 About Joan Lowery Nixon by Kelly Milner Halls Adult Published Read an Excerpt ORPHAN TRAIN author Joan Lowery Nixon trained at USC as a journalist, but found her true calling in children's books. This interview explores her rise to success. Excerpt JOAN LOWRY NIXON INTERVIEW by Kelly Milner Halls For years, Joan Lowry Nixon practiced her craft far removed from the novels of suspense (THE HAUNTING) and historical fiction (ORPHAN TRAIN) for which she's become famous. Nixon sold her first written work to Foreign Times Magazine -- nonfiction -- when she was only 17. With clear promise, she went on to study journalism at the University of Southern California, and freelanced for such newsstand familiars as Woman's Day and Parents for better than 15 years. True, she admits in a clear soft tone. "But I was always a writer. I wrote from the time I can remember. In fact, I used to dictate before I was old enough to read or sign my name." After Nixon married and gave birth to four children, she gave up her writing to focus on raising a family. She moved with her husband from sunny Southern California to sunny far-south Corpus Christie -- Texas, that is. And Texas was where the young reader mysteries began to unfold. "I went to my first writer's conference," she remembers, "and I was really impressed because I heard two people speak about writing for children. Two of my daughters, Kathy and Maureen were in elementary school at the time. Those daughters cast Nixon's mysterious fate. "They came to me and said, 'We've decided if you have to write a book, it has to be a mystery, and you have to put us in it." Carving stolen time -- one day a week -- from her domestic commitments, Nixon renewed her freelance career, writing for Teen Magazine, and dipped her toe into destiny. She started the mystery, as her girls had commanded. "I told my mother I was really going to work hard to get back into writing," Nixon says. As a show of support, her mother promised to underwrite baby sitting expenses to help free-up that solitary -- for a year. "Six months later, I called to tell her I could afford to pay for the baby sitter myself," Nixon confesses. "But she refused. She said a promise was a promise, and she covered the cost for one full year." Did Nixon find the time to write anything saleable during that 24-hour respite? Was she able to polish and perfect the work in only one day? "You never FIND time," Nixon insists. "You MAKE time. My husband helped. But the truth is, I made time because it was important to me." The fruit of that labor, Nixon's first book, THE MYSTERY OF HURRICANE CASTLE was published by Criterion, but only after it was rejected by 12 other houses. "I knew it was a good book," Nixon says. "So I didn't give up. I'd written long enough to know I had talent. And I'd read so much, I knew I'd done things right. I also knew I had a good story -- it hit the right notes with all my own children." Critical readers, her daughters offered tempered advice. "I'd read what I'd written to my kids as I went along," Nixon remembers. "And Kathy would say, 'It's been too scary, too long. Put in something funny.' She actually taught me about pacing." Was THE MYSTERY OF HURRICANE CASTLE a success? "That particular book went into paperback reprints with another company," according to Nixon. "It became a 'Calling All Girls' book club selection, and was eventually bought and used for the reading program called SRA. It did very well." But Nixon admits it was some time before she contributed significantly to the family budget. "My income kept building," she says. "And some ten or fifteen years later, I was making a big addition to the family income. Then, another number or years later, I was a financial success. For a while, I taught writing and there were always people who were going to give up a day job when they got that first contract. I always tried to discourage that." With more than 140 books, four Edgar Allan Poe Best Juvenile Mystery Awards, many Children's Choice Awards, the California Young Reader Medal, and a one year stint as President of the Mystery Writers of America under her belt, Joan Lowery Nixon, now lives near Houston, but doesn't worry much about success. She worries instead about teen mothers. "In 1992, Bantam Doubleday Dell sent me on a book tour. One of the first places I went was the Philadelphia public library down town. It was a program for teen mothers and their babies." Nixon admits she felt like a fish out of water at the presentation, but she noticed something about the young mothers that frightened her. "One of the girls scared me," Nixon says. "She was speaking to the girl next to me, who's baby was a toddler, babbling away. She said, 'You gotta learn to keep him quiet. If you don't whomp him, he won't stay quiet.' I was so disturbed." The children's author anguished over how to reach the misdirected young mothers. She decided to try and break bad parenting habits generations in the making. "I decided I would write a book," Nixon says. "But I realized they probably wouldn't pick up a child care book written for adults." A second author was teaching the young mothers how to read to their infants, and Nixon noticed both mother and child stayed tuned in. "They really paid attention, she said. "And so did I." Inspired, she wrote MY BABY, a child care guide in picture book format. And she fought to make it available to young mothers, without charge. "I called a reporter who had written an article about children at risk. He helped me make the right contacts. Under the umbrella of the Houston Mental Health Association, we published 100,000 copies in English and 25,000 in Spanish." Houston health and law enforcement agencies asked Nixon to write a second book on how to discipline children, "So that's what we're doing now," she says. "I have had to raise $43,000 to do it. And I'm hoping we'll raise more money, so we can do them in Spanish as well." Finding the time for such an ambitious act of charity might seem impossible. But Nixon finds a way. "We make time for what counts, she says. "My novels, this teen mother project and my work for the Mystery Writers of America on behalf of teaching illiterate adults to read are all important to me. So I always find a way." |
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