Featured Author: Bev Cooke
 
Bibliography at Orca
Feral: She lives in fear—of the two-legs, of the noisy, massive trains that scream in and out of the station, of cats and rats and dogs and the dark of the tunnels. She lives in the subway, where the hard shoes kick her ribs, where shrill voices beat her ears, where she subsists on the garbage of the humans. But the little cat walks alone. Until she meets Candlewax, a street kid exiled from the subway tunnels, and Katherine, a student photographer who loves her on sight. From these two she learns that trust can banish fear and love provides a home wherever you are.
Interview
Why do you write, and why young adult books? First, it’s what I do best, and because I’m driven to do it
by something inside me. Also because I love telling stories and I love words and what they can do. When I was a kid, we used to get
into a lot of trouble for telling lies – my parents valued honesty above every other virtue. So, by writing stories, I could
tell lies (fiction) but still tell the truth (the theme or message that is the truth under the story.) And it’s fun to make stuff
up and have people enjoy what I write! Why young adult and kids? Because I really like teenagers, I like the way they think, I remember
being one (way back in the era before the dinosaurs), and I remember how hard it is to be a teenager. And because those are the stories
that come to me.
What kind of research do you do before you write? It depends on the book, but there’s always some, even if it’s just looking up a small fact on the net. For my first book, I did a lot – I had to learn about Ancient Rome and how people lived then, and about how early Christians lived. For the third, I had to learn as much as could about the life of Princess Ileana of Romania. For Feral, there wasn’t a lot of official research – I did do some about the gangs, and talked to the police about gangs here in Victoria, but mostly it was drawing on my knowledge of cats and cat behaviour. I’ve lived around cats most of my life,
and they fascinate me. It was also remembering what it was like to always feel alone and lonely when I was a teen, and what I would have done to really belong, what I would have given to really feel accepted and ‘in’.
Do you put your family and friends in your books? A couple of Feral’s characters have elements of some of my friends – the name of Candlewax’s tunnel friend, Mila, is the name of a friend of mine, and her ancestry is the same as Katherine’s (Armenian and Serbian). Candlewax looks like a person I know over on the mainland, but that wasn’t conscious or on purpose on my part. Little Cat is a combination of three cats that I’ve known (and yes, they were my friends in a funny sort of way). Some of Little Cat’s personality is from Ivan, a cat we owned for about 16 years, and who stole my heart; Tasha, Ivan’s sister and another one of our cats: she was a little grey and white thing, which is who I modeled Little Cat’s appearance on. The last one is Gidget, who is currently living with us, and is the ‘real’ subway cat.
What is your favourite children's book? There are so many! I love books, and I love kids’ books and young adult books especially, so that’s a heroically hard question. And it’s usually an author I like, rather than a single book. Andre Norton is one of my favourites, both now and when I was a kid. Kenneth Oppel is an incredible writer and I loved Airborn, Skybreaker and the series of books he wrote about bats (but then, I really like bats, too.) Beth Goobie is another terrific writer. I love her stuff. Dianna Wynne Jones – Dogstar is one of my all time favourite books, and Howl’s Moving Castle is another. Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series of books has to be the best humourous fantasy going. Robert Heinlein when I was a teen – Podkayne of Mars was the very first SF book I ever read. Little Women, and Anne of Green Gables; Tim Wynne Jones, Chris Crutcher, Elizabeth Ann Scarborough, . . . the list never stops.
What are you working on now? I’m working on the revisions to my next book about Princess Ileana of Romania,
and then I’m looking forward to starting a book about D’Arcy Island and the leper colony located there in the 1890s. And I’m toying with an idea for a story about a bioengineered troll who likes music and hair ribbons.
What is your funniest teenage memory? One summer evening at our cottage, I’d just come up from the lake (in my skimpiest bikini) after swimming. The screen door had just closed when we heard a funny buzzing noise from up the hill behind the deck. Mum and Dad, on the deck with their after-dinner coffee, and I turned around to see Smokey, our cat, chasing something down the hill. His ears were perked up, his whiskers so far forward they almost crossed, and his eyes were big and black and sparkling – he was having a great time! Mum let out a yelp and Dad grabbed the machete he’d been using to clear brush. He leaped over the back of the deck, grabbed the cat and threw him at me – straight through the screen. Smokey landed on my front, all 10+ claws out and clinging, hissing like a demon. Smokey, never the brightest cat in the world, had found a Massassauga rattler to play with, and was having such fun he wanted to share it with us. The snake measured out at 31” long – very big for that species. It took four days before the cat would even look at us again, he was so mad at having his new toy wrecked and it was about two weeks before the hamburger that used to be my stomach healed up.
Biography
Only one of these biographies is true...
Bev. Cooke is actually a reclusive gold miner who lives in an undisclosed location in the far north reaches of Vancouver Island, and has discovered the world's richest lode, but is keeping it a secret for fear of setting off another gold rush. A couple of times a year, she treks from her mine (or placer, or is it just a camp in the middle of nowhere? She's not talking!) to a nearby town, to pick up groceries, do her banking, mail manuscripts and glower at the state of the world. People who have actually spoken to her report that she is a surly, sour, sarcastic woman who rarely bathes and never washes her clothes and who's been nominated to be the pest control device for the local town as a result of her personal hygiene. She's been legally banned from all public transport in the province. She carries a firearm at all times and is not shy about using it.
OR
Bev. Cooke is an introverted person who likes to stay at home and write, be with her family and play video games. She keeps trying to turn into a reclusive hermit, but her friends won't let her and keep dragging her out for coffee and conversation, where she proves she's actually not that reclusive at all. When put to the question, she will admit that she likes people, in small quantities, and enjoys nothing more than being around family and friends and pets. She hates crowds and tries to avoid them whenever possible. Her views on current issues keep getting her into trouble, as does her inability to keep quiet when she has an opinion. Since her debating skills are minimal at best, this leads to a lot of frustration as she loses any argument she gets into. She makes up for her lack of debating skill by being visually interesting when she loses - her face gets red, her eyes bug out and, if she's frustrated enough, steam leaks out her ears. When this happens, her family hustles her away and puts her in the fridge to cool down. |
