FAQ

Check out "Fun Stuff" on Katrina's HarperCollins site

Where did you get the idea for the Kindness of Strangers?
How can I become more educated about child sexual abuse?
How big of a problem is child sexual abuse?
What made you want to write Traveling Light?
If I wanted to do something to help fight AIDS/HIV, what could I do?
What makes you choose such dark topics?
Where did you get the idea about animal communication for Two Truths and a Lie?
How can I find an animal communicator?
When and how do you write?
What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
Is the restaurant El Meson real or fictional?

WHERE DID YOU GET THE IDEA FOR THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS?
The seed of the story came when I met a ten-year-old boy who was HIV+ during one of my school residencies. His birth parents, now in prison, were a white couple from an affluent suburb who had prostituted him for drug money; he had contracted the virus from this abuse. His story devastated me, but his personality, resilience, and great, sly sense of humor inspired me even more. He had been adopted by a wonderful new family. Although this novel is not his story, he was the genesis behind it. I hope the novel captures the strength and triumph of his life.

When I started researching this novel, I was horrified to learn that his story was not at all unique. I became aware of how common child sexual abuse was, and I was angry that I had never heard anyone discuss this or ways to prevent it.
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HOW CAN I BECOME MORE EDUCATED ABOUT CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE?
I highly recommend you become acquainted with the amazing organization Darkness to Light. They say, "Preventing child sexual abuse is a job for grown-ups. There are things we can do to protect our children. Start with this free booklet: 'Seven Steps to Protecting Our Children from Sexual Abuse.' You'll learn how to prevent, recognize, and react responsibly to child sexual abuse. To view it right now, download the information at the website: www.darkness2light.org."
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HOW BIG OF A PROBLEM IS CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE?
It's huge. Here's what Darkness to Light would like adults to know:
It happens more than you think. A lot more--one in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually abused before their eighteenth birthday.

It can happen right under your nose and you may never know-less than one victim in ten will tell.

The perpetrators aren't usually "dirty old men hiding in the bushes" -- 34% of those who sexually abuse children are family members. A further 59% are friends and acquaintances of the child and his family.

You probably don't realize how big the problem is -- 67% of the victims of all sexual assaults (including adults) are children.

And we're not talking about young teenagers having consensual sex-the median age for sexual abuse is just nine years of age.

Child abuse is not just a bad experience. Child sexual abuse wrecks young lives-victims of child sexual abuse are at far greater risk for all sorts of psychological disorders, including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression, substance abuse and relationship problems, often lasting into adulthood.
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WHAT MADE YOU WANT TO WRITE TRAVELING LIGHT?
I have lost friends to AIDS and those losses were the seeds of the story. A friend of mine lost touch after he moved to L.A. to become an actor. My letters to him would come back marked "address unknown" and messages left on his parents' answering machine went unanswered. I was concerned, but didn't pursue it as I was busy and buried in my first year of full-time teaching. His sister contacted me later that year to tell me that he had died, from AIDS. He was diagnosed shortly after moving to California and when he told his family, he was telling them he was sick, as well as that he was gay, at the same time. They refused to let him come home, and so he faced his illness in a brand new place without any support system or close friends. His sister finally went to see him, against her parents' wishes and ended up being there for what was the last week of his life. She's not even sure he knew she was there. She told me that an AIDS service organization had helped care for him during his last months. This knowledge horrified me and led me to the AIDS Foundation Miami Valley, which has since been renamed AIDS Resource Center. It was too late for me to do anything for my friend, but I thought if there were others here like him, I could perhaps do something for them. I wanted to get myself into a Buddy Program but the good people at AFMV were more interested in the fact that I was an educator. They trained me for their Speaker's Bureau and I began talking to high school and college groups. Sometimes I led an "AIDS 101" class and sometimes I led workshops on what it was like to live with chronic illness.

I was teaching high school at the time, and the novel began to take shape out of my desire to put a human face on AIDS for my students.

The novel started as a short story-the hayloft scene where Summer discovers that her brother is gay. When I shared the story at a writers' conference, half the readers said the story ended where it should begin, and the other half said they wanted to know these people more before they could care about this event. So, I started expanding the story in both directions. I find it interesting that that chapter is now in the middle of the novel. At first the book was from the brother's point of view. But as I immersed myself in reading every AIDS memoir and novel I could get my hands on, I realized that Todd's story had already been told. Almost every work I could find that dealt with AIDS was from a gay male perspective. Those stories had been told and told beautifully. I couldn't hope to add to that. After much struggling and rewriting, I changed the viewpoint of the novel to Summer. What I could offer was a character who could be a point of entry to an AIDS story for a reader who might find the gay male perspective a barrier. I wanted to create a book that would be accessible to readers with views like my former students, as well as ones who would be interested in a story that had gay characters and strong gay relationships. That was my goal-to touch both of those audiences

Many people have asked if the work is autobiographical. Of course I wrote about things I knew well--teaching, horses, ballet. But the actual people and story are completely works of fiction, and even the things that are from my own life are altered. Summer, for instance, was a fabulously talented ballerina and I...was not. I studied ballet seriously and was wildly in love with it (and still am), but I never had the right body shape or any real promise for it. One of the (many) joys of fiction is taking something from your own life and changing its outcome.

