When I first began my sabbatical
and started catching up on reading my pile of books with Deaf Characters, I mentioned
Silent Starsong by T.J. Wooldridge
which had just been published a few
weeks before (in July). This
was a quick and interesting read that is certainly appropriate for young
adolescents.While this is a chapter book, there are some illustrations included along with the text.
Main character Kyra is supposed to follow her mother’s line of
interpreting the future by listening to the stars’ songs but Kyra is deaf and
her mother is broken-hearted because she doesn’t see how Kyra will be able to
continue this legacy. That’s a great deal of pressure for a young adolescent. Even the doctor’s note states that Kyra is “permanently
deformed”.
Fortunately, Kyra’s father finds a book of “secret hand codes” and is
able to communicate with her by signing. Kyra’s mother doesn’t pick up on the “hand-signs”
so easily and they have a difficult time communicating. But this doesn’t stop
Kyra’s father from continuing to try to bring the family together. When they go to a market, Kyra discovers Marne, an alien servant in the Naratsset culture. While these alien servants are typically quite skilled at telepathy, Marne’s telepathy is considered weak; yet, Kyra is able to communicate with Marne just fine. Marne has never been treated so nicely and Kyra may never have felt so understood. They become quite close and supportive of one another... But don’t let this make you think the book is all about happy relationships and adventures. There is much sadness, death, and frightening adventures in store. Marne and Kyra have to find ways to keep one another safe among the ensuing danger.
About the author:
T.J. Wooldridge is the
child-friendly persona of Trisha J. Wooldridge, who reviews dining
establishments in Faerie for her local paper, much to the natives' confusion,
and writes grown-up horror short stories that occasionally win awards. (EPIC
2008, 2009 for anthologies Bad-Ass
Faeries 2 and Bad-Ass Faeries 3.)
She often gets injured while trying to ride her horse, save the planet,
interview famous movie and music people, or wear heels. She swears she loves
her Husband-of-Awesome for more than his health insurance (he's also pretty
cute). She has co-produced the Spencer Hill Press anthologies UnCONventional and Doorways to Extra Time. Her
novels include The Kelpie and The Earl's Childe in the MacArthur
Family Chronicles series and Silent
Starsong in the Adventures of Kyra Starbard series.
******Check out my interview with author T. J.
Wooldridge below*****
SP: What inspired you to include a deaf
character that uses sign language?
TW: When I write, my characters come to
me. I got the idea of Kyra and Marne
while I was working for a horse rescue and I saw a mailbox with the name of
“Starbard,” and I thought, “That would make an awesome name for a science
fiction character.” And with that, both Kyra and Marne appeared in my head, and
I could see Marne helping Kyra and her story and challenges formed in my brain
during the rest of the ride to the rescue barn.
So, I didn’t go out to specifically
write a deaf character; I met a character who happened to be deaf. And one of the things I like in books is when
authors create a character, not a ________ character. So, a character who has
these awesome adventures and happens to be deaf in the case of Kyra, or who
happens to be black or who happens to identify as queer or a combination
thereof... because, you know, people have many facets. The character comes
first; they are defined by who they are, their culture, and many, many things.
For Kyra, as I got to know her culture,
her family, her world, I had to learn how she would navigate. How she would communicate. What challenges
she’d have and how she would overcome them.
In this case, the culture she lived in was far more intolerant to
“disabilities” than the one we currently live in; her father came from a more
tolerant culture and he knew sign language because he had a grandfather who was
deaf, so he taught it to his daughter as their “secret language.” He could make
it a game, and since there wasn’t anyone else using sign language on their
planet, it didn’t matter what branch it was or if they had to make up some of
their own signs. Using their game and “secret language,” he nurtured communication
however Kyra found a way to do so.
So it wasn’t so much a specific intent
to have a deaf character or to use sign language, it was an exploration of
“what if” for the character that came into my head.
SP: What research did you do to make your
character believable?
