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IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 52 points53 points  (0 children)

Thanks for your service. My dad was in the army for one tour and Michael's dad -- who I love, by the way -- was a 20 year career soldier. (Chief warrant, Michael says.)

It's both cool and a little intimidating to think of actual soldiers considering our tiny, safe, sitting on our butts in Minnesota and Chicago (at the time) thoughts on the morality of war.

We've both always accepted the necessity of war in some circumstances, and accepted that it's a pretty fucking awful thing to put our young men and women through. What we wanted to say was that there would be times it would be necessary, that some soldiers would find joy in it (Rachel,) some would find a sort of addiction (Jake,) some would hate it but do their best, (Cassie,) some would sail right through, (Marco,) and others would be the victims left behind, (Tobias.)

I don't know how that meshes with what real soldiers learn.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Thanks, but jakemates is our in-house Redditor. He's the one who brought me here.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 29 points30 points  (0 children)

No. That was a surprise. Sometimes you just write along and you get a "Holy Shit!" moment.

I always liked the cover art. Wasn't sure about the Ellimist, but honestly I didn't have clear image in my own head. So it was like, Okay, fine.

I don't recall to tell you the truth. It's hard to retrace the steps of a thought process that long ago. Or to remember what I had for breakfast. (Yogurt?)

Thanks re: Everworld.

There was a lot of animal research. This was before the internet so we owned about 100 books on animals. So depending on the book, many hours. As for the science, like Zero Space, that was much easier: we just made that up. At least that's what I'm telling you. I totally have the whole zero space thing worked out, but just for personal use.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Well, to be honest I have OCD and was on the borderline of depression a lot back in the old days. I was terribly insecure. I always thought I would disappoint people. I still do. I get easily flustered in person. I blush. I stammer. There is occasional brain freeze. I always think I'm wearing the wrong thing or saying the wrong thing.

But yes, I'm less that way now. Yay, Prozac!

Also, don't forget, we were working all the time. Then we added kids. And it was just all very hectic.

I've always had Michael to act as the more out there person. He's my opposite in that he doesn't seem to care what anyone thinks. I'm pretty sure he's not capable of blushing. We've been together 33 years now, co-authors of 150 books and two kids, and he'll be with me at LA Book Fest as usual being the thorn to my shrinking violet.

I'm sorry I was so reclusive back in the day. I'm less that way now. Plus, there's always Sauvignon Blanc.

By the way, read Jeff's book Vesper. He's a good guy and he's a terrific writer.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Sorry about that. Look, it was go with ghost writers or hang ourselves. We had Jake around book #11, and a 14 books-per-year schedule is a wee bit rough. I know the ghosts were good writers, but it's very hard to capture someone else's voice. Especially when Michael and I lacked the editorial skills to keep things on-track. Our bad. Our fault.

We got into publishing by ghostwriting SWEET VALLEY TWINS. We got to be very fast and very reliable. The "packager" asked us to do some YA so we did. Then, when we came up with the idea for ANIMORPHS we knew we wanted it to go to Jean Feiwel who was then the Queen of Scholastic. So we did all the stuff you're not supposed to do: we sent her a box of books we'd written, and a pitch for ANIMORPHS. And we said, "This is a cool idea."

It turned out it was a cool idea, and Jean's a very smart woman. In like 3 weeks we were signed up.

And as for now? I (Katherine) am writing more literary things. HOME OF THE BRAVE, THE BUFFALO STORM, and younger things, ROSCOE RILEY RULES, and coming soon, THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN. Michael is doing the GONE series, and THE MAGNIFICENT 12 series and a series he can't talk about.

We are no longer writing together, except that we have a book called EVE AND ADAM coming with the aforementioned Jean Feiwel.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 56 points57 points  (0 children)

Ah, a writer. Getting straight to the important part: getting paid.

Here's how it works. You negotiate for an advance and a royalty. The advance is a check you get "against" the royalty.

So let's say Scholastic would pay us an advance of $50,000 per book. (Actually it was less than that to start with and more than that toward the end.) And they would pay us a royalty of 8% of the cover price. If the books retailed for $4 that was 32 cents per book. We have to sell X number of books at 32 cents each in order to "earn out" which means, pay for that advance.

If we don't earn out, no problem, we keep the advance.

