Marvelous Middle Grade Monday: The Fourth Stall--and a GIVEAWAY!!!!!

Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls: I am so very excited today. This Marvelous Middle Grade Monday sees my first ever interview with an author, the ferociously funny and supremely talented Chris Rylander. Chris very graciously gave his time to deal with my gushing e-mails and breathless interview questions about his debut novel, The Fourth Stall, so a huge thank you to him.

Before we proceed, you all must know: I LOVE THIS BOOK!!!

Don't ya just love the hand with the toilet paper?

More importantly, so does my 14-year-old son. Right now, if you can get him to read anything other than Uncle John's Bathroom Reader, or Game Informer and Rolling Stone magazines, I have a medal I'd like to present to you. So the fact that he read The Fourth Stall and even did a book report on it has me falling to my knees and praising the heavens for Chris Rylander.

The heavens-be-praised author himself

What is this book about? Here's the blurb from Goodreads:

Chris Rylander delivers a funny Ferris Bueler-style middle grade novel with The Fourth Stall.

Do you need something? Mac can get it for you. It's what he does—he and his best friend and business manager, Vince. Their methods might sometimes run afoul of the law, or at least the school code of conduct, but if you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can pay him, Mac is on your side. His office is located in the East Wing boys' bathroom, fourth stall from the high window. And business is booming.

Or at least it was, until one particular Monday. It starts with a third grader in need of protection. And before this ordeal is over, it's going to involve a legendary high school crime boss named Staples, an intramural gambling ring, a graffiti ninja, the nine most dangerous bullies in school, and the first Chicago Cubs World Series game in almost seventy years. And that's just the beginning. Mac and Vince soon realize that the trouble with solving everyone else's problems is that there's no one left to solve yours.

Here's my interview with Chris. At the end, there's going to be a GIVEAWAY (another first here at MGM!!)

MGM: The Don has been snoogling you (his word for snooping and googling) and has come up with a query letter you sent out for another novel before you wrote The Fourth Stall. The caporegime have been passing it around and chuckling. It starts: "I adore ninjas, bunnies, and zombies. So it is sad that none of these are in my novel."

What possessed you to throw out hundreds of years of query advice and go loco like this?

CR: The very first project I started querying was an adult non-fiction book about the earliest divorces in American history. And, I actually got a lot of interest in the project from agents. But then after seeing a few sample chapters, they’d always pass. And finally one agent finally leveled with me in his rejection. Basically, he said my writing was boring and just kind of bad. So, I was like, “Boring? Boring!?!?” And I re-read the chapters and realized he was right. There was no life in those sample pages. So that’s when I went loco, so to speak. I totally abandoned my non-fiction project and decided to just write the craziest, weirdest, most-non-boring query I could think of. Which is how I came up with the one you found. (And yes, you read that correctly, I wrote the query before I even started the book –generally not a good idea.)

MGM: So then you got an agent, Steven Malk, who thought you’d rock at a middle grade voice. (Sorry, Don Vito’s interrupting me. What’s that you’re saying, Godfather? You know an “agent” who could get Mr. Rylander 60% at least? And he’s also a loan shark? No, no. That’s not how publishing works.)

Sorry about that. Where was I? O yeah, Mr. Malk was right, you have a crazy good middle grade voice. You’re not actually still in middle school are you?

CR: Haha, I wish I was. No, I think a lot of that comes from the fact that my mentality is still that of a middle grader. Seriously, all I ever want to do is play video games, board games, baseball, go golfing, watch movies, listen to music, play with Nerf guns, etc. etc. I still very much have all of the same interests and hobbies that I did as a 12 year old.

MGM: My 14-year-old (also called Chris) has all the same hobbies! So, what inspired The Fourth Stall?

CR: There is no one specific event or thing. It was really just a case of me asking myself these two questions, “What would make for a fun and cool book? What classic adult story have I not seen redone for kids yet?” Turns out there have been several mafia inspired books for middle graders over the years, but I didn’t know that at the time. Well, it was also inspired a little by my love of eating grape jelly with a spoon. After eating several jars of grape jelly, you can accomplish pretty much anything. Trust me.

