My Supernatural Rubber Chicken series feature ten-year-old twins who own a talking rubber chicken who can grant wishes. I understand that twelve is older, but in the movie Harvey, James Stewart was an adult who talked to an invisible rabbit. And of course, in the Twilight series, the teenage protagonist romances an immortal vampire. I would think a twelve-year-old would be at first skeptical of a talking inanimate object. You would probably show his skepticism and then show him gradually realizing that the inanimate object really could talk.

Yaya: I've witnessed the difficulties that children, middle grade and young adults can experience after various types of trauma in their lives. When the trial of their faith comes to an end, the challenge in their lives does not suddenly stop. With that in mind, do you feel it is demeaning to include an animated situation with a real-life problem that someone is going through?

D.L.Garfinkle: I'm not sure I understand this question. What do you mean by an animated situation? Could you clarify this a bit?

Jan: I think she means (and YAYA can correct me if I'm wrong) that she wants her living-inanimate-object book to be serious and deal with some serious issues.

Jan: It's going to be a tough sell, I think. Generally adding a talking inanimate object (whether a supernatural rubber chicken or a toy teddybear that happens to chat you up) brings a story out of the realm of dealing with really SERIOUS issues. Now that doesn't mean they don't illustrate real themes about friendship or standing up for yourself or being brave or whatever. But if you're dealing with a serious serious issue like a little boy who is being beat up by his step-dad (for example), adding a talking teddybear is going to seem like an unnatural juxtaposition (unless you're Stephen King...then the talking teddy bear will rip open his seams to reveal razor sharp teeth and he'll eat the dad with tons of gore and more than a few screams.) It would be blindingly hard to do well. It would give the marketing people fits. But with anything in publishing, if you do it well enough and it ends up working...it might fly.

D.L.Garfinkle: Oh, I see now. I think Jan said this very well, and I agree with her. The juxtaposition of a talking inanimate object with serious issues could be quite jarring and very hard to pull off.

Okami: I have a question that I've been grappling with for the last two years. I've been told by more than three readers that my MG novel lacks specific details that they need to picture the story. Yet just as many who've read my novel said that kids and teens have "better and brighter" imaginations than adults and can fill the gaps easily. I know when Mikki S asked her question about "Writing Up" you said when two or more people point out similar issues in your story, it's time to stop and assess. I agree. No matter how many times you read, edit, let it cool and repeat, you can only read your work so objectively. But frankly, I'm at a loss for what to do. Either I have too much detail and leave no room for the reader's imagination, plus it reads slow and dawdling. Or I go too bare bones and no one can picture the story in their imaginations. Plus in my case, it always leads to issues with believability and suspending disbelief. Or I try to get away with "Telling" and can't. So to sum it all up, are there any tips you can give for including meaningful and purposeful details to bring your story to life? One of my readers suggested reading books on craft, and I do, but do you recommend any that help with writing better details that matter?

Jan: I know I'm not Debby (she's much cuter) but my favorite for making the whole showing thing super super clear is Picture Writing by Anastasia Suen because she takes a very sensory approach to writing. As for sensory detail, I do all of mine in the action. The closer you are to the characters, the more you are in the moments of your story, the more sensory detail will happen automatically because "close" and "detail" go hand and hand.

Jan: The setting a scene takes place in tends to affect the actions of the characters as the setting intrudes upon them (as long as the setting is real for YOU when you write.) If you have two people telling secrets in a cave, you're going to have very different specific action and the sensory detail that comes with that than if you have two people telling secrets in a bus station or a classroom or a table at the food court in the mall because there are external elements to all of those that are going to shape how ANY two people go about the business of telling secrets.

Jan: You might try (as a practice) taking two characters that you know well (any two from one of your stories) and giving them a dialogue task (revealing a secret) then writing it in vastly different locations. Just that one scene. Imagine yourself really really in that place. Imagine yourself really really in those people. What are they dealing with? How is it affecting what they do? How is the setting affecting them? Icy drips of water down your back as you lean forward to tell a secret in a cave is very different from sitting on a bench in a busy bus station and trying to tell a secret when someone in dire need of a bath comes up and squishes onto the bench with you.

Jan: Anyway, detail happens in direct result of how much YOU (the writer) are actually in the moment with the characters in your head. If you find your imagination tends to try to stick with hearing them...you'll need to dig deeper when you make your scene so that you hear them AND exist in the place they are while you write.

