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Texas author Nathan Dahlstrom \u2014 writing as  S.J. Dahlstrom \u2014 <\/span>has been compared to <\/span>John Erickson <\/span>of Hank the Cowdog fame. So it’s only fitting that the two writers have teamed up in a special session this month at the National Ranching Heritage Center in Lubbock. This week, we were happy to kick off Texas Kids Summer Reads 2018 via a Lone Star Listens interview with Dahlstrom, who talks about the importance of shining a light on rural stories.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

This month the National Ranching Heritage Center, <\/span>in Lubbock, will be hosting a writing seminar featuring both Erickson and Dahlstrom. The seminar will take place on Friday, June 15, from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the NRHC.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

         A variety of topics, including how Erickson and Dahlstrom started out in the business, marketing and publishing, and more will be covered at the 1-day seminar that also includes readings by the authors. Family members are encouraged to attend together at a discounted price. Participants must be at least 16 years old or accompanied by an adult.<\/em><\/p>\n

         Visit http:\/\/ranchingheritage.org\/writers\/ to register.<\/em><\/p>\n

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LONE STAR LITERARY LIFE: <\/span>Where did you grow up, Nathan, and how would you describe those days?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

NATHAN DAHLSTROM: <\/span>I grew up on the Llano Estacado in Roosevelt County, New Mexico. That\u2019s a huge flat piece of ground that encompasses eastern New Mexico and western Texas. Our closest neighbor was three miles away and town was a thirty-minute drive. It was an ideal childhood full of cows, horses, and endless land to roam. We went to church three times a week and never missed a basketball game at our local school. I played the first video game system, Atari, for two weeks when it came out and then one day realized how stupid it was. There was just too much to do outside. I once rode my horse twelve miles to school. It was a great childhood that many kids still get to live. But many don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

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What kinds of books did you enjoy reading while you were growing up?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I read pretty much what my dad read \u2014 the Bible, Tarzan<\/span> novels, Mark Twain, Louis L\u2019Amour, Sherlock Holmes, <\/span>WWII stuff, and eventually got around to the good old Newberys about dogs and horses and courage and being tough.<\/p>\n

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When did you first become interested in writing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Looking back, I know I always loved reading and writing. I have always dabbled in poetry. I was raised Church of Christ, and those people took the written word very seriously. That definitely rubbed off on me.<\/p>\n

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But I never came across anyone to really suggest that I might write books, even though I knew it was lurking dormant into my twenties. I met John R. Erickson<\/span> (Hank the Cowdog<\/span>) at one of his performances, and we struck a fast friendship over cowboying and writing and reading. He didn\u2019t encourage me as such, but he represented the possibility in a real person who was similar to me in many respects. So I started scratching things down. I loved it.<\/p>\n

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At the same time I was a young father and my kids were beginning to read. I had a huge library built for them of old classics, but I began to realize as I shopped the bookstores that very few of the contemporary books being written for kids passed my idea of what I wanted in their young minds. Nobody besides Gary Paulsen<\/span> was writing honest books about the outdoors, and all the outdoors had to teach.<\/p>\n

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So, like many many children\u2019s authors, I started writing books for my kids. Books are time machines, and if something should happen to me, I knew they could dip back into a book and hear straight from me what I thought was important. It\u2019s magic.<\/p>\n

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What was your first “big break” as a writer?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, the first big break was being raised with no screens to empty my childhood of meaningful memories. The second was having a mom and dad who dragged me to the library at school and town and showed me that books were important for a good life. The third was meeting John. All those gifts in place, it seems, the fourth break was that first Wilder Good contract with my excellent publisher, Paul Dry Books. Nothing flashy happened there; I didn\u2019t even have an agent. I just queried The Elk Hunt<\/span> and luckily a few folks wanted to put it out. We have had a great relationship between Texas and Philadelphia and are now five books deep.<\/p>\n

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Tell us about the Wilder Good series of books. What was your inspiration?<\/strong><\/p>\n