TW: At the time I was writing Silent Starsong, one of my old college friends
had a sister that was getting her degree in teaching music to the deaf, so I
would frequently pick her brain about communication and music and her
experiences teaching.
I also broke out all my old Girl Scouts
books on ASL and did a lot of online research and watching videos of deaf
children communicating and operations used to help the hearing impaired. I
pretty much read anything I could get my hands on.
As for telepathy, I grew up watching
television shows like Unsolved Mysteries,
Sightings, and all the early
paranormal stories. I always had an
interest in the supernatural as it leaked into reality—who believed what and
why. How people thought it worked. Military experiments on ESP, telepathy,
telekinesis and more. It was actually
something my dad and I shared an interest in; so we’d take books out from the
library or buy them from old book stores and share them, leaving notes or
bookmarks for each other.
Another puzzle piece in the believability
was a fair amount of research about stars, astronomy, and NASA articles about
the sounds stars make, all of which I found fascinating.
Besides that, I’m a stickler for
research on culture, engineering, science, and more. I do a lot of research, write,
edit, do more research, ask people who know more than I do, and edit even more.
SP: Kyra’s relationships are complicated
by her mother’s profession (and the family traveling) as well as her deafness.
Could you talk a bit about the role of Marne without giving away any spoilers?
TW: Marne appeared in my head at the same
time as Kyra; they were partners and friends from the moment I knew them both.
To an onlooker, it looks like Marne—the
small pink alien—is a communication assistant/servant. After all, the pastel
colored beings of his race are slaves, sold off their planet to keep their
genetic line clean of any weakness.
From the moment Kyra touches Marne,
connects with him telepathically, she understands his pain and fear. He’s
locked in a cage, for sale, a thing
because he is “not good enough,” and she feels the wrongness of that to her
core, so she convinces her father to bring him home. She’s the first person to
ever show Marne affection, to defend him, and that moves him profoundly. They
awaken a friendship in each other that neither expected to feel from another
person—and that both fiercely protect with everything they have.
SP: What do you hope that readers will
take away or learn from Silent Starsong?
TW: That’s a tough question; I hate to
have expectations of what someone will take away or learn, specifically. I’ve grown up with stories that were “there
for me” for many reasons that the author probably never suspected. When I get feedback from people about my
writing, I’m always learning myself and surprised what people do get. Who am I to say if that is right or
wrong? If that’s what the reader needed
from the story, let it be there.
I guess, for anything I write, be it Silent Starsong or anything, I hope it’s
exactly what the reader needs when they pick up the book. A comfort, a
challenge, an adventure, an escape, a family, a friend, a mirror, a confidence
boost, a lesson they felt they needed, or just a good, fun read. I hope it’s to each reader what the books I
read were to me—everything and anything.
SP: What advice do you have for young
readers?
TW: Keep writing. Give yourself permission
to write for fun, for yourself, and just for friends. Have fun with writing, and writing will have
fun with you. Realize that not everything
you write is meant to be shared. It’s
okay to write stories about your favorite characters if you need to—don’t try
to sell or plagiarize, but have fun with them.
I have a huge handwritten collection where I’ve gone on adventures with
the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with
Aslan from the Narnia books, with my own versions Meg and Charles Wallace from
Madeleine L’Engle’s Time series. When
you’re young, it’s okay to try and write like your favorite authors, to take
chances and discover your voice. And
it’s okay to do that when you’re older, too. Always have fun, and never stop
creating and playing in your worlds.
SP: Anything you'd like to add... such as
maybe a bit about a sequel?
TW:
I do have edits back on the sequel, Touching
the Pulse, which takes place pretty much exactly where Silent Starsong leaves off.
We’re hoping it will come out December 2015. Kyra and Marne are learning even more
dimensions and facets of friendship and their abilities. And they’re still in some serious danger that
they have to escape.
One of my proudest moments with the sequel, though, is
having written a lot more space-ship engineering and science with Kyra—and my
husband, who is an engineer, found no errors in my science and plausibility for
what she is able to do!
