Real questions from real people, answered in the order in which they were received.
Q: Did you really write this? (Usually asked while pointing at book.)
A: Yes, as a matter of fact, I did. Why does everybody keep asking me that question?
Q: Are your characters based on real people?
A: The names have remained the same. Only the species have been changed to protect the innocent.
Q: When did you first begin to think seriously of yourself as a writer?
A: I have never thought seriously of myself.
Q:What did you read when you were a child?
A: This is a serious question, so I am actually going to answer it. I absolutely adored the Oz Books as a child, and, with the exception of The Wizard of Oz, I read all of them. All thirty-two. L. Frank Baum and his niece (who continued writing the Oz books after he died), had fantastic imaginations. And the illustrations by John R. Neill are beyond compare.
Q: What is Elissa’s quest?
A: (Long silence) I’m sorry, could you repeat that?
Q: What is her quest? What is she looking for?
A:Well … in the book, Elissa has been sent on a secret quest to find something. She doesn’t know she’s on a quest, so she doesn’t know what she has to find, but there is a prophecy to guide her. Except she doesn’t know what the prophecy means, so it’s all very confusing. But I will say that the quest has to do with helping the Phoenix to be reborn.
On a personal level, though, Elissa is looking for her family. She has been raised thinking she is an orphan, although she believes in her heart that she has a father. So she is looking for him, too. In a sense, she is looking for the ideal father, which is something most teenage girls seek. The teen years comprise a period in their lives in which fathers play a very important role. As a consequence, fathers either tend to be vilified or idealized by their daughters. Elissa does both.
But on another level, Elissa is looking for herself. She is making the transition from childhood to adulthood, and she doesn’t quite know who she is. She constantly struggles for a sense of identity, which is what girls do when the full force of social expectations is unleashed on them in young adulthood.
However, in a broader sense, the book is an allegory about global warming, in which the quest for a solution to the current environmental crisis is treated through the medium of a young girl who represents the Earth … Yes? Oh, I’m sorry. Are we out of time?