As mentioned above, as a young father I saw that most children\u2019s books had left the old Newbery model of the authentic outdoors setting and real kids striving for a brave, wholesome life\u2026usually with real animals. Meaning not animal avatars with people inside. I wanted my kids, and kids everywhere, to understand the feeling a boy has when he kills his first deer. How awful it is. How conflicting it is. How violence is terrible, and has much to teach. And then, what do we eat for supper?<\/p>\n

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I wanted my kids, and all kids, to see a family with people that love each other in hard times, through cancer and grief. I wanted to simply lift the lives of rural, agricultural people into the spotlight, free of political or social agendas. Where the chief ethic is not to be nice\u2026but to be good. I\u2019m not talking about a shallow sentimentality here. I am talking about a nourishing goodness that literature can do for us. I\u2019m not saying I have pulled any of that off, but I am shooting for excellence. I am shooting for art that makes children and their families stronger, truer, better.<\/p>\n

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I guess that sounds real ambitious, but that\u2019s what I want for my kids. So my work for other people\u2019s kids had better reflect that. Writing for kids seems a very serious business, and we ought to have high standards for who gets to put ideas into their brains. I don\u2019t find many people talking about nourishment and goodness in that world right now.<\/p>\n

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What is your creative process like?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I write every morning at 5:30, and brood all day long. I write poetry constantly. I am typing this during a family-and-friend camping trip to Hord\u2019s Creek Lake in central Texas. I write in my home office some, and like I am now, showerless for three days with lake mud in my ears. My fingers reek of catfish.<\/p>\n

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I just try and observe. Simplify and observe.<\/p>\n

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Tell us about your most current book.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Green Colt<\/span> <\/em>came out in 2016 and won four nice awards. I love reading it at schools and libraries. But Black Rock Brothers<\/span><\/em> is on deck and releases August 7.<\/p>\n

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Black Rock Brothers<\/em> <\/span>(book five in the series) is about Wilder [Wilder Good, the title character of the series] and two friends taking the big trip into the wild that all boys dream of. One boy, Corndog, is a foster kid from church whom Wilder\u2019s mom coerces him into taking along. It\u2019s a backpacking narrative, wilderness adventure, and a study of how boys develop when adults aren\u2019t around. I did my best.<\/p>\n

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What advice do you have for aspiring authors?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Turn off your screens. Distraction is the enemy of the artist. ALWAYS.<\/p>\n

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Read all the time. Read everything. Not just stuff you like or is popular. Study literature page by page, book by book. Learn and watch who came before.<\/p>\n

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Write every day, and prepare yourself for not being called a little genius. Prepare yourself for criticism\u2026because success in anything is hard. You don\u2019t get to the top of a mountain by accident. You have to grab your pack and walk uphill just like every one else. Get started\u2026or go home and sit on the couch in the air conditioning. Ha!<\/p>\n

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Are you working on something currently?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Always! Book #6, Silverbelly<\/em>,<\/span> is done and being refined. I have several poetry manuscripts I would like to get out there (doesn\u2019t every writer\u2026?!). I hope to write a book this summer about a turbulent period in my life when I was kicked out of college at nineteen, went to Montana to cowboy, and then enrolled in Bible college two years later to start a boys\u2019 ranch. Strange? I hope it makes good story. Maybe not. But gosh, it\u2019s so fun to create.<\/p>\n

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What\u2019s on your nightstand or in your To Be Read stack?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am an addictive book collector and reader. I am reading Walden<\/span><\/em> (Thoreau<\/span>) for the fourth time right now; the new Jordan Peterson<\/span> book (like everyone else) Twelve Rules for Living;<\/span> <\/em>Myself and Strangers<\/em> <\/span>(third time) by the peerless Texan John Graves<\/span>; and Teacher<\/span><\/em> by Frank McCourt. <\/span>Also Calvin and Hobbes<\/em>. <\/span>Little Calvin had about as good a childhood as anyone I know.<\/p>\n

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