Betty Birney’s Blog

 For me, the very best thing about writing is on those days when I actually forget I’m writing. By that I mean, I’m so involved with the story that I’m in the action and lose the awareness that I’m outside of the story writing it. It’s a wonderful feeling, hard to describe, but exhilarating. My husband would never walk into the office without a little knock on the door -  first because he’s polite, but second, he doesn’t like to startle me. It’s like waking someone up from a dream. The knock helps. Otherwise I sort of bounce up out of my chair and go “oh!” and he knows that “oh” means I was somewhere far, far away.

But most of writing isn’t like that. It’s about details. I’ve been holed up trying to finish the first draft of a new Humphrey book. This will be a shorter chapter book with illustrations. It’s the same as the other Humphrey books but shorter - which made it a very different writing experience. Blood, sweat and tears were involved. (I finished and my editor’s reading it this weekend.)

I spent at least four days doing nothing but trying to figure out how to get Humphrey into a certain situation at a certain time safely and logically. This is always a difficulty with Humphrey because he’s a very small creature! I finally talked it over with my husband. I thought we came up with the solution, but when I sat down to write, it didn’t work.  We talked again and I got it and wrote it immediately.

I also enlisted Desi the dog for a little research - seen above. Yes, that’s a baseball cap she’s wearing. No, she’s not happy about it, which is why my husband is keeping her in place. But she didn’t argue about it either. I guess she knows research is important, too.

Even after a book is written there are more details to look after. Witness today. I get up really early, so I was at my desk at 6 am (not showered and dressed yet, but at my desk). An hour later, I got pages from my editor, Susan, about the fourth go-round of copy-editing of the next book, Adventure According to Humphrey. The bound galleys are already published but there were four or five more questions to straighten out. The Humphrey books seem to require more eagle eyes proofing them because of the way the names are written and hyphenated. Luckily, a diligent copy editor caught a few more things. I’m always soooo happy when this happens. I hate mistakes in books and I’m grateful to all those who help find and correct them.

Immediately after we straightened that out, I heard from Lucie, my copy editor at Faber, my UK publishers. Surprises According to Humphrey is coming out there  in October and there were still a few lingering issues. Actually, she was mostly answering my questions from the last round of copy editing - such as do kids in the UK understand our A,B,C system of grading and do they know the song Yankee Doodle Dandy? In both cases, they do.

Details are important. So if you think writing is just sitting in an ivory tower channeling the muse … remember Desi in her baseball cap. And yes, it is pertinent.

 Find Lisa, Lisa’s Peepy, Sally Nemeth, me (front row); Michael Reisman, Dan Santat, Mark London Williams, Sue Casey (back and center). Love the lighting!

Lisa Yee threw huge a LAYAS (Los Angeles Young Adult writers) get-together on Wednesday and it was what you’d expect when you get together a big bunch of people who spend a great deal of time alone staring at a computer: wild and crazy fun. (But as you can see, we did end up in front of the computer.) FYI, when writers get together they talk, laugh, talk, eat, get silly, talk … well, you get the idea. Two out-of-town YA writers, Julia DeVillers and Sarah Darer Littman, happened to be in town at the same time, which made it a great excuse for a party … thanks to Lisa’s generous hospitality.

And as an addendum to the last post, Greg Proops is not only the voice of Humphrey; he’s the voice of Bob the Builder in the U.S. And Bob doesn’t sound like Humphrey at all. in fact, he’s unsqueakably different.

   Bob                        Greg                           Humphrey

This morning, I got nice news from Humphrey’s UK publisher, Faber & Faber. The World According to Humphrey audiobook made the prestigious Sunday London Times pick of the best audiobooks for summer! Here’s a blurb:

Parents hoping to beguile children with fiction during long car journeys deserve stories they can enjoy, too. Kids of all ages should relish the American comedian Greg Proops reading The World According to Humphrey by Betty G. Birney. Proops gives Humphrey, the class hamster, a feisty and rather acerbic nasal whine in which he delivers sharp, funny observations on the education system and family life - and manages to get in plenty of poo jokes.

Sorry the picture I just took (above)  is so fuzzy but I tried a lot and that was the best I could do. Besides, the box is cracked. But you can see that Richard and Judy circle on the box. You never heard of Richard and Judy? Then you don’t live in the UK. They host the equivalent of the Oprah show of England and have a very popular book club. They started a children’s book club in October and Humphrey won the first round ever> The books were prominently displayed in bookstores, there was a primetime special, and forever that little logo will be on the book and audiobook. I did manage to catch the show in March when I was there and it’s a nice, relaxed talk show. In this country when I talk to Brits and mention Richard and Judy, I love the reaction. The jaw drops, the eyes widen and the person always says, “Richard and Judy are huge!” This has happened twice in the last three weeks. Actually, R&J are normal sized people - not huge at all. But they are popular.

