In 2012, Coughlin published his first YA novel, One Shot Away, A Wrestling Story, Harpercollins. The novel is the story of three high school wrestlers trying to balance their personal lives, family conflicts and maintain their weight class on the Varsity Squad.
Wecome T. Glen Coughlin to The O.W.L.!!
First lets start with the easy questions
What Point of View
-1st or 3rd:
One Shot Away is told in the 3rd person from three different POVs:
Trevor Crow, Diggy Masters and Jimmy O’Shea.
This writing style is a departure from my first two novels, which were
told in the first person. This is my
first YA novel, although the other two were both coming of age novels.
Boy or Girl main
character (or both!):
The novel has three main characters, all boys, and two minor
girl characters, Jane and Roxanne.
Genre:
One Shot Away is a YA sports related
coming-of-age novel.
Middle Grade or Young
Adult:
The novel is more appropriate for
a YA reader. The story line is a little
edgy. The hardships and drama take a
look at the serious side of competition, which can sometimes turn ugly.
More boy or girl book
(stereotypically):
I was a bit surprised
to learn that One Shot Away appeals to both boys and girls. Obviously, it has an appeal to anyone
involved in the sport of wrestling (yes, girls are now wrestling!). The novel tells the story of three high
school wrestlers living in the same community, but going through the insecurity
of high school, a desire for acceptance, the emotional confusion of first
relationships, and the pride of achievement.
I know girls can relate to these issues.
The Serious Questions!
For One Shot Away what part/character/event are you most
excited/proud about?
I
am most proud of the end of the novel, as I didn’t sell out and make it a 100
percent “feel good” ending. My second
novel, Steady Eddie, was criticized for having an ending where the two
main characters sort of sailed happily into the sunset. In One Shot Away, I had many choices
to make. I could have had Diggy, my most
controversial character, get forgiven for all the havoc he caused. He could have wound up a success story (I
don’t want to give away the ending here).
But, I chose to tell the story with integrity and truth. I wanted my readers to learn that acts have
consequences. Jimmy and Trevor are my
success stories, which bring an abundance of light to the book. Diggy, although I do love him, had to pay
some dues.
One Shot Away is a book for guys. One struggle I have as a middle school teacher
is getting my boys to read more, so I’m glad to see books like yours. Can you talk about writing for “the guys” and
in particular how this story will interest them?
From
the first page, One Shot Away is filled with conflict that propels the
action. It’s a book where things happen
and it’s not always what the reader expects.
The main characters, Trevor, Jimmy and Diggy, have interesting dilemmas. Each goes about solving their problems in
different ways. Dialogue and all of the
slang in the novel was basically pulled from real teens. The dialogue is snappy and real and boys will
enjoy the exchanges. Lastly, the plot of
the novel is more than just wrestling.
It’s about the team concept. It’s
about learning to respect a girlfriend.
It’s about discrimination and overcoming hurtful words and bullies. Lastly, this novel is a fun read.
Tell about your
writing process. How long did it take
you to write One Shot Away from idea to finish?
Please tell about revision if you can!
Good question, as I’m
sure there are many potential writers who might read the book. Start to finish, the writing took about four
years. I know that’s a long time, but I
write on weekends and vacation days, as I work a full time job. I like to develop my characters before I even
know my story. At the beginning of One
Shot Away, I put Trevor Crow into motion.
I am a big believer in knowing your character’s back-story. For instance, I wrote one hundred pages of
back-story regarding Trevor’s father’s heritage as a Penobscot Native
American.
At
one point, One Shot Away ballooned to 440 pages! I had to cut it in half in order to increase
the tension. Cutting is tough, but
necessary for most writers. I know
writers who fall in love with their own words and are unable to cut. I try to think of my reader. What will make the reader stay up late
turning the pages?
My second character
developed was Jimmy O’Shea. I wrote
about his house, his room, what he ate.
I gave him a girlfriend, Roxanne.
I wrote a short story about Jimmy leading his wrestling team in
practice. Next, I did the same for Diggy
Masters.
Then, I introduced
conflict through the plot. In Trevor’s
case, he is facing the loss of his father, and the need to fulfill his father’s
vision of being a varsity wrester.
Jimmy’s father leads him down a dangerous path. Diggy makes his own trouble with poor
choices.
Fine tuning the plot
was the hardest part of finishing the novel.
