Jennifer Holm, winner of three Newbery Honors, will be in Miami Oct. 1-2 doing visits at local schools.
The first stops on a national tour for her latest book, The Third Mushroom, include visits to Sunset Elementary and Frank C. Martin International K-8 Center among others.
Holm has written 17 books on her own and another 36 with her brother, Matthew, including the Babymouse and Squish series.
She has strong ties to Florida although she never actually lived in the state. She did spend a lot of time visiting family here.
“My mom’s family lived in the Keys,” she said. “My grandfather, who just died, was going to be 103. He was in Vero Beach.”
She has set some of her books in the Keys and some in the Vero Beach area.
The Third Mushroom is a sequel to The Fourteenth Goldfish. In that book, Melvin is a scientist who figures out a way to reverse aging. In fact, he reverses aging so far that he goes back to being 13 and has to live with his grown daughter and granddaughter — and go to middle school.
Holm said that in The Third Mushroom, Melvin is tired of being on the road, so he brings his laundry home and he is back to living with his daughter and granddaughter. At the same time, his granddaughter Ellie is going through ups and down of friendships in middle school.
There is a science component to the book.
“The science aspect is about how failure is important in science and how you have to keep trying,” Holm said.
This book is close to her heart because the grandfather in the book is inspired by her own father. Her father was in the Navy, then became a flight instructor and eventually became a doctor.
It helped, while writing the book that her son was going through puberty.
“He’s 15 now. The last two years, we’ve going through this,” she said.
Her mother was a nurse and so the family dinner conversations often centered around science subjects. She jokes that the kids were always sick because her dad would bring his work home with him. Because they lived in a small town, if a child got hurt, their parents would bring them to the Holm house and they would be sutured up in the kitchen.
Her dad also kept petri dishes in the refrigerator.
“I thought it was normal,” she said.
As an award-winning author, Holm does a ton of school visits. When she speaks at schools, Holm stresses how failure is important in science and in writing. Often students think they only need to write one draft of a story. She worries that they might give up too soon.
“You have to keep practicing and trying, and make mistakes,” she said. “Sometimes mistakes can be amazing things.”
Students are probably surprised when they learn how much she hates the first draft of her books.
“I just want to get something on the page,” Holm said. “I love revising. That’s when you see all the magic happening.”
She writes no fewer than four or five drafts of her novels and she will often write 14-15. Sometimes her editors have to let her know that she is done.
She does admit that sequels are easier. That’s because she already knows the world she is building and the characters.