The only characters that I can say are based are actual, living beings are the cat, Cooper, who is shamelessly based on my own cat and writing assistant, Montgomery (who passed away in March of 2004), and the mare, Chaos, who is my former mare, Trilby--red and fiery and from the track. She taught me much about patience. All the human characters, though, are completely made up.

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IF I WANTED TO DO SOMETHING TO HELP FIGHT AIDS/HIV, WHAT COULD I DO?
AIDS Service Organizations always need financial assistance and volunteers. Even if you cannot give money or supplies, you can probably give your time. Most ASOs have volunteer training and need people to help in a variety of ways-from helping with fundraising and awareness events, to basic office tasks, to providing services to clients. One way that everyone can help is to correct misinformation about HIV and AIDS and to speak up when people don't know the facts (...so it goes without saying, know the facts, right?).

Entering "AIDS Service Organizations" on an internet search will give you plenty of information. TheBody.com is a particularly thorough site that lists hotlines, service organizations, and hospitals and clinics state by state (and also has Canadian and International listings) to help you find an ASO near you.

Of course, an ASO close to my heart is my own local ARC Ohio, where I used to work and still volunteer. You will find the most amazing, generous, hardworking people there:
AIDS Resource Center Ohio
211 South Main Street Suite 1000
Dayton OH 45402
(937) 461-2437
www.afmv.org
info@arcohio.org

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WHAT MAKES YOU CHOOSE SUCH DARK TOPICS?
One woman at a writing conference asked about my upcoming second novel. When I told her it was about communication and centered on alcoholism and addiction, she said, "Why do you want to write about that? You seem so nice."

In a class taught by the wonderful poet Colette Inez, Colette advised us to make a list of our obsessions. She urged us to list every single thing we caught ourselves spending time thinking about, reading about, fretting about. We were to include everything, no matter how shameless or embarrassing. She said these were the things we should be writing about. Writers must pay attention to their obsessions. Use that passion. My list included things like vampires, Robert Downey Jr., and tango...but I also realized it included many social issues. AIDS. Addiction. Treatment of animals. Our prison systems. I'm drawn to these issues. I wish I knew what to do to "solve" them, but I don't. But, I took Colette's advice and paid attention.

I knew I wanted to write a book that dealt with AIDS. But I had to find the characters to tell a story about AIDS. I didn't want to just lecture the reader, "here's what you should think about AIDS." A novel is not a forum for a lecture. A novel must, above all things, tell a story.

There is a beautiful, beautiful quote (and sadly, I do not know its source) that says: "A novel should not be a message clamped to a passenger pigeon's leg. A novel is the process of watching that pigeon fly from here to there."

I don't want to tell the reader what to think about these issues. I want to ask the reader to think about the issues...and I want to entertain them at the same time. I figure I'm just trying to aid and abet awareness of the issues that obsess me.
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WHERE DID YOU GET THE IDEA ABOUT ANIMAL COMMUNICATION FOR TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE?
Be warned--this is a long story! Years ago, I owned a mare and boarded her at a great place called Rocky Point Farm and several other boarders there had started talking about animal communicators (actually some people were using the term "pet psychic" but that's not really accurate). I was skeptical, but the writer in me was very curious. A few friends of mine at the farm had used the communicator Dawn Haymon in Clinton, NY, who runs Spring Farm Cares, a rescue operation for abused and neglected animals. My friends claimed that Dawn Haymon could communicate with their animals over the phone which I found-at the time-simply absurd. I found out it cost $25 for twenty minutes and my curiosity overwhelmed me. I figured that $25 was a small price to pay to satisfy my curiosity and the worst that could happen was that I would make a donation that might buy some poor old racehorses some bails of hay. I made my appointment.

When I called Dawn, I was determined to be a skeptic. I didn't want to volunteer any information. My mare, a fiery chestnut named Trilby, was retired from the track and very, very "energetic." I was attempting to learn dressage and attempting to teach it to Trilby, and meeting with much frustration. I didn't tell Dawn any of this. All she asked for was what kind of animal Trilby was, her name, and her color. Dawn said, "Okay...yes, I think I've connected with her. Okay, what would you like to tell her or ask her?"