I needed it to be exciting, believable, and compelling, but also have
the reader feel like they entered the character’s world. The plot must carry one chapter into the
next. I wrote about twenty drafts of
this novel (I’m not exaggerating). I
would finish it, print it, read it, and then rewrite. It sounds like a lot of work; lucky for me I
love the entire process of creating a novel.
When you were in
middle school what kind of student were you? Did you write then?
I
was a mediocre student. Report card day
was always rough. I’d line up behind my
three sisters, who had A’s and B’s. I
never failed, but an A was as rare as steak at the hot lunch menu. Most of the time, I scraped by with a C or a
B-. By the time I went to high school, I
was scheduled into a lot of shop classes.
I worked on cars, built cabinets, learned to weld metals. In ninth grade English, my teacher assigned Catcher
in the Rye. I read it in two days
(it was a half-year study). She began
sneaking me novels by John Steinbeck, S.E Hinton, Claude Brown, Harper Lee and
lots more. I realized I loved to
read.
In
the tenth grade, I joined a meat cutter’s union and worked 4 pm to 10 pm
weekdays, and 8 am to 8 pm on Saturdays, cutting chickens. I didn’t have time for sports or much of
anything, except work. After I cleaned
the butcher shop at night, scraped all the cutting blocks and put down sawdust,
I’d read in the break room. In my second
novel, Steady Eddie, I wrote about my teen life, and was able to get some
of it out of my system.
In
the eleventh grade, my English teacher assigned the class a writing assignment;
a two page fictional story. I remember
writing about the end of the world. She
liked it and read it to the class. I
don’t think anyone ever told me I was good at anything, until that story. I began to believe that I could write a
novel. I started carrying a
notebook. I wrote scenes in the meat
department break room that eventually evolved into The Hero of New York. I finished the novel about five years
later. It was published when I was
twenty-six.
And because it's the owl, my standard question
always is: WHOOO do you admire when it comes to writing? OR WHOOO do you like
to read or really enjoyed in HS or middle school?
In high school I enjoyed many YA novels that are now
considered must reads. I read To Kill
a Mocking Bird and loved it. I read
all of John Steinbeck’s novels, my favorite being Of Mice and Men. I enjoyed S. E. Hinton’s novels, The
Outsiders, Rumble Fish and That was Then, This is Now. I loved, The Lord of the Rings and The
Hobbit, everything by Ray Bradbury, Jack London, John Knowles, and Robert
Louis Stevenson.
Today, I read a lot of adult fiction, but also enjoy YA
novels. Lately, I have enjoyed The
Giver, by Lois Lowry, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian,
by Sherman Alexie, Bird Nerd, by Tracy Edward Wymer, the novels of Terry
Trueman, and The Fault in our Stars, by John Green.
Presently I’m reading Ghosts of War, a true story
by Ryan Smithson. It’s a terrific YA
novel of a 19-year old GI sent to Iraq.
One novel that really changed my idea of fiction was The
Wanderers, by Richard Price. I read
it when I was a senior in high school.
It breaks a lot of rules.
The Fun Questions!
(based on what middle school students do!)
Do you chew gum?
Yes,
I chew Wrigley’s “Solstice” –“A warm and cool winter.” Sugar-free – 15 to a pack. Try it!
Do you text?
Yes, I do text and I
carry a blackberry. My son and daughter
are text nuts.
Was school lunch just
as yucky then as it is now?!
My mother
wasn’t one to “pack a lunch.” It was hot
lunch or no lunch. School lunch was a
completely sad affair from 1st to 8th grade. The food was just terrible, watery tomato
soup and wet PBJ’s, Sloppy Joe’s with unidentifiable red meat that smelled like
four day old barbeque grease. Chinese
night was cream of chicken chow mein!!!
The cream grossed us out. Oh it
was just the worst. I used to starve and
save my lunch money. I’d buy a sandwich
at a deli around the corner about once a week.
Thank you so much for joining us here on The O.W.L. I will be sharing with my students how many drafts you wrote! They need to hear things like that. Plus that you're reading Ghosts of War. I have it, and a few students have picked it up to read as well.
Stay tuned for my review of the book coming up later!
The Giveaway!
Up for grabs is a Kindle Paperwhite skinned in the One Shot Away cover art!
To enter fill out the rafflecopter.
And check out the rest of the stops on the tour!
