Teresa R. Funke - Book Clubs and Media




Book Clubs and Media For Kids For Teachers


	Home Books Events Reader Stories Writing Workshops Bio Contact Links © 2008 Teresa Funke			For Book Clubs and Media Free Story Download: In honor of Women's History Month, download a free copy of "Living on the Wind," one of the stories from Dancing in Combat Boots, during the month of March only! Download the PDF file. For Book Clubs: Teresa loves working with book clubs. She has done phone-in appearances for various book clubs across the nation. Email her if you're interested in having her speak to your club. For the Media: For a pre-written Q&A about Dancing in Combat Boots and Doing My Part, view this press release. Please let us know if you run this article. Dancing in Combat Boots How did you find the women to interview for Dancing in Combat Boots? Finding the women for this book required creative thinking and a lot of detective work. Before I started writing the individual stories, I thought about what types of women I'd like to feature in the book. I categorized them under subject headings: Military Women, Working Women, Professional Women, Mothers and Wives, Children, Women in the Thick of Things, etc. I wanted this book to represent all the important roles women played. I also made the conscious decision to include the voices of women from various ethnic and socio-economic groups, voices so seldom heard. And I wanted the book to be a sampling of women's experiences across the country. So I set myself a pretty wide-reaching task. I started by contacting established organizations like the Red Cross and women's military groups and asking around for names of women with good stories to tell. When I'd find a woman whose story sounded promising, I did an initial interview to see how well she could tell her story. In that way, I was able to track down women who not only had had interesting experiences, but could remember them in great detail. At times, it was the women I interviewed who led me to other women with whom to speak. The search was part of the fun of writing this book, and I talked to many interesting women whose stories, for various reasons, did not make it into the final manuscript. I hope to one day do something with those stories as well. Why did you decide to write these accounts as short stories? Initially I conceived of this book as an oral history collection. I actually wrote each of these stories as interviews in the women's own words. When I submitted the book in that format, however, I was told by agents and editors that "oral history collections don't sell." How disheartening that was! I'd put a lot of work into that book and I, for one, loved the format. At that point, I had a decision to make. I could give up on the stories or find another way to tell them. I almost gave up, believe me, but I couldn't let these stories go. So I started the arduous task of turning each interview into a short story. In the end, I wound up really liking this format. The elements of fiction made it possible for me to make the women's memories come to life for the reader. As a writer, what was the most challenging thing about writing these stories? Short stories are deceptive. Because they're short, there's a tendency to believe they are easy to write. Nothing could be further from the truth! Each of these stories took several months to write. Then you add on the extra challenge of writing a fictional story that is based on fact. It was important to me to remain as close to the women's actual experiences as I possibly could. At times, this meant sacrificing a bit of dramatic tension or poetic license, but I felt sure the reader would respond to the underlying, subtle truths in these stories. In nearly all of the stories, ninety percent of what you read really happened. I used that same technique with Remember Wake and it served me well. Where did the title come from? The title came from the opening story of the same name. The Red Cross volunteer I interviewed for this story recalled a wonderful detail. She said that when they danced with the soldiers in their high-cuffed combat boots, their ankles actually bled. It was an image that seemed to resonate on several levels, and it was also a great-sounding title. You are now asking people to record their own stories on your website. Why is this important? I've often been asked why I keep writing fiction set in WWII. Well it's largely because I keep coming across wonderful stories I've never heard before. The breadth of that war is astounding. 70 million people in 50 countries participated in WWII. That's 70 million stories we haven't heard. The World War II generation is fast passing from us. It's my goal and passion to try and save as many of their memories as I can. Today's kids are learning very little about this critical period in our history and I'm hoping the website can serve as a repository to help them find out more. What makes Dancing in Combat Boots unique? To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time such a diverse collection of women's voices from that time period has been gathered in one work of fiction. It's my hope that when people finish reading Dancing in Combat Boots they will have a better appreciation of the contributions of women. It has been argued that the hard work of the women on the home front had a direct correlation to our victory in that war. Knowing how busy women are today, we can well relate to how difficult it must have been to work a job, care for kids, volunteer for the war effort, tend a Victory Garden, deal with rationing, etc. while husbands and brothers were away at war. What we can't always see and what the women couldn't see while they were living those experiences is how our seemly ordinary lives can change history. It's my hope that this book honors and celebrates our mothers and grandmothers who set women on a new course. top of page Doing My Part Home-Front Heroes Series What made you decide to write a children's book? Knowing I was thinking about how to adapt my grandmother's story (she was a Mexican immigrant), a writer friend suggested I read a book called Esperanza Rising. I was enchanted by the story and I started to wonder if I could write my own historical novel for kids. A few weeks later, I was asked to speak to a fifth grade class about writing and World War II. I was so impressed with their interest in that time period and with their desire to learn more, but also dismayed to realize there wasn't much World War II literature out there for children. I immediately thought of a woman I had interviewed for Dancing in Combat Boots. Her story never made it into that collection because I decided to stay focused on older women, but I'd never stopped thinking her story was compelling. I realized it would actually make a great children's book, so I started writing. How long did it take you to write Doing My Part? Doing My Part was a rare blessing, a story