Suzanne Morgan Williams' debut novel Bull Rider has everything. A gut wrenching story. A compelling plot. Fantastic characters. Intriguing landscape. A heart stopping ending and the warmth and depth of a true literary read. It’s an honor to interview Williams for an in-depth look at how she created her timeless yet topical tale. First, a little about her.

Suzanne Morgan Williams is author of eleven nonfiction books for children and young adults. In early 2009 her first novel, Bull Rider, was published by Margaret K. McElderry Books, an imprint of Simon and Schuster. Bull Rider is a Junior Library Guild Selection, represented Nevada at the National Book Festival in Washington D.C. (2008), was selected for the Texas Library Association’s Lone Star (middle grade readers) and Tayshas Lists (high school readers) for 2010, and is nominated for a Cybil (middle grade), the Nevada Young Reader’s Award List for 2010/2011, and for YALSA’s Best Books for Young Adults 2010.

Thank you for joining us, Suzy! (Suzy is how she’s affectionately known). I cried several times reading Bull Rider, the story of young Cam and how he deals with his beloved older brother, Ben, returning wounded from Iraq. But I also laughed and cheered and got chills at your ending. Some things I don’t want to give away to readers, but that scene when Cam first sees Ben when he returns home, was MASTERFUL. You withheld just enough to make me feel like I was Cam at that crucial moment. In fact, I walked in this boy’s shoes through the entire book.

Q. Which leads me to my first question. Bull Rider is Cam’s story, yet your novel also hangs on the events in his brother’s life, and the struggles he faces coming home from the Iraq War with his terrible wounds. So while we follow Cam, the plot hangs just as much on Ben’s process as it does on Cam’s emotional growth. And that’s what helps create the powerful tension in Bull Rider that won’t let the reader put it down. Can you talk about the challenges you faced in creating these characters? And what, for you, made this Cam’s story?

Bull Rider began as Cam’s story. He was younger in the first version – eleven or twelve – and he wanted to be a bull rider, but his mom wouldn’t let him. That was the premise. I developed a family for him and it was important to me that his older brother was a bull rider too. There are families where rodeo tradition is passed down and this also would set up some competition between the brothers.

Once I’d created Ben I asked, “What would his nineteen year old brother be doing after graduating from a rural high school?” He would join the service, the Marines. As soon as I had that idea, I didn’t want it. The Iraq War was on my mind and I thought, what if Ben were injured? Writing about war injuries was not my idea of fun. So I put the idea aside and wrote a book where Ben was mainly off stage. But when that version didn’t work out, I knew I had to write a bigger book for older kids and Ben kept coming back, almost demanding to come home from the war and be in my book.

But I had already written an entire manuscript without really including Ben so I was firmly in Cam’s head. Plus, making this Ben’s story would have put me in Iraq, and that’s a place I didn’t feel qualified to go, even with research. I do know about worrying about loved ones, about waiting for e-mails from friends who are deployed, about feeling powerless in the face of really bad stuff – that was Cam’s world, and the world of many, many kids today, so Bull Rider stayed Cam’s story.

Cam was the easier brother for me to create and in the earlier manuscript he was younger, so that first manuscript almost became a character study for Cam. I’ve spent time working with students in small rural Nevada towns. I know they love skateboarding and basketball and some of them do rodeo. Cam was a collage of those rural kids, boys on my street, my son at his age, and the kid I wanted him to be in my head.

Ben was harder. He was a man faced with losing key faculties. That’s difficult. I drew from my experience with illness, hospitals, watching men I love lose some abilities. I read blogs of injured soldiers and their families. I interviewed people who work with soldiers and marines who are rehabilitating from traumatic brain injuries and amputations. I made Ben proud and confused.

Q. What first sparked Bull Rider?

This is where I say that Bull Rider wouldn’t exist, and certainly not in the form it is today, without some great editors. The idea for the first story came from a conversation with an editor who was visiting Reno. We were discussing ideas for a series and she asked me to propose a series set in Nevada. We agreed it would be about rodeo and she titled it – Bull Rider. In the end, she didn’t buy the series, but that was the beginning.

A second editor read a YA version of Bull Rider (Cam was sixteen) and gave me some valuable feedback, but he wasn’t able to buy the book either. So it was Emma Dryden, then the publisher of Margaret K. McElderry, who saw the third, MG/tween version through to publication. She pushed me for final details, to dig deeper into secondary characters, and to add to the sections on the war that I’d been avoiding. Bull Rider wouldn’t exist without these three editors or without Ellen Hopkins, my friend and critique partner, who arranged for me to interview some Professional Bull Riders and pushed me to continue after the first disappointment.

