Writing With a Broken Tusk
Writing With a Broken Tusk began in 2006 as a blog about overlapping geographies, personal and real-world, and writing books for children. Since March 2024, Jen Breach (writer, VCFA graduate, and former student) has helped me curate and manage guest posts and Process Talk pieces on this blog.
The blog name refers to the mythical pact between the poet Vyaasa and the Hindu elephant headed god Ganesha who was his scribe during the composition of the epic narrative, the Mahabharata. It also refers to my second published book, edited by the generous and brilliant Diantha Thorpe of Linnet Books/The Shoe String Press, published in 1996, acquired and republished by August House, now part of Reading Is Fundamental, and still miraculously in print.
Posts on this site reflect personal opinion and commentary protected under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
Process Talk: Kitty Felde on the Workings of Democracy and her Fina Mendoza Books
Kitty Felde says she used to explain government to grownups on National Public Radio and now she explains it to kids in books. Some years ago she wrote a middle grade novel about a 10-year old girl, Fina Mendoza who moves to Washington, DC with her first-term Congressman papa and her older sister Gabby. Welcome to Washington, Fina Mendoza, is a mystery mashed up with a family story with a generous side of Washington trivia and lashings of insight into, yes—how government works. The story involves a Washington Halloween legend, and it led to a series.
In State of the Union, a mysterious pooping bird sets off a wild Chickcharney (yes, look that one up!) chase that weaves its way through battles over immigration reform and questions about the right to protest. In Snake in the Grass, reptiles begin infesting Capitol Hill, in a funny, dramatic extended metaphor for the toxicity of partisan politics. Book 4, out this year, is Home of the Brave, in which Fina, now 11, is back in her Congressman father’s LA district, still alert and curious, still with a warm heart and an abiding sense of fairness.
My email exchange with Kitty Felde about the series ends up meandering through character, the Washington DC setting, giving kids agency, and lots more.
Process Talk: Claire Hatcher-Smith on The Mizzy Mysteries
Claire Hatcher-Smith’s middle-grade protagonist, Mizzy Maypole, is a kid with a purpose—she dreams of being a detective, and nothing’s going to stop her. In the first book in the series, A Skeleton in the Closet, Mizzy discovers an elderly relative’s diaries in a locked wardrobe and is off and running in short order, in pursuit of clues to what appears to be a most suspicious death. Now, “Mizzy the Marvelous” is back in The Shadow on the Wreck. She’s investigating a spooky shadow on the wreck of an old fishing boat. Only her cousins are doing some investigating of their own and they don't seem to want her help. Mizzy’s a lovable, quirky PI character, and the books trip along at a nice pace in her first person voice, an enjoyable ride from determination to despair and back again, and always with a dash of good humour. Here’s my interview with Claire about where this character came from, the settings in these books, and more.