Adora's Blog

Adora's Blog features Adora Svitak's thoughts, optimistic dreams, pessimistic predictions, opinions, and a journal of her daily life and memorable events.

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Name: Adora Svitak
Location: Washington State, United States

I am a twelve-year-old author and teacher. I live in Redmond, WA. I've published three books so far, Flying Fingers,Dancing Fingers, and Yang in Disguise. More books are in the works. I teach every day through school visits and distance learning mediums such as webcasting and video conferencing. I use a Promethean Activboard in my teaching. You can learn more at www.adorasvitak.com.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Emails from Viewers

Recently, I was one of the kids featured in a documentary on England's Channel 4. I received a giant wave of emails. Some of these contained questions. I decided to answer a few here on my blog.

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1.) Q: Do you agree with the advice that you should always write about what you know?

A: Not really. When you're writing "realistic fiction," it sometimes is best to stick with what you know, because otherwise your story might not ring as true with readers. However, you can always do research--and I have found research immensely helpful. Also, how could authors write fantasy stories if they only stuck to what they knew?

2.) Q: Have you ever read the book Life of Pi by Yann Martel?

A: I have read the book Life of Pi. It was a very interesting book, and I would recommend it to others.

3.) Q: Have you thought about reading more about chinese history / folklore and [then] coming up with an interesting fantasy novel?

A: I do enjoy reading about Chinese history and folklore. So far, I have not written a story about either, but I think it would be a fun idea. Thanks for suggesting!

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I also received many questions not related to the Channel 4 documentary. Here are a few.

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1.) Q: Where are you from?

A: I was born in Springfield, Oregon, but I currently reside in the town of Redmond in Washington State. If you haven't heard of it, don't worry. It's pretty small. Oh, and it is the headquarters of Microsoft.

2.) Q: How do you get started writing a story that will become a good book for people to read?

A: It does depend on your definition, and your reader's definition, of a "good book." To get started, I would advise you to first think about three important things: your story's characters (the people/animals in your stories), your story's setting (the place and time in which your story is set) and your story's conflicts.

3.) Q: Are you in the middle of writing any stories right now?

A: Not really. However, I am in the middle of editing my novella, the Pickpocket Princess.

4.) Q: How many books have you published?

A: So far, I have published two books, Flying Fingers and Dancing Fingers. I will be publishing two more books soon, Yang in Disguise and the Pickpocket Princess.

5.) Q: How many siblings do you have?

A: I have one older sister, Adrianna.

6.) Q: Have you moved a lot?

A: It depends on what you call "a lot!" I was born in Springfield. Pretty soon after that, we moved to an apartment in Bellevue, but that was only for a couple of weeks. By the way, I was really young, so I don't remember any of that part. Then we moved to Renton, and that's when I began remembering things! My dad works for Microsoft and it was sort of a long commute from Renton to Redmond, so we moved to Redmond. And I don't think we're going to move again for a little while.

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I hope that you've enjoyed reading this post. Best wishes to all!

-Adora

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Sunday, February 25, 2007

Letter to a Taiwanese Friend

Dear P,

Life is getting on very well, but my days of lazing about at room temperature eating potstickers are over. I am now concentrating on editing Yang in Disguise while the heat in our house seems to drop. I have a cold, although it's getting better. Weekends are hardly breaks, and--well, probably enough complaining. After all you are busy in school with homework and tests. What do you do on weekends? Adrianna has her violin, I do last-minute Chinese homework, we both do Chinese class, and sometimes go biking. (Saturday). Sundays are sleep-in days of boredom. The most exciting thing on Sunday is Sixty Minutes, the TV program. Speaking of TV we watched the Oscars just now. Did you watch the Oscars? The "pre-Oscar" time is extremely boring. They claim the Oscars begin at four, but that's just when everybody's getting seated and obnoxious reporters interview rushing nominees. They drone on and on about spectacular gowns. A typical conversation between the reporters would be--"And the new trend with jewels on so-and-so and bare shoulders, so-and-so's dress is Calvin Klein, so-and-so is taking a note from so-and-so and wearing diamonds, so-and-so's dress is Versace with some great beads, so-and-so is wearing..." And it goes on in that vein for some time. My mom wanted me to watch it anyways. Watching the actual awards was alright, though. Some of the commercials were quite good. Weather has taken a rather nasty turn. It is quite rainy, foggy, and windy. What are you doing in Taiwan? What is your everyday life like? Is school harder, easier, or about the same? What are you studying right now? How did you like the Taiwanese book? Also, forgot to ask you. What did you do for Christmas? Did you celebrate it? What did you do for New Year's? (Chinese or otherwise.) I attatched a photo of our aunts and uncles on Christmas Day. I hope you'll be able to see it. I took the picture with the mini Lumix digital camera I recieved from my mom as a present. I also recieved a Santa hat, a lot of candy canes, a fifty dollar Barnes and Noble gift card, and a porcelain kind of vase shaped-thing for holding pencils, pens, and erasers. It was a pretty great Christmas. We ate a buffet breakfast in Todai, Redmond Town Center. By the way, we made bedding for "The Ontario Club" (also known as the "DAM Club"). My room is covered in soft bedding. So is Adrianna's. I said hi to K for you. Oh, by the way--guess what? We didn't get any homework for the weekend!!!

Please reply soon!

Love,
Dory

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