D.L.Garfinkle: Jan (she's much smarter) gave you some excellent suggestions. I also discussed description when I answered your question about pacing. So I'm going to mostly refer to Jan's post and my answer to your pacing question. Keep in mind that just as the setting will greatly affect the story, so too will the characters in that setting. If one of the characters in the cave has claustrophobia and fear of the dark, she will have different reactions to the setting than the character whose hobby is spelunking (cave exploring).

D.L.Garfinkle: Jan is right about the book Picture Writing. It's a great book for plotting, also. And as I wrote in the Pacing post, I find Visual Dictionaries helpful, as well as noting what happens to my face when I make different expressions in the mirror, referring to pictures of my characters that I've downloaded from the Net, using clothing store websites to help describe characters' outfits, and getting color description ideas from paint store samples. Some people make a collage of their manuscript, using pictues of the characters, the characters' houses, schools, favorite possessions, etc., to set the sensory tone of their books. Other writers make music playlists to set the tone of their books.

Quill: I am curious what your thoughts are about young people (characters) in such a "throw-away" society, where change is more rapid than ever before. Are the core, intrinsic value beliefs of characters in today's society still fundamental...something that could potentially resonate with readers 50 years from now? Or does literature for young readers today have a much shorter "shelf life" due to the rapidly-changing nature of the world and its global intermingling? I would like to think that our work will create value for as many people for as long as it can. I guess I worry that so much of what we create today is more readily "tossed" or lost in the shuffle than it might have been a few decades ago.

D.L.Garfinkle: Here are my thoughts, but I'd be interested in hearing from others. I think society is changing rapidly now, but has changed rapidly in the past too. I'm not sure we're changing faster than we used to. And I think human emotion is pretty constant over time. There will always be unrequited crushes and feelings of inferiority for teens and nightmares and sibling rivalry for young children. Books that are emotionally truthful may find readers for a very long time. We've had, of course, a lot of technical changes. There are a lot more books published now than there used to be fifty years ago. Books tend to go out of print a lot faster. And e-readers are becoming more common. In fifty years, people may be reading mostly by e-reader or some other device that hasn't been invented yet. But people have always told stories and listened to stories, and I think some form of the book will be around for a long time.

D.L.Garfinkle: There are recent books that I think will be classics and probably still read avidly in fifty years: The young adult novel Speak, the middle grade novel Holes, the picture book Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus. Speak is about confronting bullies and speaking up for yourself. Bullies have always been around and probably always will. I think teens will find it relevant in fifty years just as they do now. Holes is about loyalty and perserverance, traits that will always be important. Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus is silly fun, and there is no expiration on children's desire for silly fun. Children and teens are still excited about books. Twilight wouldn't be a phenomena if they weren't. I have plenty of faith in the future of books.

Mikki: As long as we are writers...as long as there are writers...values will live both in society and in our characters. Perhaps we won't write characters that will withstand the ages, but the values they have, will. Of this, I am sure.

YaYa: I believe that nothing beats a good book. Curl up with a good book... Heaven. Curl up with a good computer... not so much. So, although I love my computer, it will never take the place of a good book and I recently read that society as a whole is still hungry, and hungrier by increasing degrees, for more books. Naturally, each of us wants to write the "Great American Novel." Perhaps, the "Great American Novel" is actually in the future of someone on these boards. But if we each write the best that we know how, always, we may someday be surprised to see how many "Great American Novels" crop up in our futures. (our futures??? does that make sense?) I believe that hard work is rewarded with success. What do you believe?

mmmgood: We all know kids use a great deal of slang and "filler" words (like, like ). I'm sure there is a line we don't want to cross in our use of slang in written dialogue. Is there a rule of thumb for determining how close we are to that line? Or does that vary from publication to publication?

D.L.Garfinkle: Another good question! You're right about the fine line between making dialogue realistic and making it boring and/or quickly outdated. If dialogue did include all the ums and uhs and likes and how are yous that people really use, it would put readers to sleep. I like to use "um" and "uh" when I want to show that my character is nervous or lacks confidence. Otherwise, I leave them out. I put in a few "like"s, but maybe once every five or ten pages. That way, the dialogue has a realistic, teen flavor but is not boring to read. My first drafts often have a lot of dialogue, much of it boring. I use the revision process to cut unnecessary dialogue like "how are you, fine, how are you" and to add inner thoughts and actions to make the novel read less like a play.

