An update from our twenty-fifth Book Club meeting! On Saturday, March 27, the Stone Soup Book Club discussed The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy, by Jeanne Birdsall. The Penderwicks, the first book in a series of five, is about four sisters and their father, and all of the adventures they encounter when they rent a summer home in the Berkshires. Our Book Club meeting, which was attended by around 35 participants from multiple countries, started with everyone being sent into small breakout rooms, so they could get to know each other a little bit better. Their conversation starter was “spring”, and what spring looks like where they live! When we all came back together, we debriefed the book (most everyone enjoyed it!) and then split into four breakout rooms—led by myself, Laura, and two of our Book Club facilitators: Lucy and Madeline). In these rooms, we talked about The Penderwicks in more depth, including the characters, setting, plot, and themes. When we shared out about our discussions afterward, we found that many people had picked up on the sort of “reverse fairy-tale” motif carried throughout the book, and we were able to have a fun conversation about this! Next, we talked about inspiration. As writers, what other authors have inspired our work? We used The Penderwicks, which is inspired by Little Women (by Louisa May Alcott) as an example. After we analyzed those novels and their similarities and differences, we talked about our own inspirations, including authors such as Rick Riordan, Markus Zusak, and J.R.R Tolkien. Our final activity was a writing prompt. The Penderwicks, although it is realistic fiction, seems to take place in a magical setting, because it is so idyllic. So, we asked our participants to write about a summer experience they had that felt magical. We shared our answers in breakout rooms, and it was really fun to hear about summer homes, lakes, hiking, and more! At the end of Book Club, we chose our next book, which will be discussed on April 24—the first meeting of our spring Book Club session! To sign up for the spring/summer session of Book Club, visit our Eventbrite page here. Our Next Book (to be discussed on April 24): Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, by Grace Lin
Workshops
Writing Workshop #37: Antiheroes
An update from our thirty-seventh Writing Workshop A summary of the workshop held on Saturday March 20, plus some of the output published below This week Stone Soup Contributor Madeline Kline, 13, led a workshop on antiheroes in which she taught us that antiheroes are captivating because of the relatability of their flaws. To begin the workshop, we discussed the qualities that distinguish an antihero from a hero, such as honesty vs. dishonesty, bravery vs. cowardice, and integrity vs. selfishness. We learned that the difference between an antihero and an antagonist is that an antihero is a flawed protagonist with good intentions, whereas an antagonist is a character who stands in the way of the protagonist, often using the worst qualities of the antihero against them. We also learned about various categorizations and examples of antiheroes, such as antiheroes who become heroes (Phil Conners from the movie Groundhog Day), antiheroes who become villains (Coriolanus Snow from the prequel novel The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes), tragic heroes (Othello), and comic heroes (Greg from Diary of a Wimpy Kid). When Madeline finished her lecture, the students set to work on creating some of the inspired writing you can find below. The Challenge: Create a character who is one of the types (comic, tragic, becomes a hero, becomes a villain) of antiheroes we discussed. The character can also be an antagonist. The Participants: Ismini, Hera, Rachael, Leo, Olivia Z, Reese, Sophia, Lindsay, Pranjoli, Anya, Eve, Sadie, Peri, Helen, Julia, Lucy R, Sierra, Liam, Anna, Sage, Simran, Lina, Elbert, Madeline S, Margaret, Alice, EMi, Yasmine, Olivia S, Emma B, Jonathan, Charlotte K, Ava, Samantha, Nami, Kaidyn, Angela, Michele, Charlotte, Enni, Noa, Dora, Nova, and Grace Z. Peri Gordon, 11Sherman Oaks, CA Wicked Moods Peri Gordon, 11 “You already got your prize, Miss Aler.” “Did not, I put it back because…the bag was stained,” I lie. “Come on, I need another one.” The lady handing out the betting prizes gives me a suspicious glance but hands me the sack of gold anyway. “I didn’t see you put it back, Samantha,” she says warily. I roll my eyes at her, snatch the bag, and say, “Thanks for doing your job.” When I was born into the kingdom of Darlaway, I didn’t take long