J.E. THOMAS IS A WRITER, author and award-winning freelance journalist. Her first book is Control Freaks, a People Magazine summer must-read as a best-of-best pick by the Black Caucus of the American Library Association. Her new book is The AI Incident, just out from Levine Querido and distributed by Chronicle Books. Listen in as she and I discuss how to choose the best opening for a book, how to write into what’s coming next, and so much more.

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J.E. Hi, Marion. I’m great. Thank you so much for having me.

Marion: Well, it’s wonderful to have you here. I’m a super fan, and not the least of which is because of your promotional material, which I just love the descriptions of you. They’re on your website and in interviews.

I’ve read that you spent your early summers stuffing grocery bags with books at your local library. There’s something about that that’s just so wonderful, the fact that you’re stuffing grocery bags, and reading feverishly and then repeating the process every week. So what were you reading so feverishly as a child?

J.E.:  I read virtually everything I could get my hands on. My poor mother, we lived walking distance from our local library. And every summer, my school would give us a little card that we would have to read at least eight books. We’d have to write the titles of eight books on. And I would probably finish that the first weekend. Yes.

And so, my mom would have to follow me to the library as I skipped ahead and had a brown grocery bag, a ground paper grocery bag. And I’d just go through the children’s book stacks, and I’d grab books.

Then I started reading above my grade level. And so, I would just go into the science fiction books and the horse books. I read every horse book I could find. And I loved it. I loved it. I think I read all those horse books, by the way, because I thought even though I lived in the city, if I read enough of them, I would get a horse for Christmas. I never did.

Marion: Oh. That was going to be my next question is what were you looking for? Because the seeker in us starts early if we read a lot. And so, you were looking for a horse. Okay, we’ve established that. And did you see yourself on the bookshelves? Did you see girls like you on the bookshelves of your early childhood reading?

J.E. I didn’t, but I had a very vivid imagination. I like to call it a “very vivid imagination.” My parents would say I daydreamed a lot, but I’d make up my own stories. I think by the time I was four, I was writing my own stories. There weren’t a lot of words to them, to be honest. I’d make up my own stories and then I could be the hero of whatever adventure I had.

Marion: And did you get support for that writing? Did your family ask you to read it? Did you keep it secret? I’m interested then how you transitioned to being someone who felt comfortable offering her work into the world. So, did you have support early on for your writing or did that come later or just talk to me a little bit about that.

J.E.: I did have support to a certain extent.

My parents had an old picture, which I’ve lost and I would probably give anything to find it, of myself when I was about four and a half, I guess, scooting up to a little chair, a little table and I was sitting in a little chair and I was just writing away. I have no idea what I was writing.

So, they definitely encouraged that. I grew up before the age of audio books and my mom – my  dad was in the military and he was deployed overseas – my mom would read Mother Goose stories in an old reel-to-reel tape recorder and play those back. So, I had my own little audio library and then I started writing. I knew I wanted to be a storyteller. I knew I wanted to be an author.

My parents had a different dream for me, actually. And so I wound up going into corporate America and working in marketing and PR and then also freelance writing on the side and taking a lot of writing craft classes all along. So, it was a dream that I nurtured while also pursuing a different career.

Marion: Yeah, I think that’s one of the things that I have a lot of conversations with people about earning the right to write. I mean, you have to be able to pay for the rent, and for food and utilities, and all of that. But with that, I love the reel-to-reel aspect of your mother’s story presentation. That’s interesting and unique. No one’s ever told me that before. That has got to have been very encouraging to hear her voice reading Grimm’s Fairy Tales or any other number of things. Yeah, it’s just a great detail. I mean, it would be a lovely way to have story delivered and apparently it worked.

J.E.: It absolutely did.

MARION Yeah. Well, your new book, The AI Incident, is for ages 8 through 12 and at 256 pages, it’s a great read for kids, but it’s also a great read for adults. And that great read begins on the first page with a checklist. And that checklist made me gasp. First because it’s a device. As a device, it’s so unexpected. Checklists usually come at the end of chapters or the end of books. But this one, written by the novel’s young protagonist, sets up the drama by giving the main character a deadline.

The protagonist is Malcolm Montgomery, and his checklist is called “Malcolm Montgomery’s How to Get Adopted Checklist.” And Malcolm needs to get out of foster care and get adopted by the time he’s 13, he believes, because, as he writes at the bottom of that list, “nobody gets adopted once they turn 13.” And time is running out. So let’s start there. That checklist is funny and charming and utterly heartbreaking and thoroughly surprising. Talk to me about that checklist, its contents, and your decision to place it at the opening of this fine novel.

