Pilar Quintana at the Bay Area Festival

Pilar Quintana
Foto Danilo Costa Cangucu
Revista Semana

Craft Chats: A Child’s Perspective

As Sadie Jones has written, “Writing is a leap of faith, and never more so than when writing childhood.” It’s undeniable that we were all once children, but that doesn’t mean it’s child’s play for writers to center the voice and perspective of a child or teen without veering into oversimplification or preciousness. In this craft-focused session facilitated by Ethel Rohan, author of the collection In the Event of Contact, we’ll engage with the works of three writers who excel at the task, first doing a close reading of specific passages and then learning more about how that youthful perspective informs the totality of the work. In Keenan Norris’s new novella, Lustre, a boy named Lustre Little is haunted by the violence of his hometown, the California desert city of San Suerte. In Stealing, Pulitzer Prize finalist Margaret Verble also portrays a child, nine-year-old Kit, who is an indirect victim of violence, when an adult’s misunderstanding, compounded by racism, sends the Cherokee girl to an abusive boarding school. And in Abyss, Colombian writer Pilar Quintana introduces readers to eight-year-old Claudia, whose perceptive observations capture delights but also hint at looming troubles. Whether you’re a writer trying to capture a credible perspective and voice, or whether you’re a reader eager to gain a deeper understanding of the writer’s craft, this session is certain to expand your own perspective.