 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
 |
Back to Featured Interviews >> MEET HELEN FOSTER JAMES
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
 |
| Helen Foster James |
I’m the author of S IS FOR S’MORES: A Camping Alphabet. I started researching the book when I was four years old—when I went on my first camping trip! Since that time, I have been on more than one hundred camping trips including backpacking down (and up!) the Grand Canyon, hiking to the top of Sierra Mountain passes, and canoeing down the Colorado River. I even met my husband Bob on a camping trip on Catalina Island.
Have any of your books earned special recognition?
I'm also the author of E IS FOR ENCHANTMENT: A New Mexico Alphabet (published by Sleeping Bear Press) illustrated by Neecy Twinem. I received a WILLA Literary Finalist award from Women Writing the West for E is for Enchantment. It was named to the Land of Enchantment Booklist for 2006-2007 and selected by the New Mexico Library Association as their “Legislative Gift Book” for 2007.
What other jobs have you had before you became a writer/illustrator?
I have been an educator for over 25 years as a coordinator of library media services, elementary teacher, media specialist, and as a teacher of children’s literature and supervisor of student teachers. I received my doctorate in Educational Administration from Northern Arizona University. I recently received an award from the California Reading Association for my contributions to literacy.
What was your first job when you graduated from college?
I graduated and received a teaching credential, but then I became a manager of a Pizza Hut! I think I should write a book about pizza . . .I've made plenty of them!
When is your next book going to be in book stores?
I’m currently working on a manuscript about California. It will be published in 2010 by Sleeping Bear Press. It will be a nonfiction, chapter book with stories about California.
What do you most want the students to get out of your school visits?
I’m a former teacher so I love doing school and library visits. I hope students who meet with me will have read or heard my book(s) before my visit and I hope they’ll have questions for me about writing. I like to tell students how a book moves from an idea in an author’s mind to a finished book. I even like to tell a couple camping knock knock jokes. I was a first grade teacher when I met my first author, Clyde Robert Bulla. I know it was a thrill for me to meet a “real live” author. I wish I would have had the opportunity to meet an author when I was a child. I think it would have been a real inspiration to me. I loved to read when I was a child and was always writing and constructing books. So, I always hope that when I visit I’ll be able to inspire students to read and write.
What books influenced you most when you were growing up?
I will always remember that my fourth grade teacher read us STUART LITTLE and THE BOXCAR CHILDREN. I loved my fifth grade teacher and she read ISLAND OF THE BLUE DOLPHINS and I was a BIG Nancy Drew fan!
Is there anything about yourself that you’d like to share - hobbies,where you were born, special talents other than writing/illustrating.
I’m a native San Diegan. My home is in Pacific Beach and I have a cabin in the San Diego mountains in Mount Laguna where I can hear coyotes serenade the moon. I enjoy watching raccoons, woodpeckers, wild turkey, deer, fox, and other wildlife outside my cabin’s windows. I write a column for the California Reading Association’s journal called “About the Cover.” When I’m not camping, hiking, and hanging out on Sail Bay in San Diego, you can find me reading, writing, watching movies, and planning my next travel adventure.