MGM: Don Vito’s very pleased that middle schools in America are run this way. He says your main character, Mac Barrett, reminds him of himself. Doing business, always helping others. He just wonders why you didn’t make him Italian. And why are Mac, and his best friend and business manager, Vince, such Cubs and Cubs trivia fanatics? Are you yourself a poor benighted Cubs fan?

CR: Yes, sadly, I am a lifelong Cubs fan. It’s really been a quite unfortunate part of my life…

 

MGM: Oh well. Personally, what I love best about The Fourth Stall (beyond the humor) is the cast of characters. Mac and Vince employ a whole bunch of bullies to try and wrest the school back from the notorious Staples. I read somewhere that your favorite bully is Kitten. Mine happens to be Great White, a transplant from England . I’m wondering if you could put in a word for me playing Great White in the movie. (We’d have to have a great make-up artist to make me look younger, of course. The Don could arrange that, I’m sure.) There is going to be a movie, isn’t there? I mean, The Fourth Stall: the Movie would be way better than Bugsy Malone.

CR: Well, that’d be awesome if there was going to be a movie! But, alas, I have virtually no control over whether that will ever happen or not. At this point, there’s been more interest in TV rights than film, so it’s much more likely that it’d eventually become a TV show than a movie. But even that is a long shot. It always is. Thousands and thousands of books get optioned every year, and just a handful ever get made. But, uh, perhaps the Don could help me out somehow? 

 

MGM: I'll pass it up the chain of command. He's got a lot of contacts in Vegas, if that's any help. Anyhoo, I also love Vince’s Grandma, who doesn’t actually appear, but who is quoted at length by Vince. Sort of off-the-wall almost-Buddhist koans. And apparently she has “Pintsized Midnight Moonbeam Workers” living in her purse. Just wondering if you have some in your purse too, and if so, whether you wouldn’t mind sending them our way @Middle Grade Mafioso?

CR: I really wish I did, because then I’d never have to shave (don’t ask how that makes sense, if you get some Moonbeam Workers of your own someday, you’ll understand.) It’s funny, though, that you mention those Moonbeam Workers… that line is actually a reference to one of my favorite bands, Say Hi. They have a song titled Pintsized Midnight Moonbeam Workers. I guess that’s something I love to do, to put in little references to some of my favorite music, movies, books, etc.

 

MGM: Very crafty! Now I'll be super vigilant as I reread. By the way, my 14-year-old recently declared The Fourth Stall to be “the best book ev-ah!!!” What weapon will you choose to battle it out if either Suzanne Collins or J.K. Rowling challenges you to a duel over this?

CR: Wow, what a great compliment! Thank you! If either of them ever challenged me to a duel, I’d probably just lay down and die. Seriously. Because what if I somehow accidently won? 

 

MGM: Omigosh, wouldn't that make for great reality TV?! Well, we're almost out of time. Last question: I read in your interview on Anita Laydon Miller’s blog that you are a cereal fanatic/connoisseur. Will your next novel feature lots of cereal-eating teens? Or are you keeping it mafia, and writing a sequel to The Fourth Stall?

CR: My next two books will be sequels to The Fourth Stall. I can’t divulge what my fourth book will be, except I can hint that it will involve fainting goats, fighting artichokes, and clowns with guns, and, now that you mention it, perhaps a good deal of cereal eating as well.

Wow, I can't wait. Thanks, Chris, for the interview. And there we have it, folks. I hope you had as much fun reading this as I did posting it.

Here's the GIVEAWAY info: If you comment on this blog post or on my Facebook page, you will be entered to win a copy of The Fourth Stall. I don't need you to FB, blog, or Twitter about it (anyway, I'm too indolent to check up on you) but there is one thing that needs to be done to set the contest in motion. The current world record for comments on an MGM post is lucky number 13. We need to get to that record number or beyond (so tell your friends!!) or else greedy little me will keep the novel for myself (or, give it to the Don's grandson, if the Don finds out I'm running such a shady scam.) So get commenting. Multiple comments are welcome. And international entrants will not be turned away. Contest will close on Sunday August 21 at midnight, PST. Ciao!!