“Star Child” and “Into the Woods”

Authors Gary Paulsen and Octavia Butler don’t have much in common. Butler,“a ground-breaking science fiction genius,” was dreamy, with a huge imagination and a drive to succeed. Paulsen didn’t love school, was essentially abandoned by his parents, had lots of adventures and eventually started telling stories, mostly about surviving in the wild. Who doesn’t know about “Hatchet,” for example? (If you haven’t read it, go, read that now!)

I recently read each of their life stories: biography in the case of Butler and memoir in the case of Paulsen. Each book offers something different for young readers but the power is in their stories. 

As I have said before, and will say again, you read enough of other people’s stories and you can begin to imagine the shape your own might take.

New York Times-bestselling author Ibi Zoboi, author of “My Life as an Ice Cream Sandwich,” which I reviewed a few years ago (https://debaronson.com/my-life-as-an-ice-cream-sandwich-and-finding-orion/), wrote Butler’s biography.  Zoboi presents Butler’s life in a wonderful tapestry (or should I say constellation) of poems, narrative storytelling and Butler’s own words. I love this combination because it has something for every reader. For myself, though the entire biography and its structure was masterful, I was often drawn to Butler’s own words. 

The structure of this biography is reflected in its title: “Star Child: A Biographical Constellation of Octavia Estelle Butler.” Zoboi tells Butler’s story in snippets, small digestible bits, which add up to a whole constellation. 

The opening poem “Stardust” tells of Butler’s birth:

“What if on the day she was born there was a quiet storm of tiny shimmering dust that settled on tree leaves, on flower petals…Maybe there was a storm of stardust and this was how Laurice James Butler and Octavia Margaret Butler gave birth to a baby girl named Octavia Estelle Butler, a star child.” 

That is the most creative way I’ve ever seen to write about a birth! Later we learn that Octavia’s mother lost four babies before her and so there is something extra special about the idea of a magical stardust storm, floating down to bless Butler’s birth.

The juxtaposition, in another cluster of poems, between stardust and plain old dust is poetic and magnetic to me. 

Zoboi also makes sure to describe the world Butler grew up in. I especially appreciated her introducing the word and concept of “zeitgeist.” Great word! The way she writes about it means the young reader comes away with a deep understanding of Butler’s world and ownership of a cool new word. 

Zoboi also plays with the phrase, “baby boom,” which was coined to refer to the large number of babies born after soldiers came home from WWII. However, in her poem titled “Zeitgeist,” Zoboi uses the phrase “baby boom,” in new and magical ways: “Hiroshima, Nagasaki. Baby, boom! Baby, boom!” so the reader hears the boom of bombs … and they gain an appreciation of the power a comma has to change meaning!

Later in the same poem it’s “Duke, Ella, Satchmo. Baby, boom! Baby, boom!” to convey the swing and rhythm of Black music of the time. This might be my favorite of all the wonderful poems in this biography. 

Butler is an author many middle grade readers may not be familiar with, but this biography will help any young reader who aspires to be an author, or one who is intrigued by the possibility of other worlds and of exploring space. 

In “Gone to the Woods: Surviving a Lost Childhood,” the late Gary Paulsen, one of the most beloved, recognized and well-known middle-grade authors of our time, tells us his own, personal story. Much of what Paulsen describes is hair raising; he lived in dangerous places, and also his home was dangerous place, because his parents were drunk and violent almost all the time. 

Paulsen took refuge in the woods —and then the library — every chance he got. 

Just when he got old enough to run away and not be returned to his parents by the authorities, Paulsen stayed put. He couldn’t figure out why until this passage: “The reason he didn’t run away now when he came on thirteen and it was a perfect time for running was the library. No. Not exactly. Not only the library. It was the library and the librarian. But still more than that. It wasn’t the library, as much as the librarian.”

I take space to include that entire quote as a shout out to librarians everywhere. You change children’s lives, just by sharing your love of books and reading. It’s your superpower!

This review first appeared in the Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette in 2023