J.E.: Ooh, thank you. That’s a great question. There was so much to Malcolm. So much of his character is someone who internalizes situations.

He believes it’s his fault that he hasn’t been adopted. He believes that if he transforms himself into the perfect kid, then he will, and I’m making quote marks here, “earn a family.” So, I wanted to show that. I wanted to show how internalizing a situation can present itself. And that’s why I did the checklist. So, when I turned in the manuscript to my editor, I had that checklist drawn out. I had that little character of him on the side saying, “Maybe I need to find something else other than art because I’m not a very good artist.” I turned that into my editor, and he was very open to that concept.

Marion: I’m so glad. And it’s the kibitzing in of Malcolm on the sidelines and the margins that’s so poignant and his realization of who he is, of the things that are not checked off. And I found it to be a great curiosity. And then again, as we said, it presents this deadline. And he’s a very unlucky foster kid. He’s a new kid in the school. And just that phrase makes me want to lie down. If you’ve ever been the new kid, you never forget it. And he’s labeled weird. He’s been in nine foster homes. And that sent me to do a little reporting where I found that according to the data from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, more than a third of children in foster care get three or more placements each year. Wow.

While there are several truly pressing issues you take on in this book, let’s start with the foster care system. Why did you write into that space?

J.E.: I wrote it for a couple of reasons. One is I did some research on foster care. And I really wanted to present a foster child who becomes the hero of his own story, whose foster care-ness is not the entirety of his identity. So, I was really looking into that.

And then also, my dad was raised by aunts. So, he was in “kin care,” that’s K-I-N care. And he talked a lot during his lifetime about how living with aunts and uncles affected him as a child and then continued to affect him as an adult. It was one of those things that never changes. He had a wonderful experience. He loved the people who raised him deeply. But it still was, I think, impactful for him long-term.

Marion: Of course it is. And you do some wonderful reporting. And I always check in the acknowledgments of a book to see who gets thanked. And you thank someone named Sherry, who shared insights from her decades-long experiences in childcare services.

And my audience is writers. And they always want to know about making that call. Can you call up someone who does something for a living and ask them about that? I have said this many times on this podcast. I have never had anyone say no to me when I’ve asked them, “Can I ask you about what you do for a living?” But beginning writers are very reluctant. I have to talk people into it. Even if it’s calling their Aunt Jane and just asking, “What was the name of your dog when I was a kid?” People don’t like to do reporting. So can you dig a little bit further into it about the foster care reporting you did with Sherry and how it informed you about the system?

E.: Oh, absolutely. I was able to lean into past careers of freelance journalist. So I was comfortable asking questions. But I was apprehensive, asking permission to ask questions. So do you remember that old, I don’t know if it was ever a physical game, but there was an old concept called six degrees of Kevin Bacon.

Marion: Oh, absolutely.

J.E. : Yes. And for those who aren’t familiar with it, it’s this theory that you know someone who knows someone who knows someone, and ultimately you are six people away from Kevin Bacon who seems to know everyone.

Marion: So poor man, poor, poor man, I’m still waiting for him to call me and say, hi, but I’ve not heard from him recently, no.

J.E.: But what I did was I called friends of mine and I said, “I am working on this book. Do you know anyone who worked in the foster care system?” And that’s how I connected with Sherry. So, it was someone made a virtual introduction for me.

Marion: Yeah. And that’s what you do, right? Whether it be somebody who can explain the foster care system to you, because perhaps you were in it, but you don’t have a lot of memory of it. It’s a good thing to do. It gives a book some authority and it gives the book some solid foundation to build the story on.

And I think you did a beautiful job here. We came away with a real sense of poignancy, but also a real sense of this child living within this system. And along with the foster care system, another major theme of this book is AI. And I love that you set this in a children’s space, since they are the exact population whose lives will be saturated with AI. And so, let’s start with children’s literature, just so we can establish why did you place this book within that reading audience, the eight to 12-year-olds?

J.E.: So there are a couple of reasons. One is when I was trying to figure out what genre I would write toward, and this was pre-Control Freaks, I took a class and I just couldn’t find my voice. I thought, oh, I’m going to write the next beach read and that didn’t happen. I’m going to write corporate intrigue and that didn’t happen.

I took a class from an organization in Denver called Lighthouse Writers. And the instructor said, “You will find your voice.” He was talking to the class at large, but he said, “You’ll find your voice when you are writing to the emotional age at which you are sort of stuck.” And apparently mine was 12.

And once I started writing for middle grade, I found the voice. I slipped right into that voice. I think I’ve matured, by the way.

Marion: Soon to be a YA novelist.

