At the end of November, NCSCL’s Graduate Assistants Andrea Kade and
Chris Deming spoke with author Isabel Quintero shortly before her talk about
her book, Gabi, A Girl in Pieces, her inspirations for her writing,
and her future pursuits as an author.
Chris Deming: Gabi, A Girl in Pieces, your
debut novel, covers a wide variety of problems and challenges a Young Adult
faces growing up. What was your reaction to the success of the novel, and have
you interacted with people who have expressed how much it affected them or how
they reacted to it?
Isabel
Quintero: It was a surprise it was a
success: a happy surprise. I didn’t go in thinking “this is going to
sell this many copies” or “it’s going to be taught” or “THIS is a winner.” I
just said “I’m going to write this book, and I’m happy that it’s being
published, and my friends and my family are going to buy this, and I’ll have an
awesome release party, and it’s going to be great. I’m going to keep doing my
job, and finish up grad school.” When it was up for the William C. Morris Award
[award for first-time YA author], I was completely shocked and happily
surprised. When the other awards came in, it was the same thing: “Is this
really happening?” Other people were reading my book, and the emails I received
actually convinced me to get onto Twitter. One reader wrote to me saying “I
really loved your book, but I had to look for you the old-fashioned way.”
Another reader, who is also a YA writer, Amy Spalding, expressed
how “this fat girl is me, you know, I’m not a Chicana, I’m a fat 30-something
year old woman, and I completely connect.” I started getting more and more
emails about how my readers saw themselves in the characters in this book and
thought “holy crap, this means a lot!”
But it also means we have a lot to do
representation-wise, and so I want us to see ourselves in books all over.
Overall, it’s been fairly positive experience, but I’ve had a few folks give
not so good reviews. I remember being at an American Library Association
conference , and a librarian told me, “you know, we have a book club at our
school, and we thought about your book, but the cover is just so scary--so ugly
and frightening--that we were put off by it. We didn’t pick it up for a while.
We finally picked it up and it was a good book.”
CD: That
seems to go against the old adage of ‘don’t judge a book by its cover.’
IQ: Especially
coming from a librarian. She said it was the eye that bothered her. I love Zeke
Peña and his artwork. He’s fantastic, and I’m glad I got to meet him through
that project. We’ve worked on other projects since then.
AK: What other projects have you worked on with him?
IQ: We
have a graphic novel that just came out,
Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide, which is a biography, and then we have another
book that we are working on together.
CD: Can
you tell us about your nonfiction graphic novel? What inspired you to write
about Graciela Iturbide?
IQ: The
Getty commissioned it. Ruth Lane, my editor, asked if there was anyone I’d want
to work with. Zeke and I had already been talking about a graphic and when this
came up, I asked “what are you doing for the next year?” Only later did I find
out these types of projects usually take two to three years to complete.
AK: They really put the pressure on you.
IQ: The book came out at the same time
as PST/LA/LA, a Getty initiative,
and they are looking at the connection between Latin American art and Southern
California. Graciela Iturbide is a photographer from Mexico with her work
exhibited at the Hammer, Scripps College, UCR Museum of Photography, and
Bergamot Station at Rose Gallery. They wanted our book to coincide with her
exhibits’ dates.
AK: How did you approach writing the dialogue for
this graphic novel? Did you talk to her?
IQ: Yes,
we emailed back and forth. I also had the opportunity to Skype with her, but I
was too scared because she is so renowned. Her work is everywhere, including
the Getty. And so I’m watching her interviews and lectures on YouTube and she’s
always introduced as this “legendary photographer” or “the most important Latin
American photographer in contemporary times,” and I began to get so nervous
about whether I'd taken on more than I could handle.
CD: No
pressure there.
IQ: Yes it’s
an honor, but also a huge responsibility. Eventually, I got to meet her when
she gave a talk at University of Southern California, I elbowed my way through
people and was like “Hello!” [laughs].
It was really cool.
AK: What did she say about the book?
IQ: She
really likes it! During the drafting process, there were only a couple things
where she said, “I don’t know about this.” Since she is alive, it was very
nerve-wracking process. I wanted to make sure I got everything right. At first,
the book was in third person, not in
first. But, Zeke and Ruth kept asking “are you sure you don’t want to do it in
first person?” I didn’t feel comfortable putting words in her mouth, and then I
figured out a way I was comfortable.
AK: You have a new books series, Ugly Cat
& Pablo, that is written for elementary school readers. Why did you
decide to write for such a young audience?
IQ: I was
actually writing [Ugly Cat and Pablo] at the same time I was writing
Gabi. As a former elementary school library tech, I remember the kids
gravitating toward funny books. They love funny stuff!
AK: My daughter is in first grade, and she loves
cats. Having illustrations--especially
for her age--
really entices them.