D.L.Garfinkle: Another thing I like to do is have interesting things going on while characters are talking. I try to avoid people just sitting around a table talking. Instead, they're walking an unruly dog, or whispering during a weird school assembly, or shopping at a mall. Dialogue can be a great way to reveal character, but not so great for moving the plot forward. My Supernatural Rubber Chicken books are geared for reluctant readers ages six to ten. I try to have a lot of humor and action in them, and not too much dialogue. My young adult novels with Putnam are also humorous, but they're charater driven and more literary. So I use more dialogue in them. I like to use slang in my young adult books to set the tone and make the book seem teenager-y. I use more slang in my humorous books because some slang words are so funny. For instance, in Storky: How I Lost My Nickname and Won the Girl, the main character always referred to the school cafeteria as the crapeteria. I find urbandictionary.com to be a great source for slang terms.

D.L.Garfinkle: There is a real danger that using too much slang will date your book. And keep in mind that once a publisher buys your manuscript, it usually takes one to two years for it to get published in hardback and another year or two after that for the paperback version to come out. For picture books, it can take even longer. I try to use slang that I don't think will go out of style around the time the book is published. It's hard to predict, though. There are a few slang terms like "cool" that have been around for decades and are pretty safe to use. Also, I sometimes use pretty obscure slang that won't go out of style because it was never in style. The manuscript I just gave to my agent has the word "nonversation" (meaning a conversation full of unmeaningful small talk) in it, just because I thought that was a fun word. Some authors make up all their own slang so that it can never go out of style. I think there's a danger that the book won't seem realistic though. The reader may think, No teen really talks like that.

D.L.Garfinkle: All three books in my trilogy THE BAND were written in 2006 and published in paperback a year later, so I used more slang than usual, knowing that it probably wouldn't go out of style by the time the books were published. I wish there were a rule of thumb for determining when the line was crossed, but I don't think there is. If you're not sure, a critique group may help, or perhaps someone who is the age of your intended reader can give you feedback on your manuscript. Um, I, like, hope this helped, dude.

becca: I am currently starting a teen horror novel. I want it to be realistic to a teen, but I wondered how much historical accuracy should I try for when it is really going to be a made up place that the story is set in? I was thinking of doing some general research, and then making up the place, and setting it with stuff that actually might of or did happen in history at one time. But, again, the place is going to be fictional.

D.L.Garfinkle: I usually set my books in fictional cities like Boring, Arizona or in very large places like San Diego or The San Fernando Valley or South Orange County, so I don't have to research specific cities and so that I can make liberal use of the setting. For instance, there's a scene in a San Diego mall with a McDonald's at the end of it in my novel Storky. I don't know whether there are any San Diego malls with a McDonalds at the end of it, but it sounds plausible and I doubt anyone is going to be sure that of the many malls in San Diego, none has a McDonald's at the end of it. It was important that I had a McDonald's at the end of the mall. If I had set the book in the La Jolla part of San Diego, everyone in San Diego would have known there's no McDonald's at the mall near La Jolla and the scene would have rung false. I think using vague settings or made up cities is a common technique for writers.

D.L.Garfinkle: Some authors use actual cities. They really need to get the details right if they do this. There's a young adult novel set in my city that got several things wrong. For instance, the main character moved there because her father got a job in Hollywood. But with traffic, a commute to Hollywood from my city would take 90-120 minutes each way. The errors really ruined the reading experience for me, as it took me out of the story and I lost some respect for the author.

D.L.Garfinkle: I'm glad you are going to try to be historically accurate. Historical errors that readers catch may take them out of the story too. I thought writing my novel Stuck in the 70s, which is set in an unnamed city in the San Fernando Valley in 1978, would be easy because I remember 1978. It actually was pretty difficult because I forgot a lot of things and had to do a great deal of research to find out, for instance, when exactly the Superman movie came out and how much clothes cost in 1978 and whether that was the year Farrah hair was popular, etc. The research was fun, and I bet you'll have fun researching the culture and events of the era you choose, while imagining what could happen to your characters who are living in that era.

