{"id":2926,"date":"2013-02-03T23:44:31","date_gmt":"2013-02-03T23:44:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dianeduane.com\/outofambit\/?p=2926"},"modified":"2013-03-20T08:40:55","modified_gmt":"2013-03-20T08:40:55","slug":"new-childrens-young-adult-fiction-from-diane-duane-uchennas-apples","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dianeduane.com\/outofambit\/2013\/02\/03\/new-childrens-young-adult-fiction-from-diane-duane-uchennas-apples\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Uchenna&#8217;s Apples&#8221;: New children&#8217;s \/ young adult fiction from Diane Duane"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"float: right; margin: 0px 0px 15px 15px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/ebooksdirect.dianeduane.com\/products\/uchennas-apples\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cover for Diane Duane's children's novel 'Uchenna's Apples'\" src=\"http:\/\/www.dianeduane.com\/images\/Uchennas_Apples_cover_450x300.jpg\" \/><br \/>\n<\/a><br \/>\n<center><iframe src=\"http:\/\/widgets.shopifyapps.com\/products\/uchennas-apples?shop=dianeduane.myshopify.com&amp;style=buy_now&amp;product-variant-id=273446876&amp;destination=checkout\" height=\"24\" width=\"90\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/center><\/div>\n<p>Writing projects sometimes get started in unusual ways.<\/p>\n<p>Some time back in early 2007 I was chatting electronically with an old friend and former neighbor, the gifted Somtow Sucharitkul \u2014 a splendid writer and (at least) equally splendid musician and composer, now the artistic director of the Bangkok Opera. And somewhere along the line, Somtow said to me: \u201cWant to write a children\u2019s book?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I couldn\u2019t see why on Earth not.<\/p>\n<p>Somtow put me in touch with a charming Geneva-based lady named Beth Krasna.\u00a0 She was working with UNESCO on a series of children\u2019s \/ young adult short novels that were meant to illustrate what the experience of childhood was in various different countries. Beth and I discussed the project for a while, and after more than twenty years spent living in Ireland, I thought I had enough background on the subject \u2014 especially through watching nearly a generation of the neighbors\u2019 children grow up,and spending a lot of time talking to them \u2014 to tackle the subject.<\/p>\n<p>The concept was of even greater interest to me than than usual because of how different a place Ireland has become over the last twenty years. The apparent miracle of the \u201cCeltic Tiger\u201d brought people from all over the world to work in Ireland, and Irish society found itself faced with the need to become multicultural in a big hurry. This need (as you might guess) was never going to be perfectly met. When so small an island, far more used to periodic emigration, suddenly has to absorb large numbers of immigrating people from cultures and ethnicities that in many cases had never been seen here before, there were always going to be problems with retooling the national infrastructure to cope. And when the people who\u2019ve always lived in such a place\u2014long poor and isolated and used to thinking of itself as \u201chard done by\u201d\u2014suddenly find their home culture apparently under siege by an army of work-seeking foreigners who\u2019ve brought their own cultures with them, the local atmosphere can become unusually challenging.<\/p>\n<p>All of this was on my mind when I started planning the book. So when the <em>protagoniste<\/em> turned up on the creative doorstep one morning, it didn\u2019t surprise me at all to find that she was the daughter of a Nigerian professional and her native Irish husband. Uchenna and her buddies\u2014a single-parented American immigrant named Emer, and a youngster from the Irish Traveling community named Jimmy\u2014shortly grabbed me and walked me into a tale of the changing Dublin suburbs &#8212; though one that developed a touch of mystery as it unfolded. As I worked, my younger neighbors were glad to fill me in on some of the fine points when I had questions about details. Other matters I didn\u2019t have to query: anyone who\u2019s lived here long enough can feel the tension of the Ireland that<em> is<\/em> as it strains against the memories and expectations of the Ireland that <em>was.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I wrote the book between 2007 and 2008 and turned it in. To the general disappointment of Beth and myself, the economic madness that started in 2008 and got steadily worse thereafter meant that a print publisher couldn\u2019t be found. The contract ran its course, and the rights for the book recently became unencumbered and returned to me.<\/p>\n<p>So here it is now for you to read as an ebook, in all the major formats. (Print publication will follow later in the year.)\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Enjoy!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Writing projects sometimes get started in unusual ways. Some time back in early 2007 I was chatting electronically with an old friend and former neighbor, the gifted Somtow Sucharitkul \u2014&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[23,24,26,39,70],"tags":[191],"class_list":["post-2926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ebooks","category-ebooks-direct","category-europe","category-ireland","category-writing","tag-diane-duane"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>&quot;Uchenna&#039;s Apples&quot;: new children&#039;s \/ young adult fiction from Diane Duane<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The new children&#039;s novel from NY Times bestselling author Diane Duane. 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