to start talking, and my first word was, “fight.” I fight to get what I want every day, and if I have to fib a bit in the process, so much the better. If everyone else is weak because they don’t know how to fight back, I hope, for their sake, that they get that straightened out. I hide my second load of gold with the first one in my little stash, which is hidden in a bush outside my house. The bush, a rich green color that matches Darlaway’s flag, is thick enough to hide the hoard so it won’t be found by a nosy parent. Soon, though, I hope to need a bigger bush. Inside, my sister is bawling, as usual. I want to cover my ears, tell her what a bother she is, and go to my room, but then Mom will know I’m in one of my “wicked moods,” as she calls them. I tried to explain to her once that sometimes I feel like fighting and will take it out on just about anyone. She told me to control my hostility. Mom and I are very different. Well, I get punished when I’m in a “wicked mood.” That’s why I bend down and stroke my sister’s soft hair. There’s a part of me that loves my sister and wants to keep her safe, and there’s another part of me that wants to teach my sister to be like me (which won’t exactly keep her safe), and there’s one last part of me that hates the little crybaby. I can feel all three at the same time, but for all Mom knows, I can only feel one at a time, so I make her think it was the first. I think it worked—Mom gives me a proud grin, and even my sister’s tears stop for a second. Enni Harlan, 14Los Angeles, CA The Finish Line Enni Harlan, 14 Dad always parked his car way on the other side of the street, past the black asphalt and closer to the row of violet flowers that dotted a neighbor’s fence—an unlucky neighbor, probably, to have only been able to snag a home right next to the busiest street in the neighborhood. The one that loops past that old bus stop stained with graffiti and under the bridge with the train Mom never lets me take. It’s unsafe, she always says. Too many people. Too many bad people. Did you know, there was a kid who went missing on Friday? Did you know that on Thursday there was a shooting across the street, right at Target? That Target? Yes, that Target. The one I bought glue from last Tuesday? Yes. Last Tuesday. That Target. It’s not safe enough, Aila. It’s not safe enough. Everything’s unsafe to my parents. I think it’s stupid. I wish they’d stop lecturing me about safety—what do they think I’m going to do, start talking to strangers? I take the bus now, anyway. It’s not like I have another choice. But there was a time where we didn’t take the bus. There was a time—okay, I’ll stop talking like I’ve been around since the ‘30s. This was six years ago. I was seven—or maybe six. I don’t remember at this point. My brother Max and I always raced to the car to see who’d get there first. He’d take one path, I’d take the other, and we’d meet up, panting, by the pot of purple flowers. Then, sometimes in the winter, the car window would be all fogged up; back then, I used to think fairies brought the dew overnight. And usually it’d clear up by noon. When I got to the car first, I’d squeak my
Writing Workshop #36: Veering
An update from our thirty-sixth Writing Workshop! A summary of the workshop held on Saturday March 13, plus some of the output published below “Nowhere is the haphazard and disruptive strangeness of veering perhaps more evident than in the space of literature. Veering involves all sorts of turns, funny and dark and revisionary. Indeed… in a sense veering is what literature is.” -Nicholas Royle, literary critic This week’s Writing Workshop on the art of veering (defined as a sudden change of direction) offered us a sneak peak of author, PhD candidate, and Stone Soup Lecturer Conner Bassett’s upcoming workshop series. We focused on four main types of veering: “the volta”, or poetic turn, “peripeteia,” or a sudden reversal in fortune/change in circumstance, “anagorisis,” or the moment a character discovers who/what they are, and “metamorphosis,” or a literal change in form. For each type of veering there were a multitude of examples within and outside of literature, including Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody,” James Wright’s poem, “Lying in a Hammock at William Duffy’s Farm in Pine Island, Minnesota,” the movement of Cubism, Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon, and Ovid’s Metamorphosis, among many others. By workshop’s end, we had mastered four new key terms with which to impress our friends, and been inspired, once more, to write! Although everyone wrote something, those