Okami: I've also been wondering about how to write a story in 3rd person omniscient without the reader feeling so detached from the story. After writing mostly in third person limited for the last 5 years, I'm starting to get really frustrated with the constraints of sticking with only one character's viewpoint. But every time I've written stories in third person omniscient, readers keep telling me they never feel engaged enough in the story. But I think about the books that I know have omniscient narrators that don't lack reader connection. What about the Series of Unfortunate Events books? They're written with a definite narrator, same with The Tale of Desperaux.

Okami: I also just noticed something in one of my new favorite series. In the first Hermux Tantamoq book by Michael Hoeye, it was told in third person, but there were little instances where other characters had little moments. In the second book, The Sands of Time, I'm pretty sure it's full blown third person omniscient as we get to see what other characters apart from Hermux are thinking, and the scene shifts between characters never feel jarring. Even when you switch between characters within the same chapter. I know they're doing something to "Get away" with it so it reads natural and smooth, but I just can't figure it out. Any insights or commiserations?

D.L.Garfinkle: Well, I think it IS hard for readers to feel close to characters when the omniscient point of view is employed. It is not used very often anymore. I used the omnisicent POV in my Supernatural Rubber Chicken chapter book series. I chose this POV purposefully because there wasn't one main character (there were three); it is a humorous, plot-heavy series rather than a character-driven series; and my editor and I felt that using an omniscient narrator gave the series a funny narrative voice. It was also useful for talking about the actions of many characters, including the pet dog and the class hamster. But I do think the drawback of the omniscient voice in my series and in many other books is that, as you mentioned, it's hard to get close to the characters. I had tried using a close third person point of view, alternating POVs between the two child protagonists, but found that the humor worked better with an omniscient voice.

D.L.Garfinkle: If your omniscient narrator has a distinct voice, that is a good way to prevent the reader from getting detached from the story. I believe that was a big benefit in the SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENT books.

D.L.Garfinkle: Have you thought about using close third person POV? I used that for my young adult trilogy, THE BAND, switching POVs between two teenage girls and a teenage boy who were all members of the same rock band. I used one POV per chapter, and felt that I was able to do a good job getting inside the heads of three different characters and making them distinct from each other.

D.L.Garfinkle: I often experiment with POVs and tenses when I write. My other two published YA novels are in first person. STORKY is supposed to be a boy's diary, and STUCK IN THE 70s alternates first person points of view between a teenage boy in the 70s and a teenage girl from the present. I think first person is a good way to magnify the character's voices.

D.L.Garfinkle: I've rambled a bit. In sum, I think you should experiment with POVs before settling on one. If you decide to use an omniscient narrator, I suggest giving that narrator a distinct voice so that the reader will look forward to hearing how the narrator describes things. Keep in mind that it's particularly difficult to do an omniscient POV well, and that it is not very popular these days. If you would like to write character-driven fiction, you might be better off writing in a close third or first person POV.

Okami: That said, could you elaborate a bit more on close third person. I've heard of it, but I don't have a good grasp on it. I have written in first person before. It definitely has punch when it's done well, but lately I just feel this need to craft a well told story of my own in third person omniscient.

D.L.Garfinkle: I might have my terms wrong. I use close third person to mean that it's focused on one character's point of view at a time and really gets inside her head. While we're in her head, we see and hear and know only what she sees and hears and knows. We follow the story through that viewpoint character. That's what I used for THE BAND books. But I switched between three viewpoint characters, staying with one character through one or more consecutive chapters before switching to another character. I'm not sure I got the terminology right.

D.L.Garfinkle: Anyway, I made a real effort to make the three viewpoint characters different, so that each personality was distinct. For instance, I made Mark the confident band leader and a very compassionate boy who was grieving over a recent loss. Tracie was pretty wild and could be selfish and impulse at times. Sienna was the good girl who was too much of a doormat at times. They also all looked different, with Mark being Italian and solidly built, Tracie being a pale, thin blond, and Sienna being a curvy African-American. The close POV, focusing intently on only one character per chapter, I think allowed me to explore and develop all three of the main characters.

Okami: I have problems with sensory details. Sight, hearing and touch aren't a problem for me. But taste and smell are extremely hard for me to work in organically. I can't always have my characters eating something, nor can I go on and on about how something smells. Any advice? Most of the time though, I'm afraid I'll bore my potential readers to death if I go overboard with description. Which many writers, writing books and articles beg you NOT to do!

