We really enjoyed hearing from Lev today, and if you are a F.AVE student, you can go to your media center classroom and watch the recorded visit! He shared that as a kid he really wanted to be an artist, but realized that he lacked the natural artistic ability to follow through with this. In fact, he said that he wasn't really good at much as a kid, EXCEPT READING. And reading led to writing, as it often does. He loved reading books that took him to fantastic places like the Narnia series by C.S. Lewis, and James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl.
His idea for The Silver Arrow grew out of two things. He told a similar story to his children, which began as a way to stop them from fighting all the time. He also said that he had this picture in his head of a girl in a cozy train car, and that started him thinking. Who is this girl? Why was she in this train car? Ultimately, he decided to add animal characters to his story because he loved the fantasy animals from his favorite kids' books. He thought a long time about what kinds of animals he would use and what their personalities would be. He chose very specific creatures like the pangolin and the eastern green mamba, animals that need a bit of reputation rebuilding. His book also has themes of how humans have affected these animals, and what we can do better to help them.
Thank you so much to Lev Grossman for sharing your time with our 3rd graders today! We learned a good bit about animals, why you can't turn steam trains upside down, and how to be a writer.
Students, if you want to order an autographed copy of The Silver Arrow, you have until Friday, September 17th to turn in your money and order forms.
Stay tuned for our next author visit blog post tomorrow...Newbery Honor winner Veera Hiranandani is visiting with 4th grade!