Mitali Perkins was born in India and immigrated to the States when she was seven years old. She’s written several books for young readers, including BAMBOO PEOPLE, RICKSHAW GIRL, MONSOON SUMMER, and SECRET KEEPER, and has now put together this insightful and very funny anthology where various noted authors speak of the multi-cultural divide.
Listen in as ten YA authors — some familiar, some new — use their own brand of humor to share their stories about growing up between cultures. Henry Choi Lee discovers that pretending to be a tai chi master or a sought-after wiz at math wins him friends for a while — until it comically backfires. A biracial girl is amused when her dad clears seats for his family on a crowded subway in under a minute flat, simply by sitting quietly in between two uptight white women. Edited by acclaimed author and speaker Mitali Perkins, this collection of fiction and nonfiction uses a mix of styles as diverse as their authors, from laugh-out-loud funny to wry, ironic, or poingnant, in prose, poetry, and comic form.
YOUNG ADULT: What three words come to mind when you think of writing?
Mitali Perkins: Blood. Sweat. Tears. (The actual stuff — not the vintage rock group.)
YA: Tell us a little bit about your latest work. What is different about Open Mic: Riffs on Life Between Cultures in Ten Voices, aside from it being a YA Anthology (which is rare in and of itself)?
MP: The book is an attempt to use humor as we talk about race and culture, and to showcase some fresh and some established diverse voices who try to lighten things up (no pun intended.)
YA: Is there a central theme that crops up among these stories, or is the whole point that each individual has a story that can’t be lumped together with any other?
MP: The central theme is growing up on the edge of majority culture, or “between cultures,” as I like to call it. We wanted to offer the feel of an “open mic,” and start the conversation.
YA: Take us through a typical writing day for you.
MP: I’ve just moved to California after 13 years in Boston and am still settling in, so sadly there’s no “typical” day. But in the past, I rise, have coffee and pray/journal, take care of email and social media, and then head to a coffee shop where I don’t connect to the internet. I grab a seat, order a latte, set a word count goal (usually 1500 words or so), and don’t let myself budge until I’m done. Not even to pee. I give myself permission to write garbage because after so many years of rejection and revision, I have confidence in making my writing better. The next day I find a different coffee shop (because I don’t want to be a regular squatter that draws the ire of people looking for tables), revise the words I wrote the day before, and write 1500 more new (crappy) words.
YA: What’s next for you?
MP: No idea. But I must carve out space to write soon before my true self revolts.
YA: What other authors, YA or otherwise, do you idolize? Or, what YA books are on a pedestal for you?
MP: It’s not good to be on the list, because my writing idols are pretty much dead: JRR Tolkien, CS Lewis, LM Montgomery, Louisa May Alcott, Lenora Mattingly Weber … wow, I just noticed I like writers who use initials and writers who are “LM”s…