About the Author: Jennifer Donnelly is an award-winning, best-selling novelist. Her books for middle-grade readers include The Waterfire Saga: Deep Blue, Rogue Wave, Dark Tide, and Sea Spell. She has also written three novels for young adults: A Northern Light (named one of TIME magazine’s best young adult books of all time, and winner of the UK’s Carnegie Medal), Revolution, and These Shallow Graves. Her novels for adults include The Tea Rose, The Winter Rose, and The Wild Rose.
Donnelly’s latest publication, Lost in a Book, is an original novel set in the world of Disney’s new live-action film Beauty and the Beast. Lost in a Book features the same beloved characters found in the movie, as well as some new ones Belle discovers within the pages of Nevermore – a mysterious, enchanted book. Donnelly states that if she was reborn a Disney princess she would be Belle: “When Wikipedia adds an entry for ‘Nerdy Feminist Bookworm,’ it will have two names: Jennifer Donnelly and Belle.’”
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Jennifer Donnelly: Yes, it was, as well as a huge love of fairy tales in general – and the grimmer, the better. It amazes me that centuries after they were told around the fire at night, these stories still resonate with us. I think it’s because they give voice to our deepest fears, but also help us resolve those fears. They acknowledge that monsters exist, but they also tell us how to beat them.
Jennifer Donnelly: I did. Disney contacted me to commission an original tale set in the world of the live-action movie. They had me at “Hello”. I loved the idea of working with these iconic characters – Belle and Beast, and was also excited by the idea of inventing a few characters of my own.
JD: I read the live-action movie script before I started writing my story, and was delighted by the screenwriters’ (Stephen Chbosky and Evan Spiliotopoulos) take on Beast. Their Beast is still angry and ferocious, but the more I got to know him, the more he felt to me like a cool loner booknerd – a bit oxymoronic, I know – who has a clever sense of humor and a good grounding in the classics. I ran with that.
JD: I thought a lot about the central struggle of the Beauty and the Beast story, and it seemed to me that it wasn’t so much between Life and Death as it was Love and Death. And then the character of Death just kind of appeared in my head, as my characters tend to do. Her struggle with her sister and counterpart, Love, plays itself out in their eternal game—and the wager they make on it.
JD: I did have access to the script and to still and animated art from the movie, which I had to keep secret, and that was great fun. (I like keeping secrets more than I like telling them!) The writing process itself was intense. Because of a very tight production schedule, I had only four months to complete the first draft. That was pretty tough – but it was also an excellent learning experience. I discovered something important: it doesn’t matter whether you have four months or four years to write a first draft, because that first draft is going to stink either way. So bash it out as quickly as you can. Make a big ugly mess. Get it done. Then make it better. That’s what the process of revising is all about.
JD: A few ways – by watching the animated movie again, by reading the script for the live-action movie, and by listening to the music. The songs that Alan Menken and Howard Ashman created are beautiful, defiant, wistful, smart, and touching and they give you windows into many of the characters.
JD: Thank you! Yes, I think that adaptations are one way to keep fairy tales in the public consciousness, but also….just read the originals! They are more than just fantastical stories. They access the subconscious and help us give voice to some of our deepest fears and hopes.
JD: Where do I start? Grimm’s fairy tales, of course. The Little House books. Everything by Dr. Seuss. A Wrinkle in Time. Harriet the Spy. Nancy Drew. When I got a bit older: everything by Stephen King. The Scarlet Letter. Bartleby the Scrivener. The Grapes of Wrath. The list is endless.
JD: Yes, I’m just finishing up a collaborative book titled Fatal Throne. It’s a retelling of the story of England’s Henry VIII and his six wives. I’m Anne of Cleves, who Henry divorced because he found her ugly and dull. I loved writing her story. Five other writers took the parts of the other wives: Candy Fleming, Stephanie Hemphill, Deborah Hopkinson, Linda Sue Park, and Lisa Ann Sandell. M. T. Anderson is Henry. Fatal Throne will be published by Schwartz & Wade Books, a division of Random House, in May 2018.
PRR Writers Lauren Krause & Samantha Montes