Hello er. How do you doing. Absolutely fantastic. How are you doing
today? I am well and really excited to be here. I'm excited to
talk with you too, because my entire life I always wanted to have an
Ivan and to have stories like this. You give us Ivan in our hearts.
Oh that's very kind to do this, though. I mean, you've
got to be able to understand the mindset, because there are so many times
in reading the book that it's like, oh my god, I didn't know
that gorillas have the same emotional things that we go through. I just we
just know them as what we assume. We know very true. But you
know what's interesting I have found I've written a lot of animal characters. I've
written trees for that matter, and it's always there's always a degree of anthropomorphism.
You're you're leaping into the head of a different species, and no matter
how much research you do, there's a big chasm there. And I do
my best to try to integrate facts where I can, but of course I'm
fictionalizing too, and it's a delicate balancing act. I think, Oh,
I got to tell you what when you spoke about writing about trees. I
live in a forest. We're the ones that planted these seventeen hundred trees,
And I mean, I would love to walk through this forest with you and
show you all the different ones and have the personality are willing to care.
And I think that's what I find in your stories. I mean, I
mean, even look at the character names Ivan, Ruby, Bob. He's
like, oh my god, you're so down to earth. My own dog's
name was Stan. Bob was based on Stan, and so what that tells
you where the names come from. Don't you think that Ivan represents so many
fathers today with the love and even admitting that it's a little bit difficult,
but there's still that family togetherness there. Yeah, I'm glad you picked up
on that. I think when I went to write this, I thought it
was going to be just nothing, but you know, ram anxious fun because
it's toddler gorillas. How can you go wrong? But it turned out that
the very complications that we all struggle with as human parents were conflicts that I
even't had to deal with as well. For example, do you tell your
kids they may never ever see real freedom? And you know, our human
version of that is, how do we deal with climate change? For example,
how much do we tell our kids. Kids, you know, pick
up on things they understand so much more than we get them credit for,
and Ivan has to kind of work through that. Yeah, when you were
creating the characters, did you come up with baby voices? Because my dog
speaks to me in the voice that I hear in my head. That's the
way I look at and she probably has a big bear tone voice or something
no no in my head. Once Danny DeVito had played Bob in the movie
and done the audiobook, Stan sounded like Danny DeVito forever after that. But
yeah, Ruby, absolutely. I've talked to teachers who do I'm not very
good at at myself, but who do amazing voices as they're reading. And
Ruby is always fun because she's just so silly and you know, incredibly curious.
So similarly with the two toddlers, they end up being quite a handful
and I imagine would be really fun to voice. So many authors have always
said that they try to write books that become the face of who their reader
is, and I think that you do that quite well in this one,
because we all can relate with these storylines and it's like, wow, yeah,
I get this yeah, it's the parallels with the human conditioner are hard
to ignore, and it's an interesting it's an interesting balancing act trying to get
it just right. But I think that in particular for Ivan, he has
to decide how much of his past he's going to share with his kids,
and how much of the future and his fears about the future he's going to
talk about. And you know, travelers have a way of asking questions and
being persistent, so he has to figure all that out. You bring up
a very interesting point about Ivan sharing how much of his past. That's the
one thing that I was disappointed about that my parents didn't give me their past,
and because I think where we are today is because of them. It
is so important to give your story to those in front of you so that
they know what the past was. Like, Oh, that's vital. You're
so right about that, and we hesitate, don't worry because you know,
you know, you want to protect kids, you want to keep them safe.
I just was in Virginia last week because one of my books had been
banned, and this instinct we parents have to protect our kids. Sometimes we
take too far. So it's a hard one, but I think it's very
important to share our stories because that's how kids learn. Does that give you
PTSD as an author? Because I know that when my first book was put
out, people are going, no, don't do this, and they were,
they were uneasy with what the subjects that I covered, and it gave
me PTSD and going the next book will not have this, I promise,
And I thought, what am I? Why am I keeping it away from
people? That's so funny because it's true, and those voices in your head,
the multiple editorial voices telling you what to do and not do, it's
it's it's hard to keep them at bay. I always tell kids to embrace
their weird and write from their hearts. And you know, because I'm sure
you found this to be true. Most of the illustrators and writers I know
are quirky as can be, eccentric, weird, and I mean that in
the best most affectionate way possible, and they look at the world differently.
And because they look at the world differently, they're able to write interesting stories.
So I think it's so important for kids to know that because there's so
much pressure to be just like everybody else. So how much pressure were you
on when it comes to the illustrators, because I've always had that challenge of
Okay, do I tell them the story verbally and then they can draw the
pictures, or do they have to have the story and then they get their
own interpretation. My illustrators are very, very patient human beings because I tend
to procrastinate, but at the end of the day, I defer entirely to
them. I just I can't draw a straight line myself, so that's part
of it. But mostly I just think it's such a magical experience when they
take a handful of words and turn it into these absolutely gorgeous illustrations. In
the case of Ivan, it's Patricia Castilau, who's done all four books,
lives in Portugal. I have never met her, and yet every time I
see a sketch, I'm just blown away. Wow, go about you and
to give you lots of love, especially those that are just discovering you.
They need all four of those books. Oh that's very kind. Katherine Applegate
dot com and I'm on the usual social media sites. But if you're looking
for the book, I always say start with your local indie because independent bookstores
are the hearts of our community. It's available everywhere. Yeah, and the
people inside those bookstores are real people that look just like us. They're not
trying to be fancy or anything. No, they're just amazing human beings.
Yeah. Please come back to this show anytime in the future, Catherine.
The door is always going to be open for you. Oh you're so kind.
Thanks. I had a great time. Will you'd be brilliant today?
Okay, thank you too,