Today we
continue the series in which award-winning nonfiction authors disscuss the joys
and challenges of writing narrative nonfiction
and expository nonfiction with an
essay by Laurie Wallmark. Thank you, Laurie!
I’ve loved math and science, ever since I was a
little girl. I’d check books out from the library that were way above my level
to comprehend, but I didn’t care. I plowed through them the best I could. Bit
by bit, reading these books increased my knowledge base in these subjects.
Not only that. They made me feel closer to the
ideas and facts of math and science. It made me think that maybe, just maybe,
one day I could grow up to be a mathematician or a scientist. (Spoiler alert: I
did. I became a computer scientist. I even built a mechanical computer in
seventh grade.)
I was also a big reader of fiction, especially
science fiction. Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Robert Heinlein, and the like.
I couldn’t get enough of these stories. Every week, I’d be back at the library,
taking out another armful of books—as many as they’d allow (always saving room
for at least one or two nonfiction books). A great deal of my early scientific
knowledge, whether right or what we now know to be wrong, came from reading
science fiction.
What I didn’t read, though, were realistic stories—either
contemporary or historical—that included math and science elements. Why not?
Because very few of them existed. The books on the shelves that contained the
math and science content I craved were either expository nonfiction or the
fantastical stories of science fiction.
When I became a children’s book writer, I knew I wanted
my first book to contain math. I so loved math and wanted to share this love
with children. But how could I incorporate math into a storyline other than in
science fiction? I had no idea.
Then it came to me. What about writing a
biography? I read many biographies as a child, though none were about women
mathematicians. You’d have thought women mathematicians didn’t exist. Well,
they do, and I’ve made it my job to let children, both boys and girls, know
this.
My first picture book biography, Ada Byron
Lovelace and the Thinking Machine, tells the story of a girl who loved math
and grew up to be the world’s first computer programmer. In the text, children
learn concepts such as algorithms. For children who want to know more, the back
matter explains her computer program in greater detail.
After that first book, I was hooked on writing
picture books biographies about women in STEM (science, technology,
engineering, and math). Using narrative nonfiction, I could combine my love of
story with my love of STEM.
But make no mistake about it. Narrative nonfiction
is not fiction. Everything in the story must be entirely factual. Authors of
these books never sacrifice accuracy for story. All the information must be
fact-checked from multiple sources.
What do I do if there’s a discrepancy in the
sources? Or if I can’t find an answer to a specific question. That’s when I
depend on the help of top-notch librarians.
In my latest book, Code Breaker, Spy Hunter:
How Elizebeth Friedman Changed the Course of Two World Wars, one of the
illustrations was going to show Elizebeth with her grandchildren. I knew from
my sources she had six of them, but what were they boys or girls? What were
their relative ages? I couldn’t find the answers.
Friedman’s papers are archived at the Marshall
Foundation in Lexington, Virginia. The librarian there was able to track down this
information for me, and I passed it along to the illustrator.
This factcheck sounds minor. Does the specific
information about her grandchildren really matter? Yes, because children need
to trust that the narrative nonfiction they read is the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth.
Laurie Wallmark writes picture book biographies of #WomenInSTEM as well as
other types of children’s books. They have earned multiple starred trade
reviews and received awards such as Outstanding Science Trade Book, Cook Prize
Honor, and Mathical Honor. Laurie has an MFA in Writing from VCFA and is a
former software engineer and computer science professor. You can find Laurie on
the Web at www.lauriewallmark.com and @lauriewallmark
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2 Responses
I feel like Laurie and I are sisters, we love so many of the same things (she's the smart sister, of course)! 😀
Love these books Laurie!