"How can we get her to relax?" I asked. That's it. That's all I provided.

Dawn said, "Well, she thinks you're the one who needs to relax. She seems a little offended by this. She doesn't know what you want from her. She can go fast, but you won't let her. She can go lots faster than you allow her to. She used to get rewarded for going fast at the track, so she's not sure what it is you want her to do."
I was surprised, my interested piqued.

"Wait, wait," Dawn said. "She's not paying attention. Okay, I've got her back. She says you don't make it very clear what you want from her. There's a man who rides her. The man she understands. Do you want her to do what the man asks her to do? Am I getting that right? Is there a man who rides her?"

I was floored. "Yes. A former Olympic rider who comes and trains us once a month." Of course Bill Fields, as experienced as he was, made it clear to Trilby what he wanted. I'm certain I was sending Trilby horribly confusing signals as I didn't really understand the dressage lessons myself.

Dawn gave me suggestions about "visualizing" Trilby and I both doing exactly what I wanted. She encouraged me to do this in Trilby's stall before I rode her. Frequently, Dawn would say, "Oh, wait, she's not listening. Just a second." This seemed to fit Trilby's personality completely, as we'd often joked at the barn that if Trilby were a person, she'd be a sophomore cheerleader with ADD! I wish I'd been able to see Trilby while Dawn communicated with her, so that I could see exactly what was distracting her during the conversation. But I had called from home and was sitting on my bed, with my cat, Montgomery curled up asleep at my feet.

We had only used half of the time so I asked Dawn if I could switch to another animal. She warmly welcomed me to do so.

"I have a cat. He's ginger and white. His name is Montgomery," I said.

Mind you, the cat was sound asleep.

As Dawn said the words, "Oh, yes, I think I've connected with him," Montgomery jumped up, puffed out his fur like a porcupine-the way cats do when they're startled-then sat down and began to purr loudly. He continued to sit at attention and purr while Dawn communicated with him.

"I think I've connected with him," she said.

"Um, yes, I think you have."

"Now, is he the only cat-" she started to ask, then immediately said, "Oh, yes, he's the only cat and he'd like you to know that he doesn't want any other cats, but he'd really like you to get him a dog."

Montgomery had spent nearly the first year of his life at Rocky Point Farm, wrestling and playing with a motley band of dog friends at a rare time of only one other barn cat (a barn cat, Henrietta, who had routinely kicked his butt).

"Well, we can't have a dog in our apartment," I said. "Is there anything else he wants?"

"Actually...he says he likes music. And you rarely play music, but Scott does, and Scott's been gone, so maybe...hmm," she said. "I think he'd like you to leave the radio on for him or put some music on. Am I getting that right? Is there a Scott?"

There was a Scott then. We have since divorced (by strange coincidence, within a year of Montgomery's death).

"That's my husband," I said, goosebumps prickling my arms. And Scott had been away for a week on a trip for work. It was true that he usually put on CDs when he was home, but when I am home alone I do not. I prefer to write in silence.

I promised to begin leaving music on for Montgomery and eagerly asked, "What else?"

She informed me his favorite toys were the birds, but that sometimes Scott and I forgot to put the birds out and he wished we'd remember. Our apartment had wide window ledges and Scott and I had purchased window feeders, which we were not very vigilant about keeping filled.

"What else?"

"Well..." I sensed an awkwardness. "He really, really likes a game you play...but I'm not sure...it's something about the bed going fast?"

I laughed. I sensed her slight embarrassment. "I know what he means and it's not that!" Actually, Montgomery was very prudish and left the room in a huff at the first sign of any romance. I explained to Dawn that my mother had made Montgomery a cat bed that he adored. Montgomery, Scott, and I often played a game of tag and Montgomery was clever enough to understand the concept of "you're it." When he wanted to play tag, he'd walked by, box you on the ankle, and take off running. If you managed to tag him, he'd reverse the game and start chasing you. He would happily play this as long as we lasted, and I'm sure it was much to his chagrin that we always were ready to quit before he was. Well, one day, Montgomery and Scott were playing tag, and Montgomery ran from Scott and dove into his cat bed. When Scott tagged him, Montgomery just looked up at him as if to say, "You can't tag me. This is safe." So Scott picked up the cat bed by the handles-with Montgomery in it-and began to spin in circles, swinging the cat bed.

"Stop it! Stop it! Put him down!" I screamed. "He's going to fall out!"

Scott did-since I was yelling at him-but Montgomery just looked up, purring, clearly delighted.

From that day on, our game of tag was changed. No more chases through the house. A box on the ankle was followed by a sprint to the cat bed, where Montgomery would brace himself into the bed and look up begging us to spin him.

