First Draft Episode #235: Kate DiCamillo

Kate DiCamillo is one of six people to win two Newbery Medals, for her novels The Tale of Despereaux and Flora & Ulysses, and author of Newberry Honor book Because of Winn-Dixie, National Book Award finalist The Tiger Rising, as well as New York Times bestselling novels The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, The Magician’s Elephant, the Mercy Watson series, and more. DiCamillo was the U.S. National Ambassador for Young People's Literature for 2014 and 2015. Her most recent novel, Beverly, Right Here completes the trilogy of Raymie Nightingale and Louisiana’s Way Home.

This episode of First Draft is brought to you by Steven Sater’s Alice By Heart, a debut young adult novel in which the Tony Award-winning co-creator of Spring Awakening tells the story of a young girl who takes refuge in a London Tube station during WWII and confronts grief, loss, and first love with the help of her favorite book, Alice in Wonderland. Alice By Heart is out from Penguin Random House now.

Links and Topics Mentioned In This Episode

• Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

• Christopher Paul Curtis, author of Newberry Medal book Bud, Not Buddy and Newberry Honor book The Watsons Go to Birmingham 1963 and Elijah of Buxton

• Katherine Paterson, author of Newberry Medal books Bridge to Terabithia and Jacob Have I Loved, as well as Newberry Honor book The Great Gilly Hopkins

• Karen Hesse, author of Newberry Medal book Out of the Dust

• Kara LaReau was Kate’s editor for Because of Winn-Dixie, The Tiger Rising, The Tale of Despereaux

• Poets & Writers magazine

• Holly McGhee, founder and creative director at Pippin Properties

• Blank Check with Griffin and David (podcast)

• The quote Kate shares from Katherine Paterson is from Paterson’s 1988 essay, “s-books-hope-is-more-than-happiness.html">Hope is More Than Happiness.” (New York Times).

• How to Talk so Kids Will Listen And How to Listen so Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish

• Karen Lotz, a-day-in-the-life-of-walker-group-s-karen-lotz.html">president of Candlewick

• Linda Sue Park, author of A Long Walk to Water: Based on a True Story and A Single Shard

• Kate was also the 2014 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature

• Ann Patchett, author of Bel Canto, State of Wonder, The Magician’s Assistant, and many more, owns Parnassus bookstore in Nashville, Tenn.

I want to hear from you!

Have a question about writing or creativity for Sarah Enni or her guests to answer? To leave a voicemail, call (818) 533-1998.

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Every Tuesday, I speak to storytellers like Veronica Roth, author of Divergent; Linda Holmes, author and host of NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast; Jonny Sun, internet superstar, illustrator of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Gmorning, Gnight! and author and illustrator of Everyone’s an Aliebn When Ur a Aliebn Too;  Michael Dante  DiMartino, co-creator of Avatar: The Last Airbender; John August, screenwriter of Big Fish, Charlie’s Angels, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; or Rhett Miller, musician and frontman for The Old 97s. Together, we take deep dives on their careers and creative works.

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