I would love to welcome Shutta Crum to the blog today. This interview is part of her blog tour through The Teen Book Scene. You can follow along with the tour here. My review can be found here. More information pertaining to Shutta Crum, and her books, including Thomas and the Dragon Queen can be found at her website here. She is also hosting a giveaway for an autographed copy of Thomas and the Dragon Queen on her website.
What is your favorite line from THOMAS AND THE DRAGON QUEEN?
I really enjoyed writing the humorous bits of THOMAS AND THE DRAGON QUEEN. One of my favorite lines is the one where Princess Eleanor admonishes the dragonlets by saying, “It is not mannerly to chew on the breeches of guests.” Hah!
Does Thomas have a theme song? If so, what is it?
If Thomas had a theme song, it would have to be (Dream) The Impossible Dream, don’t you think? After all, he went out on what seemed to others to be an impossible quest. While I don’t see Thomas being completely like Don Quixote, he is a dreamer, and stubborn. And he is so soft-hearted. So Thomas does have some of the same qualities as the Man of La Mancha.
To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go
To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star
This is my quest . . .
If Thomas had to choose between saving the princess or saving his kingdom, which would he choose and why? (Or could he do both?)
Hard question! But, of course, the heart of any story is always in the personal and particular. (E. E. Cummings said, “there’s nothing so something as one.”) So if there had to be a choice, he’d save the princess. A kingdom can be retaken at a later date. A life must be saved when circumstances demand it. Besides, Thomas is a romantic at heart . . .
What would the front page headline of a newspaper say about you?
“Local Kid Makes Good!” I was a good student in school, but not at the top of my class. I was not into athletics, or a member of the cool clique. I was pretty much your average middle-class, hard-working kid. But like Thomas, I was a dreamer and stubborn. When I decided to write for kids, I didn’t give up. It took me two and a half years, and more than three hundred (!) rejections (on approximately twenty different manuscripts) before I got my first acceptance. The local kid "made good” because she developed a thick skin.
What kind of tree would you describe yourself as, and why?
Hmm….if I had to be a tree, I’d be the kind that cedar waxwings congregate in. Perhaps that’s a cedar. (LOL!) At any rate, I LOVE cedar waxwings. They’re chatty, friendly, travel in groups and sit and preen while gossiping in the branches. They’re also beautiful birds, silvery-sleek with elegant black masks—as though they are all attending a masked ball. They remind me of the French aristocracy before the revolution, barely deigning to recognize a mere human that might stroll beneath a tree they’ve gathered in. So what does that tell you about me as a tree— not much. But if I could be reincarnated as a building, I’d be the Palace of Versailles before the French Revolution full of giddy ladies-in-waiting and dashing young rakes.
I love your answers, Shutta! Thank you so much for stopping by today! :)
I love your answers, Shutta! Thank you so much for stopping by today! :)