D.L.Garfinkle: I also am not a "natural" at writing description. I really have to work at it. Here are some caveats about writing description: (1.) Though writers are advised to write about all five senses, we should not write about them in equal proportion. Most people sense things mainly by sight, so we should focus on that the most. It would be unrealistic for a character to notice how everything smells, for instance. I think when you can describe smell, it's a nice bonus, but I don't think every scene needs to include descriptions of odors. Tastes, touch, and sound are also not as common as visual descriptions. That said, I've used odors to good effect, I believe. For instance, in my teen novel STORKY, his love interest always smelled like citrus. In the last book of my teen trilogy THE BAND, one of the characters went on a date with a beautiful girl he'd met on the Net. The problem was that she had terrible body odor. I had a chain-smoker who smelled like cigarettes. So there can be nice details about smell, taste, touch, and sound, but I think if the descriptions are overused, your book will seem artificial.

D.L.Garfinkle: (2.) Some books have more descriptions than others. Some readers love to read beautiful or poetic or unique descriptions. I do not. As a reader, I usually skim description and don't like books with a lot of description. I think it's okay to write a book that doesn't have a lot of description. There are many readers who appreciate more focus on plot and other things and less on description. However, you do want to include some description so that the reader feels immersed in the world of the story. So how can we description-impaired writers improve?

Make sure you describe things from the correct point of view. For instance, STORKY is in a teenage boy's POV. When he goes to his friend's house, he doesn't notice the decorations inside or the color of the walls. He notices how many TVs his friend has and that the house smells like smoke and that the refrigerator is well stocked. If STORKY were a teenage girl, she might notice how many clothes her friend had in the closet. If Storky were a neat freak, he might notice that the house was dusty inside and needed vacuuming. If Storky had an eating disorder, he might notice the candy bowl on the coffee table.

• Think about your character looking out a window and describing what he senses (sees, hears, smells, etc.) to a character who's not near the window.
• Buy a Visual Dictionary or find one online and make use of that. That will show pictures of things and describe all the parts of it. For instance, a picture of a truck will include details about its "sleeper-cab," "radiator grille," "grab handle," and other parts. That way, you can describe things accurately.
• Look at paint samples from paint stores and read the creative color descriptions they use.
• To describe clothing (and for a fun way to procrastinate!) go to websites like Macys.com or Nordstroms.com, pick an outfit for your character, and look at it while you describe what your character is wearing.
• To describe expressions, look at yourself in the mirror as you make a sad or angry or surprised face, and write down what exactly your face does. Do your eyebrows scrunch together? Does your face seem longer? Does your mouth drop?
• Find pictures of what your characters look like and print them out. Use those pictures whenever you want to describe that character's looks. For example, one of my characters is a slightly heavy, pretty, blond teenager, taken from a picture of one of the top 24 American Idol contestants a few years ago.

Mikki: We all know that writing "down" to our readers, no matter the age, is a 'no-no', even if it is hard to not do. But what about writing "up" in MG/YA novels? I've just finished my first novel, which is about a 13 year old eighth grade girl...to me, a middle grader...but I've been told that it should be a YA novel instead. My critique group has told me from time to time that my dialogue for her is older than what most 13 yr olds would be saying. It isn't that she uses 7 syllable words or anything like that, just that her attitude and presentation seem to be older than what she is. To me, for her particular character, this is right for who she is in the story. Is this something I should really be worried about, and something that an editor would be negative or critical of? I realize that since you've not read any of the story, this might be difficult for you to answer, but maybe a general question would be:

Mikki: How do we know when we are "writing up" for our characters in a way that does not fit with the story or the ages of the characters? In Emma-Jean Lazarus Fell Out of a Tree, Emma-Jean was not a child prodigy, but her dialogue was definitely not that of the average 11 or 12 year old, and still it went with her attitude and presentation. If we build dialogue around character presentation, is that how we determine whether we are writing "up" or "down"...and are there any little tricks to make sure we're not doing one or the other?

D.L.Garfinkle: Congratulations on finishing your manuscript! I think you're right, that it's hard for me to tell you whether I think your character sounds too old when I haven't read your manuscript. And I haven't read Emma-Jean Lazarous, though I've heard great things about it, so i can't even help you there. I did read and enjoy the middle grade novel Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee. The young protagonist used sophisticated dialogue at times, but she was a genius who was going to college. Can you go to a food court or another place where young teens might hang out and eavesdrop a little on their dialogue and compare it to what you have in your book?

