Not On Fifth Street: An Interview with Kathy Cannon Wiechman

As promised last week, here is my follow up interview with Kathy Wiechman, author of NOT ON FIFTH STREET.

CAROL: Just like in LIKE A RIVER, you wrote NOT ON FIFTH STREET from two points of view. What led to that decision? 

KATHY: NOT ON FIFTH STREET is about a rift between two brothers. When I was a kid and got into a dispute with one of my siblings, my mother always said "There are two sides to every story." And she wanted to hear them both. I felt the only way to give Pete and Gus an equal chance to tell their sides was to write it that way. Since doing that had worked well for me in LIKE A RIVER, I felt comfortable doing it again.

CAROL: Unlike RIVER, Gus’s POV doesn’t follow after Pete’s. You go back in time and show the reader what everything looked like from Gus’s POV. What led you to writing it in that manner? Why didn’t you flip-flop chapters between the two?

KATHY: Part of Pete's worry in Part 1 was due to him not knowing where Gus was or if he was all right. If I had alternated chapters, the reader would have known more than Pete about Gus's circumstances and wouldn't be able to commiserate with him about it, and I think empathy with the POV character is always one of an author's goals. I felt it was a good way to add to the suspense in Part 1.

CAROL: This conflict between Pete and Gus is crucial to this story. How did you come up with that? 

KATHY: When I wanted to write a book about the '37 flood, I knew the flood itself wouldn't provide enough conflict. I grew up in a house with six siblings, my husband grew up with six siblings, and together we raised four children. I am quite familiar with sibling rivalry and the rifts that can cause conflict in a large household. It felt natural for the brothers' feud to be the key to the story. When I began my first draft, the first line I wrote was "Pete had never seen his brother so mad." In the final draft, that line appears in Chapter 2, but I let those words set the mood for the story.

CAROL: Did using your father’s story make writing this book more or less difficult?

KATHY: I was surprised at how much more difficult it was to get into Pete's head because he was based on my dad. I created Pete and he had to be Pete, not Dad. But that was tough to do. The part that was easier was knowing Dad's story so well, I always knew what would happen next. I also spent a lot of time in my grandma's house as a child, and I could always picture my setting so clearly, from the homemade picnic table in the sunroom to the back bedroom overlooking the garage to the mantel clock in the living room.

CAROL Can you give us some idea of how much is fiction and how much is fact? Obviously the flood and the fact that your father evacuated his family was fact. What else?

KATHY: Much of what Pete does, like taking the motor out of the refrigerator, my dad did. And like Gus, he was listed as missing. And my grandmother dug in her heels about evacuating because she didn't know where he was. His family did have his name mentioned on the radio as missing, and that call was put out by WLW from Cincinnati. Dad was not 14 or 15 like Pete and Gus. He was 20, but my Uncle Bill who marked the garage wall with the height the flood reached was only 12.

CAROL: How has life changed for you since receiving the Grateful American Prize?

KATHY: My day-to-day life is the same. I write or work on some part of the process every day. It might be research or promotional, but it's for my books. What has changed is my connection to the phenomenal team of people with the Grateful American Book Prize, who believe, as I do, that knowing American history is essential for today's young people. This group pays attention to what I am doing and they continue to help promote LIKE A RIVER even two years after it won the award. And the cash prize that came with the prize helps to fund my research trips.

CAROL: What’s next?

KATHY: I am working on another Civil War novel. This one takes place in Wilmington, North Carolina during the final months of the war. And I am doing a bit of preliminary research for a possible sequel to LIKE A RIVER.

******

For a chance to win my ARC, please leave me a comment along with your email address if you are new to my blog. A winner will be chosen on August 17. 

My husband's uncle, Robert Toupal, is
always eager to read well-written historical novels. He often
greets me with, "Got any new books?"

Not on Fifth Street: A Review and ARC Giveaway- Part I

If you're one of my faithful followers, than you're no stranger to Kathy Wiechman's historical fiction for middle grades. I'm proud to review her newest book, NOT ON FIFTH STREET (Calkins Creek, 2017), a fictionalized account of the flood of the Ohio River in 1937. 

Two feuding brothers + one record-breaking flood = a fast paced middle grade book for boys and girls they won't be able to put down.

After you read the book you'll understand

why this is a perfect cover.

