Member Interview: Author Chris Barton

Where did you grow up, and how did that place (or those places) shape your work?

I grew up in Northeast Texas, in the same small city — Sulphur Springs — where my dad had grown up, and his mother before him. There was a local literary fair when I was in second grade, and my teacher suggested (or encouraged, or required...) that I create something for it. That resulted in my first book, The Ozzie Bros. Meet the Monsters.

Did you always want to be an author, or did that come later?

After I received that green participation ribbon for The Ozzie Bros., there was never anything I wanted to be other than a writer of some sort. But it wasn't until I was 29 that I got the idea that maybe I wanted to write books for kids.

If someone were to follow you around for 24 hours, what would they see?

A creature of habit, starting with my still getting up most days with an alarm at five a.m., even though I no longer have the day job or the toddler that prompted that practice when I was first trying to get published, 25 years ago.

How does your everyday life feed your work?

Paying attention to the things I see and hear, the things I read, the conversations I have, the music I listen to, the thoughts that pop into my head while jogging — all of that has the potential to inspire a story idea or a solution to a storytelling problem.

Tell us about some accomplishments that make you proud.

Sticking with stories that take a long time to get published gives me great satisfaction, and it makes me proud that I didn't give up on those stories. My first book, THE DAY-GLO BROTHERS, took eight years start to finish, received 23 rejections from publishers, and required me to cut the text from 6,000 words to (the still very long for a picture book) 2,000. If I hadn't soldiered on through all that, would I have had a second book, much less my 25th?

But for what it's worth, that 25th book — WE MATCH! — was 13 1/2 years in the making. I love where that long journey ended up. I'm glad I stuck with it.

What surprises you about the creative life?

The never-ending hustle. When do I get to rest on my laurels?

When a reader discovers your work, what do you hope they find?

That the person who wrote it took seriously the curiosity and intellect and sense of humor of the person reading it, no matter how old that reader is.

Quick-Fire Questions:

You “match” with fellow SCBWI member Jennifer Ziegler, your wife and middle grade/YA author; so, how/where did you meet?

At a manuscript-critique workshop here in Austin in 2008. It was populated by more than two dozen other local kidlit creators, but I think Jenny was the only one I hadn't already met. We said our first hellos at the coffee urn on the first morning, and we got married in that same house nearly five years later.

Common ground, common sense, common courtesy, common __________?

Decency. Come on, people — it's not that complicated. If you don't think your grandparents or great-grandparents would admire the person you've become, or the way you conduct yourself, or the votes you cast, it might be worth considering how you would explain yourself to them.

To whom do you dedicate this interview? And who is Victoria?

I do love dedications — that’s why Jenny and I started our show, “This One's Dedicated to...” — but I try to avoid double-dipping and dedicating more than one endeavor to the same person. And since I have two 2027 books that I need to come up with dedications for, I'm not going to take anybody out of contention by dedicating this interview to someone.

I'm so glad you asked about Victoria, though — you did your research and noticed the dedication in WE MATCH! That's Victoria Wells Arms, who is not only my agent but also the agent of the book's illustrator, our mutual friend Sharon Glick. I began working with Victoria four years ago, about nine and a half years into the gestation of WE MATCH! She became the enthusiastic advocate that this story needed — she saw in it the same elemental kid-friendliness and relatability that I always knew was there. So, yes: We match!