Visiting authors prove books still hold magic (w/video)

When Riley Kuhlman learned he would share lunch with the author of a dragon-themed book series he stumbled upon several months ago, the seventh-grader was in shock.

“I was pretty excited,” Riley told the Herald on Thursday, taking a minute to collect himself while helping Tui Sutherland sign bookmarks for other students at Enterprise Middle School. “I’m overwhelmed. It was really cool.”

Sutherland and 15 other authors are in the Tri-Cities this week ahead of Friday’s Cavalcade of Authors student conference at Columbia Basin College. They were also scheduled to appear publicly at Barnes & Nobles Booksellers Thursday in Kennewick and visited to area schools and libraries.

In an age where mobile devices, social media and celebrity news appear to dominate youth culture, it’s more important than ever to encourage students in their own creativity, Cavalcade organizers and Sutherland said.

And it’s the enthusiasm of students like Riley that make event worth doing. “It’s exciting to be able to meet kids who think of authors as rock stars,” Sutherland said.

Sutherland didn’t get to meet any of her favorite authors as a child. Born in Venezuela and spending much of her youth in South America, she didn’t have access to many English-language books outside her family’s home. But she started writing early on, often crafting stories with her sister Kari in mind.

She went into editing for a children’s imprint of publisher Penguin in New York City after college and often got to play a big role in the books published, even writing one in an easy-to-read series as well as a biography on illusionist Harry Houdini in an autobiography series.

“It was a lot of brainstorming, very creative work,” Sutherland said.

She started writing full time in 2006 and has largely stuck with fantasy, partly because that’s what she liked to read when she was a child. But her books, while aimed at elementary and middle school-aged kids, draw from her current life, such as the series Riley likes, Wings of Fire.

“It’s secretly about parenting,” Sutherland said, noting that there are some terrible dragon parents in the book, manifestations of her fears as she began raising her first child.

Sutherland will about talk character development with students during the Cavalcade event, saying that’s where she starts when working on a new book. She said she’s always encouraged fans of her books to write. That’s especially important with kids who may struggle in school, which many authors did themselves.

“(Kids) have so much creativity in them and I want them to know they can do anything with it,” Sutherland said.

Michelle Lane, the Enterprise librarian who has organized Cavalcade for the past eight years, said that being able to read a favorite author or talk about their craft with them are big motivators for students. Riley’s lunch with Sutherland was a reward for progress he’s made on his grades and class attendance.

At the same time, Cavalcade does take a lot of work and money, because authors usually receive a stipend and have their expenses covered. Other challenges are negotiating school and bus schedules.

“But the minute we walk on the (CBC) campus and hear these kids screaming, ‘This is the best thing ever,’ it just rejuvenates us,” Lane said.

During a quiet moment between bookmark signings, Riley told Sutherland that he’d considered writing.

“I tried it before. I was in third grade. It was really weird,” he said.

“Weird is good for writers,” Sutherland told him. “You should totally be a writer,” adding she’d love to see whatever he wrote.

This story was originally published March 10, 2016 at 5:26 PM with the headline "Visiting authors prove books still hold magic (w/video)."