Now, about Greg Proops. When I first heard Faber was doing audiobooks, I thought how funny it would be to hear Humphrey with an English accent. So they surprised me and used an American. Though we do make numerous manuscript changes to reflect the differences in their English and our English, everyone says Humphrey is perceived as an American. And kids there are used to American film and TV, so the accent doesn’t sound that strange.

  The voice of Humphrey at work …. when you’re recording two three-hour audiobooks, you have to protect your throat.

I was a fan of Greg Proops when he was a regular on the original improv show, Whose Line Is It Anyway, which preceded the American version. We watched it on BBC America. He’s really popular in the UK because of that show. So I was happy to learn he would be the voice of Humphrey. When I got a copy of the first disk in March, I was nervous. I’m pretty sensitive to hearing someone else read my books. I think I might be hyper-critical because for years, I directed voice-over talent for Disneyland and then the Disney Studios - radio commercials and the announcer tracks for TV commercials and theatrical trailers. I spent about half my life  in recording studios, working with such great announcers as Gene Moss, Danny Dark (both gone now, sad to say), Gary Owens of Laugh-In fame - who is still going strong- and Howard Morris, whom I enjoyed watching on Sid Caesar’s Your Show of Shows as a very young child.

My first reaction was - oh wow, Humphrey is a man! But I listened for a minute to the “feisty and acerbic nasal whine” Greg Proops chose, and I was suddenly thinking, “Hey, this book is pretty good. It’s better than I remember!” I guess that’s about the highest praise I can give an audiobook reader. He hooked me.  And I’m glad he didn’t do a cute little hamster voice, which would have gotten on my nerves.

Unfortunately, I don’t think you can buy these audiobooks in the U.S. I guess you can go on Amazon.uk However, audible.com has a Humphrey book - I’ve just not heard it so no comment.

The Faber audiobook of Friendship According to Humphrey (also with Greg Proops) comes out in October. That’s when Surprises According to Humphrey (the book) will be released in the UK as well.

If you haven’t played the Nut-Ding game or posted a picture of your pet, you’ve got to check out the thoroughly wonderful Humphrey UK site - www.funwithhumphrey.com. The game is fun and not just for kids.

      It’s been hotter than hot here in Southern California, with the temperature edging up close to 100 every day. Before air conditioning, before inflatable wading pools were invented, we had other ways of cooling off. Here I am in the watering can at Grandma and Grandpa’s house. (I am much more modest now.) They lived on Humphrey Street in south St. Louis. That’s right. Humphrey, as in hamster.

Still, the heat hasn’t kept me inside. Yesterday morning, Frank and I went to the home of Lisa Yee (http://lisayee.com) author of Millicent Min, Girl Genius and others including her new American Girl book) for the South Pasadena Festival of Balloons parade. Lisa and husband Scott have a beautiful 100 year-old Craftsman house on the parade route with a large front yard. The food and company was so terrific (and it was so, um, warm) we watched from the shaded front porch and I didn’t take any pictures. Dumb. But I had great chats with fellow LAYAs (Los Angeles Young Adult writers) Sally Nemeth (The Heights, the Depths and Everything in Between), Michael Reisman (Simon Bloom, The Gravity Keeper) and Amy Goldman Koss (The Girls). Amy and I reminisced about our glory days as judges (with Lisa) in this same parade two years ago. And talked extensively also with illustrator extraordinaire, Dan Santat, and family.

Later, granddaughter Remy came over for a cookout (okay she brought her mom and dad, too). We read books and sang at the table (even though Amy Vanderbilt says that’s not polite) and had a rollicking good time. The kids had thought they could see the Studio City fireworks display at CBS Studios from our backyard. Theoretically we should be able to, but the trees are just too tall. I thought of the perfect spot to see them, so Frank drove up with them while I stayed home with Desi (dog) and listened to the fireworks. I couldn’t see a thing but I could hear them quite well! And then I watched Yankee Doodle Dandy - I love corny older films. Unabashedly.

 Tomorrow, Frank and I are going to the Music Center downtown to see A Chorus Line, which I originally saw on Broadway. At first we hadn’t opted for tickets but then I thought even though we’ve seen it before, hearing great music and seeing great dancing is not a bad way to while away a few hours. I hope it is still a singular sensation.