that told itself. Unlike my previous books, which took years to write, I wrote a complete first draft of Doing My Part in a five month period. Within a year and a half of coming up with the idea, the story was on the shelves. I won't say writing Doing My Part was necessarily easier than writing my other two books, but it definitely seemed to come from someplace deep within and, of course, it helped immensely to have Shirley's story to build upon. How much of Doing My Part is true? Unlike my other two books, I took a little more license with Doing My Part. I felt I needed to in order to build upon these great anecdotes Shirley had told me and I also knew I needed the freedom to be able to create a character with a rich internal life, which meant putting a little distance between the character, Helen, and her inspiration, Shirley. But most of the events and details in the book are based on things Shirley told me and on information I gleaned during my research trip to the Illinois Valley where Shirley grew up. Is Westclox still there? The Westclox factory building is still standing. It was a thrill to walk beside it. It's an amazing old building and still looks much the way it does on the cover of Doing My Part. It's mostly abandoned now, although there a few shops in part of the factory. But the building itself still seems to breathe. It hasn't yet given up its ghosts. Where will the Home-Front Heroes stories go from here? Helen Marshall is only the first of the Home-Front Heroes. The next book will take place in a Japanese internment camp in California. Three more books will round out the series. One will involve a 12-year-old Mexican-American boy growing up in San Antonio. Another will chronicle the friendship between a Jewish girl in New York and an English boy who has been sent to America for safe-keeping. The last will deal with an African-American girl in the segregated south. Each of those books are based on stories told to me while researching Dancing in Combat Boots. What do you hope kids will take away from the Home-Front Heroes collection? I hope they will learn and appreciate how important kids were to the war effort. Unlike many wars in our history, World War II asked for something from every citizen. Everyone from the president on down was calling out to children to participate in scrap drives and war bond drives, to spot enemy air planes, to draw the black-out curtains, to help their neighbors. Kids were a vital and appreciated part of the war effort. Kids can make a difference. top of page Remember Wake How did you come across the story for Remember Wake? I was working as a research assistant for a PBS series on the history of Idaho and was sent to do a preliminary interview with a man named Clint Haakonstad, a survivor of the Battle of Wake Island. I was excited because, though I was a history major, I'd never heard of Wake. I found his story compelling, informative, and utterly inspiring. But I couldn't help but notice his wife, Audrey, who sat beside him showing off scrapbooks and filling in details for him. She knew his story as well as he did, but her presence made me wonder what the experience must have been like for women back home. Later, I had a chance to interview Audrey for an exhibit I was working on and learn more about her interesting past. You based this story on real people? I interviewed thirteen men and women who actually lived the experiences depicted in my novel, so virtually everything you read, down to the smallest details, actually happened to at least one of my interviewees. That authenticity was important to me. Why write this true story as fiction instead of nonfiction? Because it was important to me to tell the women's story as well as the men's, I felt a novel format would allow me to build the necessary tension in the women's story to assure it could hold its own against what the men went through. Also, Wake Island has been covered in nonfiction, but this story has never been told in fiction, so it was a chance to inform a new audience. Furthermore, there couldn't be a better story for a novel. Why is the Wake Island story important? Wake Island is often overshadowed by Pearl Harbor. Few people have heard of this important early battle in WWII. Wake marked the first small victory for our American forces after the decimation of our fleet at Pearl. It gave Americans a chance to once again believe in our fighting spirit. The Wake defenders became heroes to a country still adjusting to war. Where did the title come from? As the men fought for sixteen long days to hold the island against overwhelming Japanese forces, people back home couldn't help but see a comparison between their siege and the famous siege of the Alamo. So "Remember Wake" became a battle cry, much as "Remember the Alamo" had been in the previous century. What makes "Remember Wake" unique? This is first time the Wake civilians' story has been told in such detail. Usually, the Wake civilians are given a mere mention, whereas the Marines are given most of the credit for holding the island and there is some validity in that. But I wanted to tell the civilians' story and let people know the particular hardships they and their families suffered. This is the first time the women's story has ever been told. Were the Wake Island civilians ever given their due? In 1981, special legislation finally provided Veterans status to the civilians, making them one of only a handful of nonmilitary groups to be granted veterans benefits. Though the country has forgotten these men, they hold no grudges. They continue to support each other through the Survivors of Wake, Guam and Cavite Organization. It is my hope that "Remember Wake" will honor their contributions and will inspire as well as inform. top of page				Teresa meeting with a book club. Frequently Asked Questions Click a cover to find out more about the book or on the questions below. Dancing in Combat Boots How did you find the women to interview for Dancing in Combat Boots? Why did you decide to write these accounts as short stories? As a writer, what was the most challenging thing about writing these stories? Where did the title come from? You are now asking people to record their own stories on your website. Why is this important? What makes Dancing in Combat Boots unique? Doing My Part (Home-Front Heroes Series) What made you decide to write a children's book? How long did it take you to write Doing My Part? How much of Doing My Part is true? Is Westclox still there? Where will the Home-Front Heroes stories go from here? What do you hope kids will take away from the Home-Front Heroes collection? Remember Wake How did you come across the story for Remember Wake? You based this story on real people? Why write this true story as fiction instead of nonfiction? Why is the Wake Island story important? Where did the title come from? What makes "Remember Wake" unique? Were the Wake Island civilians ever given their due?