The Review

Thirteen-year-old Pete doesn't understand why his big brother, Gus, has become more interested in a girl named Venus than spending time with him and their friend Richie. They had been the Three Musketeers up until Gus met Venus. On top of that, a New Year's dinner where Venus is the guest goes sour and it's all Pete's fault. 

Then the rain starts. Within days the mighty Ohio river is rising and the folks in Ironton, Ohio fear flooding. Pete looks at the river and thinks,

...out in the middle, the river surged like a fierce animal, whipping into waves that rose and hurried downriver. A tangle of branches floated past, carried in the swift current. Were they branches from an Ironton tree? Or had they traveled all the way from Pittsburgh?

Pete looked at houses and imagined them with muddy water up to the second-floor windows and people using rowboats to go places. He and Dad had fished on the river before. But that river was nothing like this wild, alive one. He hurried away as though it might reach out and grab him. (p. 32)

Pete's father asks Gus to come with him to help out on the riverfront and Pete is devastated. He's the one who works around the house--not Gus, who would be rather reading Shakespeare and "who doesn't know which end of a shovel to hold." Why is he being left behind with the women and children?

http://www.irontontribune.com/2017/01/29/remembering-the-1937-flood/

Even though he's angry with his father and jealous that Gus was chosen to fight the flooding river, his practical knowledge of their home proves useful to his mother and two siblings. After he starts moving household items to higher ground his mother says:

"Your dad knew what he was doing, Pete, leaving you here to take care of things." 

Was she right? Was that why Dad had taken Gus to the West End? Because he wanted Pete to take care of Mom and the kids and the house? Maybe Pete had been wrong about Dad. (p. 59)

As the rain continues to fall and street after street is flooded, his worries increase over not hearing from his father and Gus. Where are they and why hadn't they been in contact? As he evacuates the family to the second floor the reader feels the impending doom, "He almost felt the river lapping at his heels as he kept moving." (p.86). The ticking clock of the rising river parallels Pete's growing anguish and remorse over his misunderstandings with Gus. 

In the middle of the book, Kathy Wiechman switches over to Gus's point of view. In a manner in which I've never seen before, (and which she'll explain in my interview with her in next week's blog), Kathy begins Gus's POV from the time he leaves with his dad to work on the riverfront. It's a clever device that shows not only what some were doing to battle the rising river while others were trying to survive, as well as each brother's misconceptions and fears about the other.

At first Gus is thrilled to be chosen to do men's work. But after unending hours of filling sandbags, eating little, wearing soaking wet clothes, and blisters blooming on his hands, he feels like a chain-gang prisoner. He can't imagine that Pete really likes this kind of work. In fact, when he asks if his father shouldn't call home to tell his mother they're okay, his father replies, 

"I don't have to worry about home," Dad said. "Pete's there. He can handle things as well as I can." 

Gus had been easing down to the floor as Dad spoke, but he landed hard when the impact of Dad's words hit him. Dad hadn't left Pete at home because Gus would be a good worker, or because Dad wanted to do something with Gus. Dad needed Pete at home because Pete was the reliable one. The one who can handle things as well as I can.  

         ........

Julius Caesar couldn't have felt worse when Brutus stabbed him, Gus thought. (p. 139)

In a "love conquers all" moment, when the river continues to surge and the National Guard send the men home, Gus decides he must check on Venus, who lives on the other side of the river. The trip is perilous and Gus proves his mettle as he risks his life to help her family.  While stranded at her house, Gus spends a lot of time thinking about his family, realizing what is important, and wanting to make things right with Pete.

Maybe reading to David (Venus's younger brother) was a way to push the rising water to the back of his mind. But the back of his mind was already filled with shame for the way he'd treated Pete. And regret for failing to tell Mom where Dad was. The flood wasn't his fault, but so much else was.  (p. 198)

I've probably already given away too much of this fine story, but I'll just tell you this--the ending will bring sighs of relief and smiles to readers' faces.  

Navigating the flood in Kentucky

A Classroom Resource

This would be a great classroom resource for history, science, and English classes. I'll use it as an example of "man vs. nature" the next time I teach problems that characters encounter. (Here is my Plan a Problem worksheet.) Teachers could have great discussions about family misunderstandings and trying to see a situation from another family member's point of view. 

The Giveaway

Next week Kathy is going to talk about how her father's experiences in this flood inspired this book. This ARC giveaway will last two weeks. Leave me a comment today and I'll enter your name once. Leave a comment on both blog posts and you'll be in twice. Please leave me your email address if you are new to my blog. Winner will be drawn on August 17th.