D.L.Garfinkle: I tend to listen to my critiquers when more than one of them says the same thing. If it were me and at least two people said the dialogue sounded too old for the character's age, I'd try to fix it. You asked whether I used any tricks to make sure my dialogue is age-appropriate. I have to say the best "trick" I know is to listen to my critique group.

D.L.Garfinkle: In fact, I just finished revising a young adult novel. The person who critiqued it said the main character at times sounded more like a woman than the teenage boy he was supposed to be. I spent several weeks trying to fix that problem only. I used urbandictionary.com to add some slang words in the dialogue. I turned some full sentences into fragments and replaced some sophisticated words with more basic words and inserted occasional bad grammar into the dialogue.

D.L.Garfinkle: An easier thing to do is to have other characters comment that she has a sophisticated way of speaking (and maybe she could even say that she first learned to talk from a proper English nanny or something like that), so that the sophisticated dialogue just becomes part of her character rather than a suspected mistake by the author.

D.L.Garfinkle: Alternatively, you could try to make the novel a YA novel. However, that might involve a lot of work, including changing the main character's age to at least fourteen and probably putting her in high school rather than middle school.

D.L.Garfinkle: Another idea, if you're not sure that the dialogue needs to be changed, is to submit your manuscript to three or four agents. If they say that the dialogue sounds too old for the character's age, you could fix it before submitting to more agents. Generally, you should try to get your manuscript in the best possible shape before submitting it to agents or editors. However, if you aren't sure whether the dialogue needs to be changed, then you don't know whether your manuscript is in its best possible shape or not.

Sharonda: I like to write mostly fiction for teens because I'm more in tone with what teens are doing and how they think and act. I do [try to] write for middle grade/ youngest readers but I'm not too sue if I'm being too "baby-ish" for those readers. When I write for middle grade readers, I find myself making the characters sound too young...sometimes I find the right voice in the correct age for middle grade readers but, then later, I go to a voice that's too young and makes that character sound like a youngest reader. I haven't wrote fiction for youngest readers because I fear I will make them sound unreal Do you have any ideas or ways to tell if I am writing down to those readers? Do you have any tricks that would be helpful in this case?

D.L.Garfinkle: I have published five teen novels, a middle grade novel, and a three-book chapter book series, so I like to write for all ages. I'm even working on a picture book now. I originally pitched my chapter book series as a middle grade series. The publisher thought it sounded more appropriate for younger children and asked me to rewrite my proposal as a chapter book series proposal. Perhaps you should try that for the middle grade work you think sounds too young.

D.L.Garfinkle: At the time I wrote my chapter book series, I'd mostly written novels for teens. Like you, I was worried that I couldn't write for my target age group. So I read and studied a lot of other chapter books before I began writing my own. I noted how long they were, how many chapters they had, how sophisticated the writing style was, etc. So I suggest you read a lot of books intended for the same age readers you wish to reach. You've probably heard this suggestion a lot before.

D.L.Garfinkle: Another thing I did was ask for critiques from other writers who'd written chapter books. I critiqued their work in return, of course. That helped me a lot. I hadn't realized that chapter books should have short sentences and easy vocabulary. I did a revision just for that.

D.L.Garfinkle: I read all three of my chapter books out loud to my sons, who were in my target 6-10 age range at the time. I had them raise their right hands if they thought a part was boring or confusing or had another problem, and their left hand for something they particularly liked. I also listened for laughter, since my books are meant to be humorous. That also really helped me. If you don't have children that age, perhaps you can ask a young relative or a friend's child to help you out.

D.L.Garfinkle: Having children the same age as my readers helped me discover what that age was interested in. If you don't have young children, perhaps you can volunteer at a school, library, church, temple, etc. with children. Another suggestion is to write your books in third person. My Supernatural Rubber Chicken books and my THE BAND YA trilogy are in third person. With third person, the narrator and writing style can be sophisticated, while the dialogue and character's thoughts and actions can still be childlike or teenlike. I hope these suggestions help. Don't be afraid to try new things!

Anonymouth: To me, there is a direct connection between lack of respect for teens and censorship. After all, isn't censoring a book from a library all about believing no teen anywhere can handle it? What do you think about that topic?

