Celebrate #Diversity during #HispanicHeritageMonth #HHM

A young friend in Mexico

September 15 through October 15 is Hispanic Heritage Month! Some 55 million people in the United States identify as Hispanic, making this the second largest ethnic group.

Why September 15 to October 15? September 15 marks the anniversary of the independence of five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico celebrates its independence on September 16 while Chile’s anniversary is September 18.

According to the US government, “The Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Gallery of Art, National Park Service, Smithsonian Institution and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum join in paying tribute to the generations of Hispanic Americans who have positively influenced and enriched our nation and society.”

Mayan ruins, Tikal, Guatemala

In the Americas, many Hispanic people can trace their roots back to indigenous peoples. These include the Maya, Inca, Aztec, and others. Today’s Hispanics may also have roots in the Spanish explorers, the Africans who were brought to the New World as slaves, and of course many other cultures.

This provides teachers, librarians, homeschooling parents, and students many options for exploring Hispanic heritage in the Americas.

Middle Grade Novels and Nonfiction

Unfortunately, there aren’t many historical fiction novels about the Maya for young people. This National Geographic post only lists my novel, The Well of Sacrifice, and Seven Serpents Trilogy—Book 1, The Captive by Scott O’Dell as historical fiction for young people. It also lists a couple of travel books and titles on Mayan prophecy and myth.

Terra Experience has an extensive page of “Children’s Books on Mayan Culture, Guatemala, Southern Mexico, Nicaragua, and Latin America.” This site lists many books about current or historical Mayan people, plus Mayan legends and folk tales. Most of the books are for younger children, but picture books can work for middle grade students as well!

A Book In Time has a list of some Books on Early American Civilizations: Inca, Aztec, Mayan, & other Native Americans.

School Library Journal has a post from 2009 on The Aztecs, the Inca, and the Maya: Empires Lost & Found, with fiction and nonfiction for different grades, pus links to Museum Collections

A student project for The Well of Sacrifice

Resources

To learn more about Hispanic Heritage Month, visit the following sites:

The National Education Association provides Lesson Plans, Quizzes, Activities and Background Resources for National Hispanic Heritage Month, Grades K-5.

The US government site for National Hispanic Heritage Month includes resources for teachers and a calendar of events, mainly in and around Washington DC.

The National Endowment for the Humanities has lesson plans and links to websites on the conquistadors, the gold rush, the US-Mexican War, prayer to Ricoh, and much more. A featured lesson plan is for Esperanza Rising: Learning Not to Be Afraid to Start Over (also available inSpanish).

The PBS Hispanic Heritage Month site links to episodes about famous Latinos, issues affecting immigrants, and much more.

Scholastic offers resources for celebrating the month, including information on Latinos in history and Hispanic history in the Americas. Scholastic also has Bring Hispanic Heritage Month to Life: A Collection of Resources and 24 Great Ideas for Hispanic Heritage Month.

Hispanic Heritage Month includes information on the history of the month, people, events, and fun facts.

Please add any recommended books or resources in the comments.

Chris Eboch’s novels for ages nine and up include The Eyes of Pharaoh, a mystery in ancient Egypt; The Well of Sacrifice, a Mayan adventure; The Genie’s Gift, a middle eastern fantasy; and the Haunted series, about kids who travel with a ghost hunter TV show, which starts with The Ghost on the Stairs. 

Her writing craft books include You Can Write for Children: How to Write Great Stories, Articles, and Books for Kids and Teenagers, and Advanced Plotting. 

Learn more at www.chriseboch.com or her Amazon page.

Theme: Too Many Messages?

Last week I discussed how to identify and develop your theme. That helps overcome the problem of a weak or confusing theme. But I also sometimes critique stories where the author seems to be trying to explain everything they believe about life, the universe, and... well, everything.

For younger readers and short stories, you need to keep the theme simple. The longer the story or novel, and the older the reader, the more complex you can be. At first a book may appear to be a humorous romance, but as the story unfolds, it may reveal a theme about honesty in relationships.

Your theme doesn’t have to be obvious from your first paragraph, and probably shouldn’t be. In fact, the theme may only be clear from the final twist in the story. The theme can be revealed through what the main character learns, how she changes, what she gains or loses.

