CHRIST
IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith for the Years of Winter… ©
I
have known that daughter Katie was an excellent writer since at least her fourth
grade year. At that time, I was the Teaching/Administrative Asst. to James
Spalding, the Director of The Iowa School of Religion, while doing doctoral
work at the U of IA. One night I was grading papers for one of his university
courses after reading an essay Katie had written for a class as Longfellow
Elementary. I thought, “Good grief, my fourth grade daughter is a better writer
than these university students.”
With
the release of Katie’s debut YA [Young Adult] novel, Learning to Swear In America, now everyone knows what I knew then:
she’s a terrific writer.
Katie
was once a YA herself, and as a student at IU became the BSF [Best Student
Forever] of Dr. Robert H. Ferrell, Distinguished Professor of History at
Indiana U, now retired.
Dr.
Ferrell was rightly amazed at the writing ability of such a young person.
“Where did you learn to write like this?” he asked her. “From my father,” she
replied. “And where did he learn to write?” he asked. “From you,” she sweetly
replied. He liked that. [I was a History major at IU from 1955-59, when Dr.
Ferrell was a new young professor.]
The
summer after Katie graduated, Dr. Ferrell taught a course at Eastern Illinois
University, in Charleston. We lived there at the time, so Helen and I audited
the course. When Prof. Ferrell learned we were Katie’s parents, he was
ecstatic. Every day he started class telling stories about how to be a good
student, using Katie as his example.
In
the class was Bob Ubriaco, who looked and talked like he should be working on a
garbage truck instead of working on a master’s degree. [Looks can be deceiving;
he was an excellent student.]
After
getting his MA at EIU that summer, he matriculated at the U of Illinois for his
doctorate. Katie also started her doctoral work at the U of IL that fall. The
first day of classes, a professor had each of the students do a
self-introduction. Upon hearing an exceptionally pretty and sweet curly-haired
blond say “I’m Katie McFarland,” Bob Ubriaco yelled from the back row, “I hate
you!”
Katie
said she knew that the McFarland name could evoke strong responses, especially
if it were preceded by “John,” but that was the strangest reaction she had
encountered. [1] She was even more chagrined when she learned that the
disgusted shouter, while not being all that thrilled with her father, or even
her mother, since their presence in that EIU class had brought forth the paeans
from Dr. Ferrell about her, was really and actually aiming his disgust at her.
“All
summer at EIU I heard nothing except how wonderful Katie McFarland is, and now
you’re here, too,” he yelled. “I hate you and I’ve never even met you.”
Of
course, they became good friends.
There
are a lot of morals to be learned from this story, but grandson Joe says, “Kids
don’t want morals. We just want a good story.” Isn’t that true for everybody?
That is why his mother is such a good story-teller, she writes for her
children, and kids just want good stories. If you tell a story well enough, the
“moral” will be there for the taking.
So,
no moral, but everyone thinks that Learning
to Swear in America is a pretty good story. [2]
JRMcF
johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com
I
tweet as yooper1721.
1]
Our son by reverse adoption, meaning he adopted us, Len Kirkpatrick, is an
Illinois state trooper. He once stopped old friend and colleague, Burt
McIntosh, for speeding. When Len learned Burt was a UM preacher, he asked him
if he knew me. Burt said, “My immediate reaction was, will it help me or hurt
me if I admit I know him?” [Yes, I’ve told this story before.]
2]
Russian boy genius Yuri Strelnikov is a 17 year old with a PhD in Physics. The
Americans recruit him when they discover an asteroid is blazing toward earth on
a collision course with Los Angeles, where NASA has assembled the best and
brightest to figure a way out of this deadly impact. Yuri has only a few days
to work the math, find a solution, and then convince those much older to accept
his anti-matter plan. He meets the quirky teen girl, Dovie, and her equally
quirky family, and finds there are more reasons to save the earth than just winning
a Nobel Prize.
So
goes Katie Kennedy’s marvelous Learning
to Swear in America, published by Bloomsbury, which also publishes lesser
authors, like JK Rowling. It has received a rare star review from Publisher’s Weekly and another star
review from BCCB [Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books]. It’s on
B&N’s, Bustle’s, and PopCrush’s “Most Anticipated” list, and Goodreads
“Best New for the Month” list. An IndieNext pick. Available in print, audio,
and e-book, from your friendly independent book store, Barnes & Noble,
Amazon, etc. It is Amazon’s “Best Book of July.”
