CALAIS – Earlier this month, M.T. Anderson’s young adult tale, “Elf Dog and Owl Head,” was named as a Newbery Honor Book when the American Library Association announced the 2024 Youth Media Award winners.
M.T. Anderson writes of his book, ”As a young reader, I learned to stay away from animal books because I loved animals too much. Why don’t the kids ever get sent to the glue factory instead to teach the animals an important lesson about life and death?
So I determined that if I ever wrote a pet book, no animals would die. Now I’ve written a pet book – happy ending, don’t worry, smiles and face licks all round – and I’ve been thinking a lot about why pet books are both a genre that’s often trivialized or dismissed, and a genre that may be some of the most important writing there is.”
He continues, “I wrote a dog book, “Elf Dog & Owl Head,” a fantasy about a boy trapped alone in Vermont during the pandemic with no real companion but a magical dog – because, during the pandemic, I was trapped alone in Vermont with no real companion but a magical dog. It was basically my own story, except for the owl-headed people.”
Anderson shared thoughts about writing his award winning young adult fiction tale, noting, “People like to talk about how writing is hard. Usually it is. In this case, though, it was a total pleasure. I have never had such an easy time writing a book, and oddly despite that, I think it was one of the best and purest things I’ve ever written. My editor Liz Bicknell noted, “It’s the first book of yours that’s entirely devoid of irony.” It’s just filled with pure love.”
M.T. Anderson spent the pandemic in a Calais home built in 1796, where his award winning book was written.
The 2024 John Newbery Medal winner for the most outstanding contribution to children’s literature was “The Eyes and the Impossible,” written by Dave Eggers. Newbery Honor awards are given to authors of other distinguished children’s books that came out that year.
Paul Fixx is editor of The Hardwick Gazette and lives in Hardwick.
