EW sat down with Rick Riordan and interviewed him about his latest book in the Heroes of Olympus series, The Mark of Athena. They also shared the exciting trailer for the novel!
The latest book from Riordan will release in less than a week, and EW was lucky enough to ask him a few questions about what it’s like writing for children versus adults, who his best editors are, and what he can tell us about The Mark of Athena.
Riordan says that it took him a while to realize that he could write for children, instead of adults (which was the target audience for his Tres Navarre series). After encouragement from his students, he decided that he knew middle-grade students best and wanted to write stories for them.
When asked if there was a difference between writing for adults and writing for kids, he said, “Most of the tool kit is the same. Kids, if anything, are harder to write for because they are a more discerning audience.” He goes on to say, “You really have to tell a tight story. You have to give them humor and suspense and believable characters. All those things that adults want too, but you have to be really on your game when you’re writing for kids.”
And who are his favorite editors? His wife and his kids, of course! He says that his wife has been editing for him since he began writing his adult mystery novels in 1997. His oldest son Haley is also a talented editor, though he’s quickly growing out of the targeted age range for these middle-grade novels. His younger son, Patrick, also seems to have an eye for mistakes as well. Riordan says:
It started as a joke. I had copy-edited The Son of Neptune and the copy editor at Disney had and my editor had, so three professional people in the writing business had looked at it already. [Patrick] said, “Well, if I look at it for mistakes, will you pay me 10 dollars a mistake?” I sort of laughed and said, “Yeah sure.” I figured there were not going to be any in there. He found 40 mistakes that all three of us had missed. The kid’s going to put himself through college being a copy editor. [Laughs]
Riordan also talks about The Mark of Athena, saying that even though all of the characters are together, it is “truly Annabeth’s story.” He continues by saying, “There’s a lot going on, but at the heart it’s about Annabeth figuring out what her stirrings are, what her mother Athena needs from her, and how she can come to terms with her destiny.”
The book trailer can be seen on EW’s website, along with the rest of the interview.
Don’t forget that The Mark of Athena will hit bookshelves on October 2.