IQ: I
really like the job [Tom Knight] did with the illustrations. Cats are a little
ornery and they can be assholes, but they’re good characters. I wanted to write
a friendship story, and I wanted it to be funny, and I wanted them to be
Chicano, and I wanted them to speak Spanglish. Kids need to see themselves in
books. As an elementary library tech, I would try to get books that reflected
the population we served, mostly Black and Brown kids. But we didn’t have books
about Black or Brown kids on our shelves. So I started writing Ugly Cat
& Pablo. When I finished the book, I gave it to a second-grade teacher
and asked “can you read this? Do you think your kids would like this?” She
ended up reading it to her class, and at first I was like “why did you do that?
I didn’t ask you to do that.” She said “I didn’t tell them it was you, I just
asked them afterwards if they liked it.” When they finished the book, the kids
came into the library asking “do you have any more of the Ugly Cat and Pablo
books?” It felt really good to hear that from the kids because that was my
target audience.
And I know they’re eager, but they’re also very honest about what they
like and don’t like. One of things I found with kids who are “reluctant
readers,” is that they haven’t found the right book yet. The books they enjoy
are the ones that would make them laugh. If I can have a kid associate
happiness and joy with reading, then I’ve done my job and it makes me feel
good.
AK: How was the process of working with an
illustrator? Do you just submit your manuscript, or did you sketch things out
by yourself? How is the process of that collaboration? Did you get to pick the
illustrator?
IQ: No, I
didn’t. Gabi was sold without an agent because other agents and small
presses had rejected it. So I sent it to Cinco Puntos (publisher for Gabi)
where you actually have to call Lee Byrd, editor and owner, who will say “oh
yeah, that sounds interesting. Go ahead and send us ten pages” or “Hey, good
luck somewhere else.” The good thing is you don’t have to wait months to find
out, but the bad part is you hear immediately “we don’t want your work.”
CD: And in
person.
IQ: [laughs]
Yeah. So that’s what happened with Gabi. With Scholastic, I actually got
a letter from Nancy Mercado, my editor, and she said “Hi, my name is Nancy. I’m
sure you have heard from other people, but I was wondering if you had anything
you’d like Scholastic to look at.” I was like “Yes! I have this [Ugly Cat &
Pablo]!” The second book, Ugly Cat & Pablo and the Missing Brother
is coming out in 2018. This process is the reason I got an agent,
because Scholastic has a much larger and longer contract. As for working with
illustrators, you usually submit your work, and then they ask if you have
anyone you’d like to work with. I gave them a list, but none of them were
available or an option, so they had Tom Knight work on the project. I really
like how he rendered the characters, and appreciate his illustrations. It’s
been really good!
CD: We
have an MFA program here at SDSU. We were wondering if you had any advice for
aspiring Children’s and Young Adult authors trying to get their books
published, or trying to start writing, or general advice?
IQ: Just
write. It’s easy to get discouraged. I think one of the things about being a
writer is--we don’t
say it often, and maybe I shouldn’t say it--but we
think our work is good enough to be published. That’s why we write! We
write to understand ourselves, we write to understand the world, we write for
various reasons, right? But when we submit stuff out into the world, it’s
because we think it’s good enough to be published. But, when that’s rejected,
we feel pretty shitty about it.
Michelle Serros said
[of Gabi]: “This
is your baby. No one is going to love your baby like you’re going to love your
baby, so you need to do what’s best; no one
will know what’s best besides you.” No one is going to know what is best for my
work besides me. People can give advice and suggestions about editing or
revisions which are helpful. But I would say take your work seriously because,
if you don’t, it’ll be hard for others to take it seriously. And you have to
realize that it is work. There is no recipe or “here are these five
rules to get published.” It just doesn’t work that way. I know people who have
been working a long time and putting poetry manuscripts together, but then you
have folks who are super young--amazing
writers like Ocean Vuong or Kaveh Akbar--who
are under 30 and have amazing success. Stay dedicated and find a dedicated
community that is supportive. I think that really helped me with Gabi. I
was part of a writing critique group (it was
a poetry group) but we
were honest and supportive of each other. Finding a group who will be honest
with you, not
hurtful, but also not like “good
job, good job,” because we don’t need that.
CD: Not
cheerleading but constructive criticism.
IQ: Yeah,
because our parents or grandparents can tell us “good job,” but we need people
telling us what to work on. We need people in our lives who are going to tell
us “this character needs more depth” or “this doesn’t make sense.” Just keep
working, don’t be discouraged, cry when you need to, take a break when you need
to, and writing doesn’t always happen on the page. I’ll go for hikes or go for
a walk and just think about my writing. I’ll stare at my ceiling and talk to
myself. Anything that gets me to think creatively.