Q. One of the things you do beautifully in your novel is to tackle the larger questions in life, in this case the questions about the price of war and what heroism really means. Yet you’ve also written a story that while heart wrenching, is full of hope and promise. So you have a topical story that reads like a timeless classic. Can you speak to this process, which I think we all struggle with in our stories, of striking a balance between reality and the healing power of story? Between what you might call raising awareness and plain good story telling?

I’m kind of a serious person when it comes to thinking about big issues, so it probably helped me that Bull Rider started out simply as a story. It was a story about rodeo and I hope that part still reads loud and clear. When I decided that Ben would be injured in Iraq and come home to heal, then it seemed I had a story with a contemporary heart.

I started interviewing people who support our injured veterans, and I realized what a huge impact the recovery process has on the whole family. So that real impact was the second layer of the story. But Cam was taking on a foe that was larger than life, in reality and metaphorically. He needed a lot of support. I wanted to draw a community and family the way it ought to work - the way small towns can be on their best days, and I wanted Cam and Ben to have a solid family to fall back on. Otherwise, it all would have been too bleak.

Family, faith, and promise, tradition and tall tales – all the things that carry us through the toughest times, those were the final layer to the book and I added many of those details last.

Tomorrow, Suzy talks about landscape as character, the use of contrasts to develop plot pacing, and how her character’s moral choice helped create story tension.

--z.v.

Yesterday, we talked about the value of short forms in learning techniques you can call on when the story you want to tell calls for that technique. Today the conversation is about the novel. How do authors do it? Once they’ve mastered technique, how do they settle on a particular structure or form to suit the story they want to tell?

It’s not always an easy thing to break down, separating the weave of story from how the story is told. But I asked three fabulous debut authors what structural or stylistic devices they used in writing their new novels, and how these devices tie in with the theme or story arc of their books. Their insights into process are as unique and compelling as the stories they tell.

Here’s how Jeanne Dutton, author of Freaked (HarperTeen, 2009); Sydney Salter author of Jungle Crossing, (Harcourt, 2009); and Lauren Bjorkman, author of My Invented Life (Henry Holt, 2009), approached the structural challenges of writing their novels, and how these challenges have informed their next books.

“Freaked is the story of one boy’s road trip to the most unforgettable show of his life,” says author Jen Dutton. I made the stylistic choice in Freaked not to include “white space” or gaps in the time line (except between one chapter break). This means that the action of the novel is compressed into a 48 hour period and the narrator dwells on small, internal details rather than large, external ones.

“I also chose to use very little dialogue. I opted for this approach for two reasons: I have listened to a lot of Deadheads tell their stories and when it came to relating their favorite show, everything was important, from the breakfast they ate that morning, to how close they were to the stage.

“Second: I wanted to reveal a sense of Scotty’s feelings of restlessness, isolation, and his small private sadnesses and joys. When I drafted Stranded, my second novel (due out in June 2010), I opted for snappier pacing, action that was much more external, and lots of sharp banter.

“I made my decision because the main character and narrator Kelly Louise Sorenson, is much more of an extrovert, more likely to tease the world with her words and engage with other people. Even when Kelly Louise is alone, she still has imaginary conversations with others. I guess that’s a little like me.”

--Jeanne Dutton

“In my middle-grade novel Jungle Crossing, says author Sydney Salter, “I wrote two intertwining stories. One takes place in contemporary Mexico, the other in an ancient Mayan kingdom. My modern Mayan character tells the ancient story to my 13-year-old protagonist, who is an American tourist.

“To differentiate between the two stories, I wrote the contemporary story in first person, while the ancient Mayan story is in limited 3rd person. I worked hard to create conversational transitions between the two stories, since the 3rd person telling isn’t really in my contemporary Mayan boy’s voice—it’s written from the ancient teen girl’s perspective.

“The themes in both stories also echo each other. The biggest challenge, however, was making the two stories equally compelling—something that took quite a bit of revision. While I have written another (unsold) story using this technique, I find that each new novel demands its own unique structure. But I always learn a lot from my previous work’s challenges.”

--Sydney Salter

“In My Invented Life,” author Lauren Bjorkman says, “Roz experiences flights of fancy so real that the reader cannot distinguish them from “reality.” After a while, Roz cues in the reader by breaking from the fantasy with a statement such as, ‘I'm so lying. This is what really happens.’

“I also use the present tense to give the story immediacy. Roz evolves so much by the end of the story, she couldn't possibly portray herself as clueless as necessary if she told the story in the past tense.

“I love using devices, and made up entirely different ones for my new novel, Miss Fortune Cookie. My main character, Erin, wants to make independent movies. I start each chapter with a header like those used in screenplays. Some of the flashbacks are in screenplay format, too.”

(note: check out Lauren’s website for her amazing real life adventure of growing up while sailing around the world!)

--Lauren Bjorkman

Jeanne, Sydney and Lauren are all part of the Classof2K9. Congratulations to each of the debut novelists in 2K9!

