Interview With Neal Shusterman and Eric Elfman, Authors of THE N.O.A.H. FILES: I AM THE WALRUS

Short and sweet--give us the elevator pitch for I Am the Walrus:

(If the elevator is only going to the second floor:) A comic middle-grade science-fiction/fantasy adventure, a thrill-ride with unexpected and hilarious twists and turns.  (If we’re going to a higher floor) 14-year-old Noah Prime is reacting to stress in uncontrollable and absurd ways – for example, freezing up like a possum when he’s confronted by bullies, or flapping his arms, bobbing his head and shrieking like an Emperor penguin when he’s dancing with a girl he likes. Noah doesn’t know what’s happening to him, but his best friend, Ogden, who’s a bit on the spectrum, has a theory that at first sounds outlandish, but turns out to be true – Noah has the DNA of every species on Earth wrapped up in his own DNA. So the question becomes “Why?” And when absurdly inept aliens try to kill him, Noah’s main goal becomes surviving. 

 I’m always intrigued by writing teams. How did this writing pairing work? What was the drafting process like? 

Ideally, we like to get into the same room and write together. It feels like we’re just goofing around for five or six hours, but when we look down, we’ve written ten pages. In fact, our main goal when we’re working together is to make the other person laugh, and if we succeed it goes in the book. We used to live within an hour of each other, which made it fairly easy to work together, but now we live across the country from each other—so now we work mainly by Google Docs, and we both try to be in the document at the same time. We usually even have our iPhones next to the computer, so we can talk to each other via Facetime while working. We do still get together for the occasional writing retreat, which we did recently to start work on book two of the N.O.A.H. Files, and we managed to get the first 110 pages written in two weeks!

Our readers are always interested in inspiration. I tend to think inspiration is something that happens AFTER you start working. But this book has so many wild elements: aliens, in-town volcanoes. Where did the ideas come from?

Mostly by making each other laugh! We had an idea of where the story would end, but we really had no idea how it was going to get there. In fact, when we began writing, we weren’t 100% sure the answer would be aliens, and the possible explanations that Ogden ticks off (evolution, government conspiracy, etc.) are things we had actually considered. Ultimately, we decided on aliens, which opened the door to many more possible absurdities (like a volcano popping up in the middle of the town). Our ideas usually come out of our discussions, by asking each other “Why?” and “How?” and “What else could go wrong?”

The thing that sucked me in, right from the start, is the humor. It’s that rare humor that works on both the MG level and the adult level–it’s a great feeling to be either smiling or laughing as you’re reading. Did co-writing help or hinder humor? I’m thinking it’d be great to punch up the humor with another author, but it could so easily mess up the voice…

We’re so pleased you appreciated the humor! We both agree that with a collaborator who has a similar sense of humor is very helpful! Writing is usually such a solitary pursuit—your own head can be a lonely (and sometimes scary) place. As for working on multiple levels, we intentionally included things that we thought adults would find funny too, because, A) we know that parents usually buy the books for their middle grade kids, and will often read the books before, or to, them, and, B) We amuse ourselves. 

You both have screenwriting experience. Did that help in crafting the dialogue? (Your dialogue does a great job of both adding humor and driving the action.)

That’s a very good question! Yes, it does help, as dialogue is such a critical part of character development, rhythm, and, as you point out, a large part of the humor in the book.  Most of the screenplays we’ve written together have been comedies.

One of the main themes here seems to be one of the most basic, enduring questions–what does it mean to be human? Nothing can hold up humanity for examination quite like a creature from the outside. Is that how aliens became part of this story? 

One of the inspirations of the story was the idea that early teenagers are just entering that stage of life when their bodies begin to change, and we wondered what would happen if we pushed that to an extreme. And Noah certainly does begin to question his humanity as the story progresses.  He also begins to wonder if his parents and his little sister are not quite human.  Also, by involving aliens, we can poke fun at a whole bunch of alien tropes! 

What was the biggest surprise writing this one? 

One of the comments we see over and over again from both student and adult readers of our previous trilogy (Tesla’s Attic, Edison’s Alley and Hawking’s Hallway) is “I didn’t know what was going to happen next!” That always makes me laugh because I think, “Neither did we!” The characters are constantly surprising us by the choices they make. (The unexpected time-traveling character is an example of that!)

What do you want readers to take away from I Am the Walrus?

As you pointed out, “What does it mean to be human” is a question that Noah asks himself, and we touch on themes of friendship and teamwork in the book as well. But our fondest wish is that the book will make readers laugh out loud, and maybe get that reluctant reader to realize that that reading is fun!

Where can we catch up with you?

We’re both very active on social media. 

 

Credit: Gaby Gerster

Neal at www.storyman.com, facebook.com/nealshusterman, Twitter, TikTok and Instagram @Nealshusterman  (remember there’s no ‘c’ in Shusterman, or you might end up with Neal Schusterman, the dentist in New Jersey.  Seriously.)

 

 

 

Credit: Jan Elfman

Eric at www.facebook.com/EricElfmanAuthor), Twitter @Eric_Elfman (don’t forget the underscore because there’s another Eric Elfman on Twitter - a lawyer, who won’t understand _at all_ if you ask him about the aliens in the book, and might sue.)

 

 

 

Will we be seeing any additional works by the two of you in the future?

Definitely yes! We’re already working on Shock the Monkey -- book 2 of the series, and after that, well, we have lots of ideas!