D.L.Garfinkle: That is an interesting question. For this issue, I don't think that I bring too much to the table by virtue of being a published author, but I'll share my feelings about this anyway, mostly because I have a big mouth. I'd be interested in hearing how others feel about this also.

D.L.Garfinkle: I have always been a huge bookworm. As a child, I read the Narnia series many times. It was my favorite series. I learned only about five years ago that the story was an allegory about Jesus. I'm Jewish. I don't believe in Jesus as a God. But I loved the four sibling characters (two boys and two girls), as there were two boys and two girls in my family too. I also loved the adventures and the special candy in Narnia. I have always been a big fan of adventures and candy. In other words, I took from the series only what I wanted from it.

D.L.Garfinkle: I also started reading adult books at age ten. The Happy Hooker was my first adult book and it was VERY adult. I also read Sheila Levine Is Dead and Living in New York that year. I reread the Sheila Levine book a few years ago, and was surprised about how sexually explicit it is. I do not think I understood the sexual content of the book when I read it. I remember liking the book for it's humor. And on rereading it, I still think it's very funny. Again, as a child I took from the book what I wanted from it.

D.L.Garfinkle: I did not stop reading children's book once I started reading adult books. I read a little of everything. I still do-- chick lit, memoirs, celebrity biographies, classic novels, literary fiction. But I wonder: if I was allowed to read only certain books my parents approved of, would I have loved reading as much as I did and still do? Reading opened up the world to me. I saw things from other people's perspectives, sometimes from an adult perspective. I learned a lot, but I knew that fiction was just that. I did not try to become a hooker after reading The Happy Hooker, but I was entertained and felt that books were really fun things. So I'm glad my parents didn't censor my reading, and I don't censor my three children's reading choices.

D.L.Garfinkle: I understand that some parents want to restrict their own children's reading choices, and I don't want to interfere with their parenting style or their belief about what is best for their children.

D.L.Garfinkle: I also wouldn't want my child's elementary school library stocking The Happy Hooker or even my own novel, Storky: How I Lost My Nickname and Won the Girl, which has a humorous erection scene in it. When I do book signings, I tell parents that Storky is probably appropriate for children twelve and up, and that even if their children are excellent readers the content is not geared to children under twelve. So I understand that school libraries should not have books that have inappropriate content for the ages of the children they are serving.

D.L.Garfinkle: High school libraries, I think, could have all kinds of content. I have heard my twelve-year-old and fifteen-year-old with their friends, and know what they see on TV and the Net and the movies. I don't think they'd find anything alarming in a book that they haven't heard or seen elsewhere. And the nice thing about books is that we can pick what we want from books and skip over other parts, just like I used to do with the Narnia books and The Happy Hooker, and like I still do with books with a lot of boring description. Reading is not not like watching a movie or walking down the hall of a middle school, where you cannot filter what you hear.

D.L.Garfinkle: I also believe public libraries should not censor content. I have no problem with parents who want to prevent their children from checking out certain material. But I have a problem with parents who want to prevent other people's children from checking out material.

D.L.Garfinkle: I do think it's disrespectful to censor books from a public library. It is disrespectful to others' parenting choices. Even my own three children are so different that I parent each of them a little differently. I do not want another parent telling me how I should parent my kids, and which books they won't be able to access from a public library.

D.L.Garfinkle: And I think censorship underestimates the ability of children and teens to filter out the material that they may not be ready for and to process the things they've read in their heads. For instance, I believe teens are smart enough not to have sex just because a fictional character did.

D.L.Garfinkle: As I said, this is just my own opinion, and I'm sure others will disagree with me and I'd love to hear others' thoughts on this.

D.L.Garfinkle: The one thing I can add as a published author: My young adult novel, Storky, is written as a fictional teenage boy's diary. I wanted it to sound realistic, so I made him think about sex, because that is something most teenage boys think about. I have been disinvited to a school visit to a middle school for that. I know some libraries aren't stocking the book because of the sexual references. But the scene in which he gets an erection when he has to go to the board in Spanish class has been called the funniest scene in the book by several reviewers. More importantly, I've gotten wonderful letters and emails from teenage boys saying things like, "Storky got me through middle school," and "It's like you got right into my head" and "Storky was the first book I ever read and finished just for fun, and now I'm reading more books." I think a big part of Storky's success is that I kept it real.

Jan: Thanks so much for everything, Debby. Thanks for chatting. And thanks to all our question askers. Good answers come from good questions.