Patron, Susan 1948-

Personal

Born March 18, 1948, in San Gabriel, CA; daughter of George Thomas (a business owner) and Rubye (a homemaker) Hall; married Rene Albert Patron (a rare book restorer), July 27, 1969. Education: Pitzer College, B.A., 1969; Immaculate Heart College, M.L.S., 1972.

Addresses

Home—CA.

Career

Librarian and author. Los Angeles Public Library, Los Angeles, CA, children's librarian, 1972-79, senior children's librarian, 1979-2007. Served on several awards committees; taught courses in children's literature. Member of board of advisors, KCET public television's Storytime program.

Member

Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (member of board), Author's Guild, American Library Association, California Library Association, International Guild of Knot Tyers.

Awards, Honors

American Library Notable Book designation, 1993, and Parenting magazine Certificate of Excellence, both for Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe; Children's Literature Council of Southern California Dorothy McKenzie Award, Friends of Children and Literature Award, PEN USA Literary Award finalist in children's literature category, and Newbery Medal for Children's Literature, all 2007, all for The Higher Power of Lucky.

Writings

(With Christopher Weimann) Marbled Papers: Being a Collection of Twenty-two Contemporary Hand-Marbled Papers, Dawson's Book Shop, 1978.

Burgoo Stew, illustrated by Mike Shenon, Orchard Books (New York, NY), 1991.

Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, illustrated by Mike Shenon, Orchard Books (New York, NY), 1992.

Bobbin Dustdobbin, illustrated by Mike Shenon, Orchard Books (New York, NY), 1993.

Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe, illustrated by Dorothy Donahue, Orchard Books (New York, NY), 1993.

Dark Cloud Strong Breeze, illustrated by Peter Catalanotto, Orchard Books (New York, NY), 1994.

The Higher Power of Lucky, illustrated by Matt Phelan, Atheneum (New York, NY), 2006.

Work included in anthology Expectations, published in Braille, 1992. Contributor of reviews to periodicals, including School Library Journal and Five Owls.

Adaptations

The Higher Power of Lucky was adapted as an audiobook by Listening Library, 2007.

Sidelights

Susan Patron grew up in Los Angeles, California, the middle of three sisters and, as she once told SATA, "a reader, dreamer, eavesdropper, washer of cars, shiner of shoes, mower of lawns, director of elaborate neighborhood plays, and teller of stories." Although she eventually pursued a career in library science, Patron also channeled her natural curiosity, her admitted expertise as an eavesdropper, and her skills as an observer into writing. Writing for the elementary grades, she has produced the books Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, Dark Cloud Strong Breeze, and Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe, as well as her Newbery Medal-winning novel The Higher Power of Lucky. "I hope that by sharing vividly remembered feelings from childhood in my stories, I will be giving readers or listeners a way of recognizing and articulating their own," Patron noted of her work writing for children.

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Patron knew by age eight that she wanted to be a writer. "Confiding this ambition to my father, I received both encouragement (go ahead: if you want to be a writer, write) and excellent advice (learn how to type)," she recalled. "He also told me I wouldn't have to go far to find story ideas; all I had to do was keep my ears open. He was right. I began eavesdropping and hearing stories everywhere." After graduating with a B.A. from Pitzer College, she earned a library-science degree and in 1972 joined the staff of the Los Angeles Public Library, where she worked until her retirement in 2007. As a children's librarian, Patron read numerous children's books to groups of preschoolers and elementary school children. In addition to creating STORY: Seniors Taking the Opportunity to Reach Youth, an innovative program in which older adults were recruited and taught storytelling techniques, Patron also gained a familiarity with the stories young readers most enjoyed. Her first book, Burgoo Stew, was published in 1991, beginning her career as a children's book author. Describing the book as a "jaunty variation" on the classic story "Stone Soup," a Publishers Weekly reviewer praised Patron's debut picture book as "superbly narrated" and "an ideal read-aloud."

In Patron's novels Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin and Bobbin Dustdobbin, the protagonist from Burgoo Stew returns to entertain readers. In these picture books Billy Que is joined by several of his ne'erdowell friends, as well as by Hob and Bobbin, a pair of "dustdobbins" that live amid the dust beneath Billy Que's bed. In Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin Billy Que almost steps on the tiny Hob, prompting the angry creature to shrink the man to pencil height and assign him a series of tasks in the hopes that he become more tolerant of tiny creatures. Brought to life in watercolor art by Mike Shenon, Bobbin Dustdobbin finds a dustdobbin family threatened when the five bad boys arrive to celebrate Billy Que's birthday and offer to do gus chores—including sweeping the dust out from under the bed. Noting the "sly humor" in Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, as well as Shenon's "large, comical illustrations," Horn Book contributor Hanna B. Zieger deemed the work "an original and satisfying story to share." "Patron's ambitious text has plenty of verve," noted a Publishers Weekly contributor in reviewing Bobbin Dustdobbin, and Maeve Visser Knoth deemed the story "clever and very funny" in her Horn Book review. "I hear in my mind the voices of my Mississippi grandparents, Baby R. Della and Homer, as these stories spin out," Patron explained of her "Billy Que" books, adding that "they are meant to be told or read aloud like stories from the folk tradition."