who read their work aloud were Rachael, Ismini, Olivia Z, Julia, Sierra, Liam, Peri, Enni, and Lindsay. The Challenge: Using one or more of the four main types of veering, write a story or poem that either changes genre, tone, mood, &/or plot halfway through, or, in which one character changes their mind &/or physical form. You can edit an older piece of writing or start something new! The Participants: Ismini, Georgia, Madeline K, Peri, Leo, Kaidyn, Julia A, Reese, Lindsay, Helen, Ava, Lucy K, Pranjoli, Liam, Margaret, Lena, Samantha, Eve, Lina, Sierra, Nami, Rachael, Maggie, Sophie, Anya, Tegan, Noa, Elbert, Ruhi, Olivia Z, Charlotte K, Sage, Anna, Angela, Tilly, Yasmine, Lucy R, Emma B, Enni, Olivia S, Charlotte M, Jonathan L., Nova Peri Gordon, 11Sherman Oaks, CA Haven Peri Gordon, 11 Peaceful nights Sitting by the ocean, resting on the shore, Watching the moon’s pull capture the waves And release them Peaceful days Watching the tranquil silhouette of a dove As it overlaps, from my angle, with the sun Serene sunrise, serene sunset The breeze of summer dawn Or the chill of winter dusk The sound of the seagulls, The salt of the seawater Overlapping with the sane sound of spring Or the calm cool of autumn But when you’re bursting with anger And hate for humankind Sometimes, the fury can’t be drained By temporary peace So I leave. Liam Hancock, 13Danville, CA Pedestrians Liam Hancock, 13 I sat on the porch where I always sit, wringing sweat from my hands and squinting through the shimmery hot air. Across the street, Miss Reynolds scurried around her front yard in a frilly sunhat, undaunted by the suffocating heat and painted like a tribal warrior, sunscreen unceremoniously streaked across her shriveled old skin. Above the both of us, a clear day was speckled with wisps for clouds and the sun spread its warm embrace across the blue sky like something straight out of the Toy Story intro credits. From a distance, I could briefly make out the deafening rumble of the trucks as they passed by, their tail ends dragging across the gravel, stereos blasting with hard rock that shook our windows, drivers screeching, whooping, laughing as they went along. Miss Reynolds only briefly acknowledged the din with a deep scowl that spread fault lines of wrinkles across her face before returning to her garden with a new urgency. She crossed the crinkled brown grass quickly on shaky legs, water swishing from her can and gathering in brown puddles as she went, ripping through stands of poppies and rosemary bushes that I knew she’d been fostering for years, decades even. At her age, centuries weren’t out of the question. “Miss Reynolds?” I called questioningly. “What’s… uh, you okay over there?” Alarmed, her grey eyes shot up from beneath the brim of her gardening hat, searching my face as if she’d forgotten I was there. “Young’uns,” she cursed beneath her breath. No sooner did she resume her frantic disassembly of the front garden. “Young’uns and their guns’uns, and they’s trucks’ns. Nobody’s got my flowers, you see? Remember that, Velma. ‘Member it when they come.” I bit my lip, learning further back on my palms. “I think it’s better if you head back inside,” I urged her. “Cool down a bit?” “Guns’uns and trucks’uns,” she chanted. It had become some sort of disjointed kind of song. “They’s a big’uns and small’uns, child’uns and wild’uns.” I was just about ready to get up and call the Dementia Center– for the sixth time this month, of course– when the rumbling picked up again. I tilted my head, trying to decipher the skull-crushing music through the jostling of the tires through the scraping of bumpers along a low gravel road through Miss Reynolds’ mumbling, practically yelling now. The strangeness of it all finally worked some movement back into my stiff legs. I stumbled to my feet and tripped down the shallow front steps. Now, the noxious fumes of gas and exhaust was sharp and heavy over the street. Above us, the wisps of clouds, which hadn’t changed one bit, looked somehow different to me. “Those aren’t clouds…” I whispered to myself, panic fluttering in my chest. “It’s smoke!” Miss Reynolds growled, having appeared, pressed against the picket fence with a bundle of flowers and weeds tucked under her arm. She had no more time to explain before the sound of booming punk rock broke our hazy stillness and a fleet of heavyset trucks swerved through the tree line. Terrified, my gaze flew up to that plain, clear Toy Story sky, indifferently gleaming far above the grumbling engines and blasting rock music and somehow still beautiful despite how little it cared
