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SNEAKS-A Twisty Middle Grade Mystery: Interview with Author Amy Tern--By Julie Phend

Sneaks is a twisty middle grade mystery by debut author Amy Tern released by Holiday House this summer. I’m excited to interview Amy for the GROG blog.

Author Amy Tern

First, a little about the book:

Rook, a sheltered musical prodigy, couldn’t be more different from Valorie, the troublemaking daughter of his family’s cleaning woman. But their strengths complement each other when they team up to solve the mystery of a piano-playing child hidden in an apartment across the street. Spying from the balcony, Rook and Valorie are alarmed by the strange woman who goes out to buy pizza at the exact same time each day, a child’s simple piano tunes played only when the woman is gone, and a discarded doll whose head has been ripped off. Sensing danger, Rook and Valory try to alert their elders, but no one takes them seriously. As they investigate on their own, they discover important things about themselves, their families, and the assumptions they’ve made.

This tightly plotted mystery keeps the reader guessing to the very end. Amy’s memorable characters and quirky humor make Sneaks a very fun, enjoyable read!

We’re so glad to have you as a guest on the GROG Blog, Amy. Tell us a little about yourself and your writing career.

Amy: I grew up in Colorado, taking the mountains for granted. My heart was in other magical places—Narnia, snowbound Canada, Britain with its moors and tea, and that most wondrous place of all, the Past. Little did I know I was living in the old days myself, and deprived of computers and video games, I wrote and illustrated my own books—mostly featuring animal characters because I could draw them better. I continued to write fiction until college. There, I took a creative writing workshop where I was convinced by a bunch of creatively dressed classmates that my writing wasn’t very sophisticated. Experimental fiction was in style, and I didn’t fit in very well. After college, I mostly quit creative writing because I was distracted by having to earn a living. Much later, when I had my own family, I reconnected with my childhood dream of writing kidlit, but getting published was harder than I expected.

**How did you get the idea for Sneaks?**

Amy: When I watched Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window with my two sons, I thought the premise might be good for middle grade. In Sneaks, twelve-year-old Valory and Rook sit on the balcony spying on the neighbors and notice clues that something fishy is going on in the apartment building across the alley. In Rear Window, the police don’t take Jimmy Stewart’s suspicions seriously. In my book, it’s the grown-ups who underestimate the sleuths and accuse them of having overactive imaginations. When Valory and Rook set out to solve the mystery on their own, they break a few rules and make a few bad choices, but they also learn about being brave and following their own consciences.

Of course, Rear Window has been adapted many times. Hitchcock himself adapted it from a short story by Cornell Woolrich. My book isn’t even the first kids’ version—The Secret Apartment, by Natalie Fast, particularly influenced me. I made the story my own by recalling how my brothers and I used to love sneaking around as kids and trying to capture that exhilaration in the story. When I was eight, my family went to Belgium for three months and lived in a five-story apartment building. My brothers and I explored that place from top to bottom. We couldn’t even watch TV or get our hands on many English-language books, so we spent our time spying on people and having adventures.

The two main characters in Sneaks are very different. Rook is an introvert and a gifted pianist. Valory is a daring rule-breaker. You tell the story in both their voices. Was that hard to do? Was one character easier to write than the other?

Amy: This was my first experience writing in dual perspective. It seemed to fit this book, which has two protagonists of equal importance. To me, the hard part was differentiating the voices, but it helps that the characters are such different personalities. Valory is mouthy (to use one of my mother’s favorite words), brash, confident, shrewd, and judgmental. Rook is thoughtful, musically gifted, proud, somewhat timid, and secretive. Valory has to learn to be less self-centered, and Rook to speak up for himself.

One useful hack I discovered quite by accident. I started out writing Valory’s chapters in first person and Rook’s in third. But I changed my mind and decided that would be too confusing for young readers. After converting Valory’s perspective to third, I was surprised to find that the language had a certain tone—a sort of slangy bounce—that was different than if I’d written it in third person in the first place. The tone served to further distinguish the voices, very subtly.

There were other devices I used: for example, Valory uses more hyperbole and gives everyone nicknames. Valory is into clothes—what Rook calls a hat, she calls a fedora. Meanwhile, Rook uses a lot of music metaphors and tends to reference science fiction and superhero movies. At an even more granular level, Valory says “anybody” and “somebody,” while Rook says “anyone” and “someone.” More importantly, they notice...