Tomorrow, another 2K9 novelist, Suzanne Morgan Williams, comes to Tollbooth for an in depth discussion of her stunning debut novel, Bull Rider. Williams is a pro who brings years of experience to her insights into writing and the writing life. Don’t miss her discussion on writing about topical issues versus creating a timeless story!

--z.v.

Have you ever noticed how many books on writing use the analogy of laying brick or stone when talking about craft? Writing is like putting one brick on top of the other, they’ll say—as if masonry was just about doing time and any fool with a trowel could manage it! There’s this perception that with both masonry and novel writing, you can wake up one morning, walk out your door and build a stone wall, or sit down and write a novel. When what you’d really end up with is a pile of stones or several thousand words strung together.

We writers have to earn our apprenticeship, just like a good brick layer or stone mason spends years learning his or her trade. In fact, the two require different techniques themselves—a good brick layer doesn’t always make a good stone mason—natural stone needing an eye for flow and brick using a more linear design. Sound familiar?

You don’t stuff your story into a form; you let the form suggest itself through your story. You’re not a young adult novelist; you’re a writer telling this story through the structure of a young adult novel. Tomorrow may be different. You might move from brick to stone.

I started off with a short story snippet yesterday because I wanted to suggest writing short stories as a way to practice form. So much of writing is playing with form. Trying things out and learning techniques you can call on when the story you want to tell calls for that technique.

I wrote dozens of short stories and sold handfuls of them before I wrote The Lucky Place.

Looking back I can see that some of my characters in the novel first showed up in some of these stories. And I probably wouldn’t have been able to pull off writing a book in vignettes if I hadn’t learned a few things about short forms first.

Not that writing a short story is easy. Read Annie Proulx or Ray Carver if you want to be truly humbled. But the shorter form does provide a place to practice technique without spilling hundreds of pages.

For one thing, you can write toward an ending that’s held in your mind’s eye (I can’t recommend this enough as a way to get a feel for the arc of a story).

Or you can write an entire short story practicing a single technique—try telling a tale in just dialogue—no narrative, no dialogue tags. See if that doesn’t emphasize how much dialogue is more than talk, but has to move the story forward.

Or play with character, situation, scene and narrative. Fiddle with different structures and points of view. Rewrite the same story from different character’s perspectives, or retell it in past, present or present perfect tense. Even if you’re comfortable writing novels, playing with form this way can enhance your work and bring new insights into technique and structure. You might even find the seeds of your next work here.

Look at how Elizabeth Strout wrote her Pulitzer Prize winning tale about Olive Kitteridge, letting Olive’s life unroll from myriad angles through a series of short stories. Or how Ray Carver, whom I mentioned earlier, not only re-invented the short story but simultaneously left us with his own blue collar life as a mythic hero’s journey. And if you want to watch an entire world take shape through landscape and character, read one of Annie Proulx’s short story collections such as Close Range.

Then give yourself a gift. Maybe even a Christmas gift! Of writing a short story, just for the joy and practice.

Tomorrow… some compelling thoughts from debut novelists Sydney Salter and Jeanne Dutton on how they wove structure and theme into their new novels. -- z.v.

--art by Steve Ferchaud

Mary saw him first. She’d crossed through the orchard to the railroad tracks, had her ear to the ground listening for the 10:50. The conductor always waved to her. She caught the train’s far off tremble, then sensed footsteps to her left. She looked up and there stood Santa Claus.

He wasn’t dressed as Santa, of course. He wore a lumberjack jacket, red and black checked, and thin pants with patches on the knees. But there was no mistaking his beard and white hair. His jolly blue eyes. His rounded cheeks.

Mary blinked.

Santa looked startled when he saw her. He probably hadn’t noticed her at first, ducked down by the tracks like that. He stepped back.

“It’s okay,” Mary said. “Don’t run away.” He carried a pack slung across one shoulder. An odd crooked pipe in his mouth. No doubt about it. This was him.

The 10:50 rumbled loud. Santa squatted down and took a puff off his crooked pipe. “Is there any place around here a man could get a meal?” he asked.

“My house,” Mary said quick, her heart turning. Santa at her very own house! His rounded cheeks were polished. His mouth a cherry red. Mary was close enough to touch his snowy beard, which looked as soft as heaven.

Santa twinkled. “Well, I’m mighty hungry,” he said.

Mary jumped up. “This way!” she said. She coaxed him to follow her back through the orchard. “You are Santa, aren’t you?” she asked. But his answer was drowned by the blast of the train when the conductor saw her and pulled the cord…

Fiction is like Christmas. We’re promising— as with the start of my story here— that our mechanism will create some magic, and Santa will step off the train. We read for the unexpected, the impossible, even. That’s the gift of fiction. This week some thoughts on creating that gift. The package, the process and in case you need a great read to put under the tree-- a book that really delivers.

--z.v.