The Beauty of Middle Grade Fiction

 

The Beauty of Middle Grade Fiction

 

Over the past week or so, I’ve interviewed several authors of middle grade novels on my blog, Book Q&As with Deborah Kalb, and I thought I’d share some of their thoughts.

 

 

Alicia D. Williams is the author of the new novel in verse Mid-Air, which looks at a boy in the aftermath of his friend’s death. “Isaiah came out of my want to question why boys are not encouraged to defy gender norms. How boys are held to a standard of toughness and, most times, toxic masculinity. And how they have to hide parts of themselves to fit in the narrowly defined “boy” category,” she said. “And Isaiah was modeled after the sweet, sensitive boys I had the pleasure of teaching in my classrooms.”

 

Aaron Arsenault’s new novel, The Academy, focuses on climate change. “I was looking for something to read to my own kids about climate change that was inspiring, and I couldn’t find anything!” he said. “What little there was in the genre seemed to be so negative and dystopian. I wanted to find something for them with a hopeful voice. So, I set out to do something about it and wrote my own!”

 

Heather Murphy Capps’s novel Indigo & Ida looks at the journalist and activist Ida B. Wells. Capps said, “Ida’s story is incredibly important not just because of her legacy of investigative reporting and social activism but also because…the issues she was writing about in the late 19th century and early 20th century are so sadly similar to those that play out every day our world today.”

 

Lisa Greenwald’s new novel, Ellie’s Deli: Wishing on Matzo Ball Soup!, features a girl trying to save her family’s deli. I asked how Greenwald came up with the idea for the novel, and she said, “A love of deli and grandparents inspired Ellie’s Deli. I was super close to my grandparents growing up and I wanted to write about a character who had that relationship as well. Add in a deli setting and voila - it all came together!”

 

It's all part of the beauty of middle grade fiction.

 

--Deborah Kalb