With Gabi, there came a point where I was stuck, and my editor
had said Gabi lost her voice in a certain section of the book. I was just
stuck; I felt Gabi had stopped talking to me, and I didn’t know what to do. I
was talking to a friend of mine (who
was this old hippie) and
she said “you know what you should do? You should go for a walk and talk to
her.” I was like “Out loud?” [laughs], and she said “yeah, talk to her like a
person.” I got desperate though and started to do that. I would walk, and I
would talk to Gabi, and then she wouldn’t shut up!
It’s some of the best writing advice that I’ve gotten. I did that also
for Ugly Cat & Pablo. There was a part there that I just didn’t know
what was happening, so I’d go hike in these hills and take my phone with me to record the notes.
CD: It
sounds like a freeing and fun way of doing it too where it’s just a release of
ideas.
IQ: Yeah,
because you are constantly in your head when you’re writing, and you need a
break, you need to say things out loud.
CD: How
does your Latinx identity inform a lot of your writing?
IQ: Well,
I can’t stop being Chicana: that’s
what I am. Do we ask white writers how whiteness informs their writing? I’m Chicana,
a Mexican-American, and also American. But my American experience is different
than your American experience, and different than another Chicano’s experience
from some other part of the country.
We are a part of this society: we have to tell our stories, but we are
fed that we are not and sometimes we believe it. In that way, my multiple
identities inform my writing. If you have read Joe Jiménez’s Bloodline,
he re-writes Hamlet from the second-person. He’s an incredible poet, and
it’s beautiful and heartbreaking, but he’s a queer Chicano writing this
beautiful story, and it’s very different, so his identities are going to inform
that differently. Gabi is a lot like me. She’s also a lot not like me.
She’s foul-mouthed, I’m foul-mouthed; she’s a light-skinned fat Chicana, and I’m
the same thing. But, she’s also braver and able to do and say things that I was
too scared to do or say at that age. It all informs and shapes the way I see
the world, and what I want to write. Especially with language, I have multiple
languages to grab from and to incorporate, so I don’t have to stick with
Standard American English. I can use Spanglish and slang and code-switch.
AK: Do you consider yourself a Latinx feminist? Are
there any overlaps or tensions of being Latinx and a feminist?
IQ: Sure. I’m a feminist… Yeah,
I’m a Latinx feminist. The only reason I respond that way is because I think
when we put ourselves in or are put into categories, we are expected to behave
or say certain things that are homogenizing. Like, all Latinx feminists think
this way, and not all feminists think the same way. So, I’m feminist and also
Latinx. It is really important for me. The dedication in Gabi is
specifically to all young women.
Of course, I come from a Mexican background. We have a lot of machismo
in our culture and we live in a patriarchal society. Just look at our news and
our President. It doesn’t matter who you are, patriarchy runs everything.
There is tension any time a woman or anyone who identifies as a woman, queer, or non-binary, will have some push-back for
writing about their stereotype or expectations set for them. I remember reading
a review that said, “Well, Gabi isn’t really true to a high school experience
because teenagers don’t talk like that.” How I read it was “Brown teenagers don’t
talk like that” or “Latino teenagers don’t talk like that.” I don’t think I’ve
heard the same critique from other writers like John Green, whose characters
have a pretty extensive vocabulary for high school students. Someone like Gabi
isn’t expected to be able to use these words. There’s that push-back, or
tension, right there.
Talking about sexuality was one thing I was a little bit worried about
[in Gabi], and I realized I would have to talk to my mom at some point about
what was in this book. I’m in my 30s and I’m still scared my mom will scold me!
She didn’t though and said “if you think this is helpful for other young women,
then I’m okay.” It was completely unexpected. But it gets folks talking, and I
appreciate that it gets young women talking about their bodies, about autonomy,
about pushing back against these traditions because not all traditions are
good. I love my culture, but we have a lot of flaws, like machismo. As a
teenager, I was not allowed to cut my hair because my father would not let me
and my hair was down to my butt. When I finally did cut it, he didn’t speak to
me for a few days. He was very, very angry with me.
Tension with my mom was there too, though. She wanted me to go to
school, but she also wanted me to get married. It was one of the most important
things, and that was my goal as woman growing up because you have to be
married. So, I did get married, and I’m no longer married. That was kind of
tough because I had to reconcile…I think many women do--not only Latinas-- but this one thing I was supposed to do, I failed at. Like, I was
supposed to be a wife, and I failed at that. There is that and getting those
kinds of thoughts out of your head. Even though I’m writing these things that
are feminist, that try to question expectations put on women, I still struggle
with them because this is what I grew up with; this is what has been expected
of me. It’s rough, and I see that with my friends, whether they are writers or
not. We all deal with the same thing. You have a lot of divorces, a lot of
kids, and a lot of “why don’t you have kids?”, so that’s another thing too:
questioning “what kind of woman are you?” or “when are you going to get serious?”
I think I’m pretty good where I’m at. I have four books, I have a fifth one
coming along. I’m doing okay.
