San Diego - Karen Cushman

Karen Cushman

June 2, 2022June 2, 2022 by Karen Cushman

Writing a Book with a Strong Sense of Location or Place

Karen Cushman asked a number of authors, “My newest book, War and Millie McGonigle, started with a place: South Mission Beach, San Diego, where my husband grew up. You, too, have written books set in a place alive and rich. A number of gracious authors thoughtfully answered these questions. If you haven’t read them yet, please do. Now it’s Karen’s turn to share some insights into place in her own story, War and Millie McGonigle.“

Q: Did you choose the setting first, before characters and plot? Did the story grow from the place or did the place grow from the story?

Cushman: The setting—South Mission Beach, San Diego—inspired the book. For nearly fifty years I’ve heard Phil’s stories about growing up there. It seemed a peaceful and comforting sort of place, so its juxtaposition with the coming war was intriguing.

Q: How/where did you find the details that brought your place to life?

Cushman: A lot of research is how. The publications of the San Diego History Center were invaluable. eBay provided specialty items like an old history of the San Diego Zoo, a 1940(ish) Zoo tour guide, photos of polio patients in iron lungs, and a plane-spotting manual. The internet offered memoirs of the war years by San Diegans, photos of wartime downtown San Diego, and a wonderful, colorful, 1940s map of the area. While I was writing, Philip and I visited San Diego and walked along the bay with its soft waves and gentle splashing.

Q: Did the place enrich the story, or did it create limitations? Did you have to change details about the place?

Cushman: The place was the heart of the story, and, yes, it did create limitations. It’s a real place with a real history. I couldn’t create a bridge where there wasn’t a bridge in 1941 or sail warships into Mission Bay. I had to change some things about 2020 Mission Bay to make them more accurate or realistic for 1941.

Q: What would you like us to know about the place you chose for your book?

Cushman: The Mission Beach and Mission Bay where Phil grew up don’t exist any more. Since his time, Mission Bay was dredged, redesigned, and developed into a splendid resort with hotels and restaurants and multi-million-dollar houses. And countless tourists. Milly would not recognize it, but the tides still come and go, seagulls still shriek, and the breeze off the ocean can still soften the air and the spirit.

You’ll find a slideshow with photos from Phil’s childhood on South Mission Beach here.

______________________________

War and Millie McGonigle #4

October 12, 2021March 11, 2021 by Karen Cushman

You’re not old enough to remember 1941, the year in which War and Millie McGonigle is set. Of course, you weren’t old enough to remember the time periods for your medieval books, either. What was there about Millie’s time that made you want to write about it?

My experience of the war is mostly second hand—my Uncle Chester’s stories about fighting in the South Pacific, my father’s struggles to find tires and gas for the car, my mother’s complaints about rationing. Until the day she died, my mother grumbled about how many ration coupons I used up for the shoes I kept outgrowing. I wanted to know more about their struggles, challenges, worries. What would it be like to live in a time of such constant fear, deprivation, and uncertainty?

War and Millie McGonigle #2

June 23, 2022March 4, 2021 by Karen Cushman

Your book is full of the details that make 1941 in San Diego, California, so authentic. Mission Beach, Northern Tissue splinter-free toilet paper, Jungle Gardenia. What type of research did you do, which sources did you use, to help young readers connect to this place and time? Did you have to look up each product mention to make sure it was available in 1941?

There are many pieces to Millie’s story, and I had a lot to learn.

The internet helped me with 1940s slang, music, food, and fashions. People wrote about and posted their memories of Pearl Harbor. I accessed headlines from The San Diego Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, and back issues of The San Diego Historical Society quarterly history journal online.

I used the volumes Mission Beach, Pacific Beach, La Jolla, The Navy Comes to San Diego, and Surfing in San Diego from the invaluable Images Of America series by Arcadia Publishing. Titles such as Daddy’s Gone to War, William M. Tuttle, Jr; “War Comes to San Diego” from the San Diego Historical Society; and Peg Kehret’s memoir, Small Steps: The Year I Got Polio made history personal. Two pamphlets, Official Guide to the San Diego Zoo, 1947, and the Coca Cola Company’s Know Your Planes, I found on eBay.

But by far the most important and richest resource was traveling to San Diego and walking on Bayside Walk in South Mission, watching the waves on the bay, imagining the mudflats, hearing seagulls and waves breaking on the ocean side, and listening to Phil’s stories and memories. That all made Millie’s story truer and much richer.

Yes, I checked on every product I mention to make sure it was available and named correctly. I found that Cheerios in 1941 were CheeriOats, though Jello was Jello. The reference to Northern Tissues splinter free toilet paper was pure serendipity so I had to include it. Jungle Gardenia was the heady, exotic fragrance I wore in college and I was pleased to see it would have been around in 1941 for Cousin Edna.

War and Millie McGonigle #1

June 23, 2022March 2, 2021 by Karen Cushman

How did the idea for Millie’s Book of Dead Things come to you?

Haunted by her Gram’s death and the looming war, Millie became fascinated with death and dying. I wanted to give her a way to achieve some control over a scary, gloomy world. Thus The Book of Dead Things, a concrete manifestation of her obsession. Why a book? Because I was the kind of kid who made lists in a notebook to help me keep track of my world: best books, favorite singers vs. singers I hated, handsomest movie stars, good teachers vs. bad teachers, clothes I’d like to wear when I grew up. I still have a notebook with lists of suggested plots for Elvis movies.

The Book of Dead Things also felt like a metaphor for the troubled, frightened, worried Millie before she felt the courage to accept and embrace what was good in the world. The Book became an integral part of Millie’s story and her growth.

FAQ #6: Research

August 31, 2021May 24, 2018 by Karen Cushman

What’s your favorite part of researching a book you’re writing?

I like the early research that give the flavor of a time, a few interesting facts, and a place for me to stand.

It gets harder later when I search for specifics such as, “Was there mail delivery at Mission Beach, San Diego, 1941?” Never did find that answer. Do you know?

Glad You Asked, Q1

August 31, 2021March 23, 2017 by Karen Cushman

Are you working on a new manuscript?

I’m struggling my way through a book set in San Diego in 1941, shortly before Pearl Harbor. Here’s the beginning, or the beginning at the moment:

Jorge lifted the slimy creature to his lips and bit it right between the eyes.

I shuddered as I watched. “Doesn’t that taste muddy and disgusting?”

“Nah,” he said, wiping mud from his mouth. “Is only salty. This way they don’t die but only sleep, stay fresh.” He threw the octopus into a bucket and slipped through the mud flats to another hole in the muck. He filled a baster from a mud-spattered Clorox bottle and squirted the bleach into a hole. When the occupant slithered to the surface, Jorge pulled it out and bit it, too. “You want? Make good stew.”

I shook my head. I preferred fish that came in cans and was mixed with mayo and chopped celery.

San Diego's Santa Fe train station — San Diego’s Santa Fe train station 1940s

We went to the Zoo

August 31, 2021September 2, 2014 by Karen Cushman

In San Diego for a memorial for Frances Cushman, Philip, Leah, and I hung out with the other wild animals at the San Diego Zoo. If you ever get a chance to go, go!

It was very hot and most of the animals were asleep or finding shade, but here are some favorites. First up, koalas!