J.E.: I also, as you said, AI is something that’s going to impact this younger generation in ways that we can’t even imagine. So, as I was doing my research, I did something that sounds kind of weird. I actually logged into a couple of AI programs to ask, “How many AI programs are there?”

 I think we tend to use the term AI as though it’s just this one thing. There’s only one AI.

And, not surprisingly, I got two different answers from two different programs, but both of them said there were more than 60,000 different AI programs. And I don’t recall the number of ed tech or education technology AI programs offhand, but I do remember that there were at least five figures in that number.

So, the fact that AI is impacting school curricula, the fact that it’s impacting teachers’ careers and young lives was something that made me just want to bring it into the school. And as we hear more and more about AI replacing certain jobs, I thought at the time, and keep in mind, there’s usually an 18-month cycle from the time a manuscript is sold to the time it comes on the shelf.

And then years before that, for the writing process, I thought, Okay, I will just set this up as though an AI could replace teachers, because that is never going to happen. So now as it’s coming out, there are stories of schools that are looking at AI applications, handling certain aspects of education, and it just is becoming quite real. So that was a long and sort of windy answer.

Marion: It was a great answer. And I think that that covers a lot of territory in terms of what might interest you and then what might happen at what pace when you’re writing, and that we might be where you are. And that’s one of the reasons I love this book, is it feels like it’s perfect for right now.

And you also, while this AI character in the book takes the form of a rogue robot, but what you take on through that is, as a writer, is code bias, as defined by the racial prejudices within facial recognition algorithms, resulting in a threat to civil liberties that AI provides. So, let’s go there.

Writers want to be relevant. Writers want to write into that time we feel coming. Writers need to react to what’s going on in the world, but they frequently struggle with turning it into story. So just let’s, even though you think that was a windy answer, I think it was great and a great setup for just take me into the moment when you realize that code bias was among the major themes you would explore in this novel.

J.E.: There is an organization called the Algorithmic Justice League that has a lot of incredible information about code bias. And I delved into their treasure trove, I suppose, of videos and there’s a documentary and the organizer of that group talked about her time in, I think she was in graduate school, when she was working with an AI application that couldn’t see her. It didn’t recognize her face, which is something that is presented in the book as well, where the AI application doesn’t recognize Malcolm’s face.

And I wanted to put that in, but I think also I was walking that line of, I wanted this to be humorous versus feeling like oppressive and there’s nothing we can do about it. I wanted the characters in the book to work together to recognize and solve this particular problem, to bring it to the attention of the creator of the rogue AI to a level that he had to address it.

So, that’s really one of the things that I wanted to show. And I also thought it was very important for readers to understand that this can happen to anybody.

Marion: Yes

J.E.: And so, it’s depending on how the AI application is programmed, anybody could be falsely accused, falsely recognized, not recognized at all.

Marion: It makes such a good point and situated as it is with children within a children’s social group, a school group, it’s even more shocking or more informing depending on who you are. And I think that I was fascinated how you kept these big themes, these big issues spinning through the whole book.

So, let’s talk about mapping out a book. Writers have habits. Some people use a big old piece of cardboard. Some people use index cards. Some people use software programs. And I always try to talk to writers about how they map out their books with the major themes of AI, code bias, the complex issues of family. Ultimately, this novel is about what it means to be human. So ,that’s a lot. So, did you have a big old chart up on your wall? Did you use index cards to map out your scenes and themes? Did you use a software program? How did you not only plan this, but keep all this straight as you moved through this story?

J.E.: Well, my husband would say I was incoherent throughout the writing process.

Marion: Well, then we’re not asking him.

J.E.: I tried one approach with Control Freaks. I expanded on it slightly with the AI incident. So I’ll tell you what those approaches were, and then I’ll tell you what I’m going to use going forward because that might be helpful as well. I created an author’s journal or a book journal. And in that, I mapped out the book, and it literally changed every entry.

I was in despair. I thought I was going down one path, I’d wind up going down another. I had bullet points, and then also each entry had a description of what I thought I would accomplish that day. And then at the end, it said, here’s what I actually accomplished that day.

Marion: Ooooh. No.

J.E.: I know. Ooh. I know. When I was doing Control Freaks, I had one entry where I woke up and I was feeling full of the power of the muse, and I said, I’m going to write 2,500 words, and I’m going to finish this chapter, and I’m just on fire. And at the end of the day, the entry was, I think I wrote 25 words maybe, I’m never going to finish this book, I don’t know what I’m doing. But being able to go back and look at those entries was hugely helpful.

