Margi Preus, author of The Littlest Voyageur
Middle Grade Literature category, sponsored by Education Minnesota
Each week leading up to the 33rd annual Minnesota Book Awards announcement, we are featuring exclusive interviews with our 36 finalists. You can also watch the authors in conversation with their fellow category finalists here.
In a year defined by a pandemic and its fallout, virtually everything about our lives has changed in some way. How has COVID-19 impacted your writing habits and preferences? Has the unique zeitgeist of the past year influenced your writing output in any ways that you can pinpoint?
Like a lot of others (from what I hear) I floundered for a while. With everything that was going on in the world it could be hard to focus on that 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper. (I write the old fashioned way). In addition, my grown children came home to stay for many months which was a wonderful thing but the solitary task of writing took a hit. But I am back at it now and writing something completely different for me–a new challenge for a new time.
Would you tell us one or two things about your finalist book that you are particularly proud of, and why? (Sure, it may feel a bit un-Minnesotan to say so, but it’s not boasting if we ask!)
I don’t know how PROUD I am of it, but I am certainly pleased that northern Minnesota is a featured part of this book, and that at last, a little red squirrel, preeminent creature of the northwoods, gets to have his say–about everything! Also, the idea Jean Gentille hatches of the traveling, lending “book canoe”–I really think it’s going to take off.
What do you hope that your audience learns or takes away from your book?
I hope the story inspires young readers to adventure out and explore their area’s woods and waterways. Jean Pierre Petit le Rouge (squirrel) hopes the story inspires those readers to also respect the Earth’s wild denizens.
Minnesota enjoys a reputation as a place that values literature and reading. If this sentiment rings true for you, what about our home state makes it such a welcoming and conductive place for writers?
Wow! As I believe I said at a previous MNBA event, Minnesota is like Paris in the 20’s–so many great writers all in the same place at the same time. And in the children’s book world, as I know from personal experience, they are a welcoming and inclusive bunch of people.
What advice would you give to an aspiring writer with an interest in your category?
Read. Write. Revise. Repeat.
Tell us something about yourself that is not widely known! (It doesn’t have to be about your writing.)
In addition to writing for and directing a comedy theater company for most of my previous grown up life, I’ve written a couple of comic opera libretti.
Margi Preus is a New York Times bestselling author of several books for young readers, including the Newbery Honor book Heart of a Samurai and West of the Moon, winner of a Minnesota Book Award.