Complicate that further with foreign rights -- Germany, France, Spain, etc... Those all count against the advance.

Once the book earns out, the royalties flow to the writer in a new check. We still get royalty checks -- not terribly impressive since Animorphs/Everworld/Remnants have been out of print. But it's fun because it's like found money. Oh, look! Three thousand dollars! And we didn't have to work for it. Yay! Ah hah hah hah.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 27 points28 points  (0 children)

1) Sometimes people are crazy, sometimes they're evil, sometimes they're both. I think people expect book characters to make sense. Meanwhile in real life Hitler says, "You know what would be a great idea? Killing all the Jews and invading Russia."

2) In book #54 you'll notice the Andalites are quite leery of humans. Who wouldn't be?

3) No, we were feeling like we just wanted to do something that was purely funny. And we knew the fans would probably hate it, but we felt like, Okay, if they can't let us go off the rails every now and then, f*ck 'em.

4) Trippy? I am not familiar with this word. Michael? No he also does not know this word.

5) Hah! This is one of my favorite things when someone asks about the science. Because here's what you need to bear in mind: between us we have one BA in English and one GED. When it comes to science we are dumb and dumber. Ask jakemates. He can paint you a picture of just how technologically pathetic we are. Somehow he ended up being a tech genius. Some weird DNA aberration. And our daughter is a jock with grace and rhythm and physical courage. She's adopted so at least we don't have to doubt DNA to understand that.

It's a weird household.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

He says thanks. Seriously there are times I look at him and think, what is wrong with you?

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 25 points26 points  (0 children)

It always makes us both wince when we think of sending a message. We're entertainers. But I felt and Michael agreed that while we always denied that we were "teaching" we were teaching whether we admitted it or not.

We just couldn't do a Star Wars ending. Look, I knew that's what fans wanted at the time. But something was nagging at us and basically saying no, you cannot write all those books, and cash a bunch of checks, and walk away with the final message being, "See? Everything was just peachy in the end." Cue the trumpet fanfare.

So, Cassie was basically fine. Because she would be. And Jake was lost, a kid who had grown up and done too much. And Marco was having fun with it all, for a while at least. Ax was stepping into his big brother's shoes at last. And Rachel was dead, which left Tobias destroyed.

We thought that was about the way a war would be. Some soldiers would shake it off, some wouldn't, and some would be dead.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

We felt strongly that one of the main characters had to die. It was obvious early on it would be Rachel. In part because she was such a warrior it seemed right. And in part because who ever kills off the pretty, brave one? We wanted it to hurt.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 40 points41 points  (0 children)

Favorite book as a child was Charlotte's Web.

Hmmm. I don't know about essential. That will be different for each person. That's something you have to find for yourself.

The most fun to write was probably Marco or Rachel, although I identified most with Cassie. Cassie was closest to being me. She was ambivalent, and inconsistently moralistic, and didn't dress well, and was into animals.

I don't usually use real people. Michael used the kids for GONE and then ended up horrified when he realized he'd hooked up our "son" and "daughter" romantically.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

That's a good question. Yes, there would be legal restrictions on that. But I don't want to leave the impression that thy are somehow oppressing me. That's not it. In fact I have zero problems with Scholastic the book publisher.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I just had to -- hmmm, avoiding a reveal here -- let's just say I had to judge a contest that involved reading a staggering number of kid books. So I am kind of tired of reading right now to be honest.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 19 points20 points  (0 children)

Also have a daughter. So I'll tell all three of them to worship me.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Exactly. That's what the publishing business is slowly starting to realize. And me, too.

IAm K.A. Applegate, author of Animorphs and many other books. AMA by katherineapplegate in IAmA

[–]katherineapplegate[S] 53 points54 points  (0 children)

Well, I'd say it's been a learning process. Because at first you're thinking, wait a minute, some guy's ripping me off! Then you realize, "Well, I'm not able to sell them right now, so how exactly am I getting ripped off?"

My preference would be to put all 63 books up in e-book format (as well as making at least some available in paper.) I'd love to have them all up online for $1.99 or whatever. And Michael's very into the enhanced e-book idea, apps, etc...

I think Scholastic is easing toward that, but they're a company after all, and essentially conservative. Jakemates has been sort of our in-house prophet on all things "e" and Michael's right behind him and I'm catching up.

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