The Totally Made Up Civil-War Diary of Amanda MacLeish

Ages 8 to 12.  Farrar Straus Giroux, 2008. 978-0-374-37696-3

“Budding writer Amanda is totally into her fifth-grade class assignment, writing a diary from the point of view of a person living through the Civil War.  Assigned to be ten-year-old Polly from Frederick, Maryland, whose brothers are fighting on opposite sides of the war, Amanda writes about Polly's heartbreak when her brothers enlist and about her deep feelings of betrayal when her favorite brother decides to fight for the South.  The diary entries are filled with genuine emotion, possibly because Amanda's family is in the midst of its own civil war.  Her mother has asked Amanda's father to move out, and Amanda, like Polly, is desperate for life to go back to the way it was, wounds healed and a truce declared.  Like Polly, she doesn't know whom to root for, her loyalties torn between those she loves. . . Young readers will appreciate the cathartic nature of the diary and be drawn along by the real-life battles Amanda endures with her family and with her best-friend, who seems to have deserted her for another girl.  Veteran author Mills wins again, with an eminently likable protagonist, well-integrated subplots, and an emotionally involving story, perfectly aimed at her middle-grade audience.” - Horn Book

How I Came to Write This Book

I've been increasingly drawn to write books inspired by the remarkably creative assignments my sons' teachers gave to them when they were in elementary school, such as Mini-Society ( Trading Places ), a biography tea ( Being Teddy Roosevelt ), and here, a diary-writing project.  I knew I wanted to write about a child who would pour out her feelings about her own life into the diary she was writing for her school social studies assignment, and it seemed natural then to pair a Civil War diary with a story of a parental separation.  The cat Peanut in the book was inspired by our own cat Snickers.

Being Teddy Roosevelt

Illustrated by R. W. Alley. Ages 7 to 10. Farrar Straus Giroux, 2007. 0-374-30657-5.

"Riley goes to school with Harriet Tubman, Helen Keller, Martin Luther King, Jr., Queen Elizabeth and many other world-famous figures -- all fellow fourth-graders researching their chosen topics for Mrs. Harrow's biography tea. Riley is Teddy Roosevelt, and not only is he learning about Teddy Roosevelt, he's being influenced by his can-do spirit. Riley may still lose things, like all of his notecards, but now he figures out how to get them back. He still wants the saxophone his mother can't afford to get for him, but now he is determined to earn the money (after begging his mother failed). Mills writes with such a light, humorous touch that many scenes beg to be read aloud. Much information is subtly woven into the narrative, and the gathering of world leaders at the tea is a sight to behold. The black-and-white illustrations perfectly complement the humor of the story." -- Kirkus Reviews

"Bully for Riley and bully for Mills." -- Horn Book

How I Came to Write This Book:

When my boys were in fifth grade at Mesa Elementary, in Boulder, they both participated in the fifth-grade "biography tea," in which kids had to read a biography and attend a fancy tea party dressed up as that person. At Mesa, kids could choose the subject of their biographies, but I thought it would be more interesting in a book to have kids encounter great figures whose stories they might not otherwise have known. And so I have inattentive, dreamy Riley assigned to read about go-getting Teddy Roosevelt, and materialistic, video-gaming-playing Grant assigned the very opposite figure of Mahatma Gandhi. Perfect Sophie gets assigned Helen Keller -- as a child, I read Helen Keller's biography and was so inspired that I wrote Helen Keller a letter, only to find out that Helen Keller was already long dead! And as a child I also loved reading about Queen Elizabeth I, the subject of feisty Erika's report.

Trading Places

Ages 8 to 12. Farrar Straus Giroux, 2006. 0-374-31789-4

Bank Street College of Education Best Children's Books of the Year

"A crisp drama that aptly shows how things rarely turn out perfectly in life, but they often work out well enough. Mills level-headedly speaks for and to 'tweens about the ways we adjust to fit into an ever-changing world." -- Kirkus

"Fifth-grade twins Todd and Amy know their roles: Todd is the clever and organized one who takes life in stride, while Amy is the disorganized and sensitive poet. Roles don't seem to mean much at home, though, since the twins' father is now hanging unshaven around the house all day after losing his engineer position, while their mother has taken a job at the local crafts store to make ends meet. Roles at school start to deteriorate as well, when the class has to make products to sell: Todd, who always works alone, can't think of anything in the face of the illness of the elderly and beloved family dog; Amy gets squeezed out of her friendship triumvirate and ends up involuntarily partnered with the class crybaby, Violet. What could be a fairly standard exploration of family and friendship strain is lifted into a subtle exploration of an unusual theme by Mills' insight and nuance, presented with her usual unobtrusively thoughtful writing. . . Readers will appreciate the easygoing read and may want to consider the possibilities of stepping beyond the boundaries of their own usual roles." -- Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

How I Came to Write This Book:

I've always been fascinated by the way that parents -- even, or especially, the best-intentioned parents -- label their children as a way of establishing the child's own special identity within the family: "This is my shy one" or "This is my outgoing one"; "He's my little musician"; "She's my little diplomat." I caught myself doing it once when my boys were younger: I was explaining that Christopher was my shy one and Gregory was my outgoing one, when I looked down to see my "shy one" off digging happily in the sandbox with a playmate, and my "outgoing one" clinging to my leg! And I started to wonder about what happens when children outgrow the identities their parents create for them -- or even trade identities with each other.

I decided to set my story against the backdrop of the fun elementary school "Mini-Society" curriculum that both my boys had enjoyed experiencing, where kids learn about economics by creating products and services to sell to their classmates. I had such a good time coming up with both successful and doomed entrepreneurial schemes for Todd and Amy and their friends, some modeled on what I was lucky enough to observe in my boys' own classrooms.

Ziggy's Blue Ribbon Day.

illustrated by W. R. Alley. Ages 5 to 8. Farrar Straus Giroux, 2005. 0-374-32352-6

"When Ziggy's class goes out for track-and-field day at school, Ziggy knows that he is supposed to do his best. Unfortunately, he knows that his best is 'worse than everyone else's best' and that he will probably end up with an envelope full of 'gray' (silver) ribbons instead of the blue, red, and gold ones that indicate various levels of winning. He's right, but Ziggy, the class artist, really shines at drawing brightly colored pictures, and the other kids happily barter their blue ribbons for his work. . . Mills offers a simple but heartening story for kids who don't excel on the playing field but have other talents. From the roll of a pencil off a desk to the body language of schoolchildren who really want to be called on and those who really don't, Alley's paintings capture the school milieu with keenly observed details and a wry humor. A great choice to read aloud on field day, this upbeat picture book has broad appeal." -- Booklist

How I Came to Write This Book:

Track and field day is glorious outdoor fun for many kids, but for those who don't do well in sports, it can be a day of public humiliation. In fact, one child I know begged his mother to let him stay home from school on field day, because he couldn't bear to face coming in last in every event. So I thought it would be satisfying to give one of these non-athletic kids a chance to succeed on field day in some other way. When I first wrote Ziggy, I had Ziggy getting black ribbons, instead of gray (silver) ones, but my writing group friends said that no school would ever give out black ribbons to the last-place kids -- but my boys' school actually did! However, I've heard that field day there has now been changed so that it is pure fun with a rainbow of ribbons for everyone.