Dark Cloud Strong Breeze takes a folkloric approach to a modern predicament as a girl and her father find themselves locked outside their automobile as an ominous rainstorm approaches. While Dad fumbles with the lock, the daughter takes a more active approach to the problem, and goes in search of a locksmith. As each step toward an ultimate solution brings its own problem, the girl soon enlists the help of a succession of other people and animals to solve the problem. "Patron's distinctive language makes this an obvious choice" for storytelling, according to Booklist reviewer Kay Weisman, and in Publishers Weekly a critic cited the story's "insistently rhythmic rhyme" as well as praising illustrator Peter Catalanotto's "splendid paintings." Describing Dark Cloud Strong Breeze as "a rhythmic, circular tale for very young children [that] moves back and forth between the fanciful and the mundane, the wish-world and the everyday one," Patron herself was especially pleased with the book's illustrations. "I had long admired the way that the artist Peter Catalanotto paints both [fanciful and mundane] qualities into his beautiful illustrations, so I asked my editor, Richard Jackson—a man of great vision—whether he thought Mr. Catalanotto might be interested in working on my story. To my great happiness, he was."

Moving to slightly older readers, Patron's elementary-grade novel Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe focuses on middle sister PK, who is sandwiched between the drama of beautiful, pre-adolescent older sister Megan and the incessant questions posed by tenacious little sister Rabbit. With a working mom, the sisters look to each other much of the time, and imaginative PK provides the spark to inspire creativity and fun; as a Publishers Weekly critic noted, "PK's dreamy and determined character is endearing; her small revelations are the very stuff that growing up is made of." When the family must move to a new apartment, their feelings of dislocation are soothed by PK's characteristically entertaining stories. "It is the author's distinctive voice and characters rather than the plot that drive this engaging novel," wrote Horn Book contributor Nancy Vasilakis in a review of Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe. As Vasilakis added, Patron's book will appeal to "gifted readers" through its insightful story and beginning chapter-book readers due to its simple vocabulary.

A dozen years would pass between Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe and Patron's next book, the Newbery Medal-winning novel The Higher Power of Lucky. The reasons for the lengthy span were several: a form of writer's block that prevented Patron from finding the emotional core of the story; the death of her mother enabled Patron to unlock the feelings of sadness and loss that motivate the actions of her young protagonist and ground them in the complex backstory. On the heels of her Newbery win, Patron was hard at work on a sequel to the novel, scheduled for publication in 2009.

In The Higher Power of Lucky, readers meet ten-year-old Lucky Trimble, a girl whose love of both stories and science inspires her to want more than what her small California desert mining town can offer. Lucky is fascinated with the emotional lives of others in town, particularly Short Sammy, a local hippie/recovering alcoholic who often speaks at the many twelve-step group meetings she overhears. Like the twelve-steppers, the girl hopes to discover her own "higher power," and she estimates that the tragic death of her mom, the disinterest of her widowed father, and the ennui she senses in her legal guardian combine intensity to qualify as hitting rock bottom. Fearing abandonment, Lucky ultimately runs away from home during a dust storm, and ultimately comes to term with her grief while learning to appreciate her unique situation and its many blessings. "Lucky is a true heroine, especially because she's not perfect," maintained Francisca Goldsmith in Booklist, and School Library Journal reviewer Adrienne Furness cited the novel's austere setting as well as its "quirky cast and local color." Dubbing The Higher Power of Lucky "a small gem," a Kirkus Reviews writer praised Patron as a "master of light but sure characterization and closely observed detail." In its short chapters, told in the third person, the book "reflect[s] the cyclical, episodic nature of life" in small-town California, noted Horn Book contributor Elissa R. Gershowitz, the critic praising Patron's "meandering yet meticulously crafted sentences" and "sensory descriptions" of her book's unique characters and stark desert setting.

Biographical and Critical Sources

PERIODICALS

Booklist, September 15, 1991, review of Burgoo Stew, p. 153; November 1, 1992, Ilene Cooper, review of Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, p. 522; March 15, 1993, Deborah Abbott, review of Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe, p. 1322; March 15, 1994, Kay Weisman, review of Dark Cloud Strong Breeze, p. 1374; December 1, 2006, Francisca Goldsmith, review of The Higher Power of Lucky, p. 178.

Horn Book, September-October, 1991, Ellen Fader, review of Burgoo Stew, p. 606; January-February, 1993, Hanna B. Zeiger, review of Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, p. 77; July-August, 1993, Nancy Vasilakis, review of Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe, p. 459; March-April, 1994, Maeve Visser Knoth, review of Bobbin Dustdobbin, p. 225; May-June, 1994, Nancy Vasilakis, review of Dark Cloud Strong Breeze, p. 318; January-February, 2007, Elissa R. Gershowitz, review of The Higher Power of Lucky, p. 71; July-August, 2007, Richard Jackson, review of The Higher Power of Lucky, p. 339, and Susan Patron, transcript of Newbery Acceptance Speech.

Kirkus Reviews, July 15, 1991, review of Burgoo Stew, p. 939; September 1, 1992, review of Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, p. 1133; March 3, 1993; October 15, 2006, review of The Higher Power of Lucky, p. 1077.

Publishers Weekly, August 23, 1991, review of Burgoo Stew, p. 61; August 31, 1992, review of Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin, p. 77; April 5, 1993, review of Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe, p. 78; September 6, 1993, review of Bobbin Dustdobbin, p.95; January 31, 1994, review of Dark Cloud Strong Breeze, p. 88; March 6, 1995.

School Library Journal, October, 1991, review of Burgoo Stew, pp. 111-112; December, 1992, review of Five Bad Boys, Billy Que, and the Dustdobbin; March, 1993; October, 1993, p. 107, review of Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe; December, 2006, Adrienne Furness, review of The Higher Power of Lucky, p. 152.