As part of your revisions (or in the planning stage, if you are really organized), work on your character in order to set up your theme. Use her virtues and vices. How will her strengths help her? What weaknesses does she have to overcome? Make sure these tie into the theme. In The Well of Sacrifice, Eveningstar discovers that she can't count on other people to solve her city's problems -- she has to act. Her courage and deep-seated honesty help her, but she has to overcome the shyness and insecurity that would prefer to let others take center stage.

For longer works, think about how you can use other characters or subplots to support or expand on your theme. Maybe your main character learns to be honest in her relationships, and so develops a loving connection with her boyfriend. In contrast, her friend might keep lying in order to make a good impression, and get dumped, or wind up with a shallow, dissatisfying relationship. A subplot with the main character’s divorced parents could explore the theme in yet another way.

Although you should be able to clearly identify a single main theme, you may have additional themes. Holly Cupala said in an interview, “The theme I seem to be writing is that you can’t find yourself in other people. It’s very much there in Tell Me A Secret as well as the novel I’m working on now. Then there are the peripheral themes—looking to the past for meaning versus looking to the future for purpose, wanting to be loved for who you are, trading blame for hope.” 

Multiple themes can give a novel extra depth and power. However, don’t let your story get cluttered with too many themes, especially wildly different ones. If you try to share everything you believe about life in one story, it will just feel cluttered and confusing. Focus on one primary theme, and save the others for different works. For example, my middle grade historical mystery, The Eyes of Pharaoh, touches on immigration issues and homeland security (in ancient Egypt, but relevant today). But my main theme can be summed up by these words spoken by Pharaoh toward the end.

“Every Egyptian is my child,” he said, “and I am responsible for them all. By serving one of them, you serve me. If everyone acted with love and courage out of loyalty to their friends, I wouldn’t need soldiers or guards, tax collectors or spies.”

That brings the political commentary down to a personal level and focuses on the main theme -- that supporting your friends and family can sometimes be more important than focusing just on your own success. 

So for short fiction, keep your theme simple and focused. For longer work, you can delve more deeply into the nuances of your theme, but it's still best to have a single primary theme. You can explore different aspects of that to give your story depth, but don't try to share everything you believe in one story.

The Drama of a Place

I've been discussing ways to add tension to your stories, by making better use of elements such as the villain or secondary characters. You can also look to your setting for more drama. Sometimes the possibilities are obvious. In my Mayan historical adventure, The Well of Sacrifice, I opened with the heroine gathering medicinal plants in the jungle, and running into a tribe of savages. In later chapters, she gets trapped inside the dead king’s sealed tomb, and then thrown into a sacrificial well. How's that for a dramatic use of setting!

But not every book has to have tombs or cliffs. Even everyday settings such as school or a suburban neighborhood can provide elements for adding drama, humor, or other interest.

In the Haunted books, the "setting" is a traveling ghost hunter TV show, with different specific settings for each book. In my first version of The Ghost on the Stairs, the kids watched some of the filming, but I didn’t use the TV show much. While expanding the novel, I added a chapter where they try out the ghost hunter gadgets, and another where their stepfather interviews people who have claimed to see the ghost. Both these offered opportunities for humor, as only the kids knew whether the gadgets were really working, and whether the interview subjects were telling the truth.

I used the individual settings specific to each book as well. The Riverboat Phantom takes place on a Mississippi steamboat, where action scenes include a fight in the boiler room and a ghost-induced hurricane on the top deck. The Knight in the Shadows starts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and involves a subway journey to The Cloisters. The MET and The Cloisters are full of interesting elements. A subway is even more intriguing to a kid who's never been on one, but add a ghost to the mix, and you get action and humor.

Tip: Look for ways to use your setting to add complications. What if the weather changed? What if they went somewhere without cell phone reception? What if they had to pass through a bad neighborhood—or sneak through a rich gated community with a guard? If your setting could be Anywhere, USA, charge it up for dramatic value.

Example: Look at the movie Sweet Home Alabama. Would it be the same if the main character only had to go home to New Jersey?