Soon after completing the inital draft of The Inventors’ Daughter– my first children’s novel – I met a conscientious and amiable teacher named Brian Williamson.  We bumped into one another where I meet most of my friends, in a coffee shop in my neighborhood. When I mentioned the manuscript, he asked if a segment of his fifth-grade class could read the book and give me their opinions. I was thrilled. Here was the perfect readers group for a book aimed at 9 to 12 year-olds.

Six weeks later Brian and his students ate our brown-bag lunches around a venerable, well-worn work table in the school’s art room.  As you can see from the photo, the students were a fun, lively lot.  But as the discussion of the book moved around the table, I could see that they were intelligent and focused as well. From some, the remarks flowed freely. A few needed a bit of encouragement from Brian. But in no time, they too were giving me valuable commentaries on what they found funny, exciting or confusing.  

The gratifying thing for me and Brian was that all of the students read the entire manuscript judiciously.   And from their comments, I’m certain that I got more from these bright kids than I would have received from a my own writers’ group, however well-meaning, who would have been trying to second-guess my actual audience.

Two comments stood out in particular: 

One girl said twice – with deep sincerity – that “the story must flow.”  Other’s nodded.  It was then I realized that, having been accustomed to writing screenplays which are scenic in nature, I had not acquired the skill of writing the smooth, corherent monologue that is the narrative of a novel.  Scripts are shocks of dialog and an sparce, choppy narrative written for a host of artistic and technical people searching for their own assignments detailed within its text.  A novel is something else altogether.

My second revalation was that some things were unclear to my readers.  In an effort to conceal the skeleton of the mystery on which my plot hangs, my story had murky spots.   A rule I learned in the University of Washington literary fiction program is that you must never describe something as “indescribable.”  It is the duty of the writer to describe a character’s perception of anything – even a phantom.

With those two gems, I returned to my story and did my best to polish the manuscript into something my audience could understand and enjoy.  My special thanks to Mr. Williamson’s readers’ group.

I decided over the weekend to rename my recently completed novel The Inventor’s Daughter.  The original title was Erin Isabelle and the Wicked Uncle, which gave rise to questions regarding the uncle’s variety of wickedness.  I consequently renamed the story Erin Isabelle and the Bandit Uncle since that accurately described the aforementioned’s profession. 

Before the manuscript was properly polished, a very generous and helpful contact at Random House suggested the title might be a bit long.  But as I worked through the manuscript, I couldn’t think of anything better.  And I was rather attached, as people are, to their own ideas. 

It was not until I designed the blog for the series (ErinIsabelle.wordpress.com), that a solution was forced upon me by a gaping text box asking me what my blog was about. I responded in a moment of clarity.  In that instant it seemed obvious that the series was about the plight of … the inventor’s daughter.

 The phrase naturally brought to mind a singularly perfect story and title: “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” which in three words describes not only the profession of the main character, but his predicament as well.  How does a person audacious enough to take on such an position come to equal or best his mentor?

Are not inventors the sorcerers of the modern world?  In the ancient world where few were educated, the word sorcererwas often infused with an air of the malevolence of a tyrant.  People then and now were naturally suspicious of that which they do not understand.  In our more democratic where education is relatively plentiful, we defuse our sorcerer characters with humor.   The word “inventor” connotes abstract,  well-meaning curiosities dislocated from the world of business and money.   But their intellectual intensity and the purity of their curiosity also make them dangerous.   Witness Dr. Felix Hoenikker, Kurt Vonnegut’s character in Cat’s Cradle who in an idle moment creates the dreaded ice-nine which could crystallize all of the water in the world.

What then would the life of inventor’s daughter be like – one who has not only one such parent, but two?  Were she like them, probably not much but add to the excitement and danger.  But what if she was an intelligent, but normal girl named Erin Isabelle Becker-Spotsworth?  Well, you’ll just have to read the story to find out.

A slim note about the sources of this story.  My sister Lalu, whose name I use in the story, read me delightful parables of wickedness when I was very young.  Those tales are the origins of the noir characters of Wicked Uncle Charles and the Men With Bulldog tattoos who run through the manuscript.  Secondly, our mother was a poet, painter, sculptor, etc. who stood just a little bit off third base.  To all who knew her well, she was a wonderful woman who, because of her intense imagination, bore careful watching on occassion.  Living and especially travelling with her when I was a child was always … interesting, and is to be the source of another book I intend to write someday.