I explained all this to Dawn. She laughed. "Yes, yes, that's it. And he says Scott does that better than you do."

I'm sure that was true. I was always afraid he would be flung from the bed and injured, so my spinning was very cautious.

But Dawn was able to know things that she could not be able to know any other way. Even if she had researched me before the appointment, there was no way for her to learn the information she had obtained. I became a believer.

I began to read everything I could get my hands on about animal communication. I studied the books of Penelope Smith-Animal Talk and Animals: Our Return to Wholeness. I was heartened by the shared belief of communicators that this was not some special skill for a gifted few. This was a skill anyone could acquire-or rather, re-acquire as most communicators believe that all children possess this skill, but lose it as language garners most of the praise and attention in our culture.

I attended workshops on animal communication and learned that this skill required a quiet mind and practice.

It was at one communication workshop where I heard someone tell a story of robbery that was solved by communicating with horses. A farmhouse had been robbed when neighbors called the night watchman to tell him that horses were loose on the road. After the watchman rounded up the three horses, he returned to find the house and safe broken into. When the owner-a communicator-returned, she asked which three horses had been loose, and then "asked" them who had let them out. She received the same image from all three horses-a relatively new barn employee. When police questioned this employee, he confessed in minutes.

This story first gave me the inkling that animal communication certainly had story potential. This same summer was the summer of the O.J.Simpson trial, and I was intrigued by the report of Nicole Simpson's howling dog the night of the murder. I became fascinated by the idea that what if the only witness to a crime or mystery was a non-human animal? Was there a way to glean the information, the eyewitness account, from that animal?
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HOW CAN I FIND AN ANIMAL COMMUNICATOR?
Penelope Smith's website animaltalk.net includes a state-by-state directory of communicators who have trained with her. This field is gaining more respect and awareness and now several nonfiction books are available to give you more information. Again, I recommend Penelope Smith's books, Animal Talk and Animals: Our Return to Wholeness.
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WHEN AND HOW DO YOU WRITE?
I teach full-time, so it's a constant struggle to carve out writing time. A routine is absolutely crucial for me to make any progress. I write Saturday and Sunday mornings for about three hours, and I used to designate two nights per week as "writing nights." On writing nights, I didn't work out, I didn't make dinner, I didn't make social plans—I just came home and wrote. But, any of you who are teachers know full well that if you've done your job well at all, then at the end of a school day, you are spent. My evenings were never as productive as morning time, so I decided to readjust my schedule: during the school year, I now get up at 5 AM and write for two hours before the school day (this is made all the easier since I moved four minutes from school!). I always wake up eager to write, but the hard part is making myself go to bed earlier. I feel like a zombie by the end of the week, but it's well worth it; I get much more done in those two hours in the morning than I do in four evening hours after a school day.

In the summers, when school is out, I write every weekday morning for about three hours. Mornings are my best writing times. The morning hours are always more productive than hours in the evening.

I don't need anything to write except silence and my computer, but my ideal writing mornings include good coffee, dark chocolate, and fresh flowers in view.
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WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO ASPIRING WRITERS?
To write your book. I don't mean to be flippant, but there's a great Isaac Asimov quote: "It's the writing that teaches you." Once you have a story actually on paper, you can then begin to edit and revise and learn from it. As long as you're talking about a story as an abstract idea, you've got nothing.

Also, start writing NOW. Don't wait for some ideal day when you're going to have a giant chunk of time fall into your lap. If your life is anything like mine, then that's never going to happen! I wrote the first draft of Traveling Light in two hour slots on Saturdays over the course of two years. I told myself that every single Saturday of my life, I could find two hours that were mine that I could carve out as writing time. It was difficult, and sometimes those two hours were found in the wee, wee hours, but I did it. A few Saturdays fell on holidays so I "made up" those hours on other days.

Soon, I discovered those two hours a week were not enough and I became more creative and flexible at finding more time. I compare it to being in love. You know when you meet someone new and you're in that breathless, exhilarating, all-consuming stage of a crush? You will do anything--rearrange schedules, skimp on sleep, overcome impossible logistics--to be with that beloved person? Well, you need to feel that passionate about what you're writing. If you're not (if I'm not, anyway), you shouldn't be writing this particular story.
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IS THE RESTAURANT EL MESON REAL OR FICTIONAL?
Lucky for you, it is real, and if you haven't been there you should do yourself a favor and go as soon as you can! This is the restaurant Summer and Jacob go to in Traveling Light. In The Kindness of Strangers, Courtney and Sarah go there in the first chapter. It is my favorite restaurant of all time, and I was honored when El Meson hosted a reception for the release of Kindness. Check it out for yourself at www.elmeson.net

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