And it also kept me tracking with what I thought I was working on. And I worked on both books with an amazing editor at Levine Carrido named Nick Thomas, no relation, who is so good at asking questions. He doesn’t send feedback back that says, “Change this, do that.” But he will ask questions like, “What is this person doing at this moment? What is this person feeling?”

And those questions helped me delve deeper and deeper into the book. And then I also used an application called Word Tracker, which is great at allowing you to set a finish date and an approximate word count, and the days that you want to write. And then it tells you how many words you’re supposed to write. It has a little built-in timer, so I used that.

And then, the last thing that I did was I set up accessibility on my laptop so that the computer would read back to me, and I could hear text in a different voice, which gave me some distance.

Marion: Oooooh.

J.E.: So yeah, that is so handy. And I was even able to change the voice so it would sound like a 12-year-old boy. And that was super handy.

Marion: Wow.

J.E: Yeah. Yeah. Wow.

Marion: I read everything aloud to myself after I’ve written, and it’s something I’ve done since I, well, since I was in my 20s, it was taught to me by a great editor in New York. But to have it read back to you in a different voice and be able to program it to sound like Malcolm, oh yeah, okay, now I’m really interested in what that’s going to do for us. And it so reminds me of your story of having your mother tape those stories. You know, it’s in your heritage, it’s in your, well, it’s in your DNA. And that’s lovely. That’s lovely. Oh, are we just having that realization together?

J.E.: Yes. Uh-oh. Yes. Yes. And I’ll tell you, I use a Mac. So I didn’t have to upload my text to an external application or use an AI program to read it. I just set it to accessibility and I had a number of different voice choices.

Marion: That’s just fantastic. I love that detail. Everybody is now going to be doing that. That’s just so great.

So let’s just turn to the world we live in right now for a minute, because right now in America we have direct bans, indirect restrictions, state level actions, and local level actions directed at the content of public library shelves. And while PEN America states that it’s difficult to give a precise number of states that allow book banning, they have identified that book bans occurred in at least 29 states and 220 public school districts last year.

So, topics that are predominantly banned are books on gender, identity, and race. Did you consider the threat of being banned while writing this book?

J.E.: I tried not to. I mean, it’s definitely an issue that’s very hard to ignore, nor do I think that we should. But I wanted to tell a story. So I had to keep focused on telling that story.

Marion: Yeah. That is it, isn’t it? Just to hold your course. I think I worked with writers all day long and it’s probably the sentence I say most often people look up and say, “Oh God, what world am I writing into?” To me, when I work with memoir writers and you can imagine the amount of trauma, trauma around gender, trauma around race, trauma, trauma, trauma that we talk about all day long. And when they look up and think about the world they’re writing into, sometimes they really stumble. And I think you’re right. I think it’s just keep your head down, keep writing and do what you believe in. Yeah, absolutely.

J.E.: Yeah. I remember talking with a young person, I think it was after a school visit or so when Control Freaks was out and this was at an extremely well-resourced school. And the girl came up to me and she said, “I really like your book because it made me laugh. I don’t laugh that much anymore.”

Marion: Oh.

J.E.: And so as I was writing this book, I was thinking, both books, actually, but as I was writing The AI Incident, I also thought about bringing joy to kids. And so this is a book where I wanted them to be able to laugh. And I wanted it to appeal to all readers, but also to reluctant readers. So, the chapters are short, they’re not intimidating. It’s easy to engage. There’s age-appropriate humor. That was my audience. And so, I focused on that.

Marion: Well, you brought a lot of joy to this reader and you’re going to bring a great deal of joy to the world with this book. I just can’t thank you enough, both for your books and for this lovely interview. And I think that’s a good place to leave it. Let’s leave it with joy. How about that?

J.E.: That sounds great.

Marion: Yeah. Thank you, J.E. I’m a super fan now. So, I can’t wait for the next one. And I’m going to go explore my computer about accessibility. That is a cool tip. Thank you for that

J.E.: Thank you so much.

Marion: You’re so welcome. The author is J.E. Thomas. See more on her at j e thomas author dot com. The book is The AI Incident, just out from Levine Querido, distributed by Chronicle Books. I’m Marion Roach Smith, and you’ve been listening to QWERTY. QWERTY is produced by Overit Studios in Albany, New York. Reach them at overit studios dot com. Our producer is Jacqueline Mignot. Our assistant is Lorna Bailey. Want more on the art and work of writing? Visit Marion Roach dot com, the home of The Memoir Project, where writers get their needs met through online classes and how to write memoir. And thanks for listening. Don’t forget to follow QWERTY wherever you get your podcasts and listen to it wherever you go. And if you like what you hear, please leave us a review. It helps others to find their way to their writing lives.

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