Jame Richards: About Me

Jame Richards

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About Me

Love it

Smells
Piney woods
Bakery
Basil
Babies
Woodsmoke
Cinnamon
Coffee

Sounds
Crickets
Rushing water
Tree frogs
Golf carts
Kids playing
Baby's laughter
Reading aloud
Rain on the roof

Hate it

Smells
Wet dog
"Throw-up cheese"
Temporary crown

Sounds
Coughing
Fighting
Slamming
Stomping
Honking

Superpowers

-Finding what's missing
-Identifying diet-colas in a blind taste test
-Imitating people: voices, gestures and accents
-Loving my family

Favorite Titles

I Been in Sorrow's Kitchen and I Licked Out All the Pots

Dear Mem Fox, I Have Read All Your Books Even the Pathetic Ones

A Blue So Dark

Favorite Books

Nory Ryan's Song

Maggie's Door

Out of the Dust

Aleutian Sparrow

If You Come Softly

Locomotion

Heartbeat

Fever 1793

Starring
Sally J. Freedman as Herself

Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret

Deanie

The Weight of the Sky

Song of the Sparrow

Diamond Willow

Crossing Stones

Carver

The Buffalo Storm

Anne of Green Gables

The Secret Garden

Mandy

The Fattening Hut

See You Down the Road

Number the Stars

Hitler's Canary

Yellow Star

The Diary of a Young Girl

Ethan Frome

The House of Mirth

Emma

Otto the Growly Boy

My favorite part of a writer's website is the page where they talk about themselves, their writing and their journey. Get to know them, get to know their style...and it goes a little something like this...

What did you want to be when you grew up? Did you always want to be a writer?

I wanted to be an artist when I grew up. Mostly visual arts. Adults informed me there was no market for pencil-on-paper drawings, and even less for crayon-on-coloring-book pages. (I know, right! Why not?) I wasn't very good at painting. So, I thought I would wind up a fashion designer---funny, because writers spend a lot of time in their pajamas. Maybe I could've been a pajama designer.

In a casual, off-hand way I did think I would write a book or two, you know, in my spare time. Then I read Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great, and slammed headfirst into my real reading life. Starring Sally J. Freedman as Herself changed me forever---it was the first time I believed the main character was someone I could reach out and touch. (Of course, that reaching out and touching would have had to happen in the 1940s, but still.) After that, I thought for a while that I wanted to be Judy Blume when I grew up. Sadly, the job was already taken.

If you'd like to read a little something I wrote about growing up in a labyrinthine development where all the houses are kissing cousins, go on ahead. Then come back.

What were you like as a teen? Were you like any of your characters?

I don't like labels: my favorite stories are about young people who transcend categorization. You might guess I was pretty studious, but I also played sports and loved art. I had a few friends, but I resisted being limited to just one group. Like Celestia, I enjoyed being alone, often with a good book, but could also be "one of the boys." One of my guy friends said, "You're not a girl; you're Jame." Great. Thanks.

So, kid, teen...then what?

After many years of self-imposed creative exile, I dipped a toe in the water of writing. Unfortunately, I spent too much time thinking about writing and talking about writing instead of writing. It took a few more years to cross the chasm between wishing I was already a writer and intending to write until I die even if no one reads it, all those pages piling up in a bureau like Emily Dickinson. Writing itself is the true satisfaction.

Finally, a few years ago, the dam of self-expression burst. I was writing everyday like my life depended on it. Then I picked up a copy of Maggie's Door by Patricia Reilly Giff and the landscape changed completely. "That's what I want to do!" Spare, haunting, impeccably paced---it was everything I aspire to, the same with Nory Ryan's Song. I began writing for young readers and then, in the most amazing twist of fate ever, my new hero became my mentor.

How did you wind up writing in verse?

This is a question people are particularly curious about. Who would ever chose to make their life harder? But this style comes naturally to me and I'm actually much more productive since I switched to verse. I didn't know how to put my poetic nature to work until my mom handed me a copy of Karen Hesse's Out of the Dust: "Go upstairs and read this and don't come down until you're done." She begged to me to at least try this style. Yeah...sometimes moms just know things.

I'm very lucky to have an editor at Knopf who knows how to deal with this kind of material: I call it writing and editing at the word level. Microscopic level might better describe it! Every word choice, every punctuation mark, every line space and line break...well, you get the idea.

What would you be if you weren't a writer?

The pedestrian answer is that I would be an editor, proofreader, document designer, production editor, teacher/tutor of writing or literature. And I've done many of those jobs over the years. But I know in my heart that the job I was born to do, besides writing fiction and poetry, is to name nail polish colors. Lipstick, too. Even wall paint. The Honda Civic was named by a poet, and it is the longest-held car name in history.