A conversation with Kathryn Lasky

Kathryn Lasky is one of the busiest and most successful author of children's books today. The Cambridge resident is a Newbery Honor medalist and two-time winner of the National Jewish Book Award. She is perhaps best-know for "The Guardians of Ga’Hoole," a fantasy series about a world of owls which was turned into a movie in 2010. She has published adult myseries, memoirs, epic fantasy, historical fiction, and more. Currently, Lasky is hard at work on "Faceless," which centers on a young British spy during World War II. Lasky will be speaking as part of the Cary Lecture Series in a virtual event Nov. 7. We caught up with Lasky to pick her brain on avoiding writer's block, fantasy world building, and much more.

The following interview has been edited and condensed for publication.

You've written more than 100 books. How do you stay so productive, and what's your writing process like?

I get an idea and it rolls around in my head for quite a while. If it disappears I know it's not worthy of attention. If it sticks around, I start making notes and trying to pull together the central narrative. Then I have to do an elaborate proposal, which requires writing a few chapters. If something gets accepted, I make these very detailed outlines. They're ongoing. I could easily have 15 outlines for a book as it progresses. I start with a crude one, just a few sentences for the beginning, middle and end. As I go along, I'll outline the next few chapters and so on. And I never get writer's block or anything. I think it's because I choose my topics so carefully. That way, I maintain a passion for the book throughout.

I'm not slowing down, either. I've been writing since my kids were little, and I didn't have as much time then. Now they're all grown up and I have grandchildren and I'd say my output has increased. I have more time to work now.

You've written in a lot of different genres and styles, from memoirs to historical fiction, to epic fantasy. Which type is most challenging?

I've done some adult books, mysteries, and I've found those are the most challenging. You have to drop in clues, and red herrings, and to tell you the truth, I don't think I'm that good at it. People that are great mystery writers, it's almost like a crossword to them. They enjoy solving it.

Many of your books are told in the format of fictional diary entries for real-life historical figures. Was it difficult trying to make the thoughts of these people relatable to modern readers?

I started with a ton of research and I found that emotions don't change that much throughout the years. Queen Elizabeth experienced loneliness and anger like anyone would. Feelings don't change. I read a lot of her letters, and you get something of her voice from that. It's more formal, but her feelings are timeless.

When building a fantasy world from scratch, where do you start?

My fantasy books are largely about animals, so I start in the natural world. I live very close to the Harvard Natural History Museum and one day while I was working on a book with owl characters, I heard a knock on my door and it was someone from the museum, who showed up with a pair of binoculars on my doorstep. He said that there was a sighting of an Eastern screech owl in a tree in your backyard and he wanted to take a look. I got excited too, since one of my characters is that type of bird, and I was just writing about him. That owl stuck around my yard for about two years and I made friends with the guy from the museum. He was a curator of the bird exhibits there. That became a wonderful resource for me. They have a massive collection.

For my wolf books, I went to a wolf refuge in Ipswich. For my series about polar bears, I even went on a research trip up in the Arctic. We went out on the ice on these rovers and saw the bears up close.

What are your thoughts on the future? Do you have upcoming projects you'd like to talk about?

I try not to talk about new projects because it's very easy to talk a book out, if that makes sense. It's interesting watching the trends in young adult writing. For example, dystopian novels are huge now. I love the older ones like Louis Lowry's "The Giver." But then they got too bizarre for me, personally. But I realize that genre has a powerful draw for young readers.

I will tease my next book a bit, though. My fourth World War II book is coming out next year and I'll talk about that during the event.

This is probably a question you've been asked multiple times, but I think it's important. What advice do you have for aspiring writers?

Read. Read all you can. That's how I got interested in animals, World War II, everything. You need to read very widely, all genres, fiction and nonfiction. That way, you'll find something that inspires you and go from there. Also, there's no one way to write. I do all these outlines, but you have to find the process that works for you.

The public can register for Lasky's talk at www.carylectureseries.org.