A Q&A with Michelle Knudsen and Kevin Hawkes, Author and Illustrator of March/April Kids’ Indie Next List Top Pick “Luigi, The Spider Who Wanted to Be a Kitten”

“Luigi may have eight legs instead of four, may prefer webs over snuggling under blankets, and would surely rather eat a bug than play with a toy one. He may be a spider in body, but he’ll always be a kitten at heart. A super sweet, unique pet story,” said Angie Tally of The Country Bookshop in Southern Pines, North Carolina.

 

Here, Knudsen and Hawkes discuss Luigi with Bookselling This Week.
 

Bookselling This Week: A spider is such an unexpected but adorably effective subject for a be-yourself story like this. I’d love to know how the idea for this book came about.

Michelle Knudsen: Luigi was inspired by a real-life scary spider who was sharing a house with me in rural upstate New York a few years back. I have been afraid of spiders my whole life, and so this unplanned cohabitation was rather uncomfortable for me. In an effort to make him seem less frightening, I named him Luigi and talked to him a lot about staying as far away from me as possible. Something about that spider stayed with me once I was back home, and I began working on a story about a giant spider who gets mistaken for a kitten.

I can’t really explain how I got to the kitten part of the idea. I have loved cats and kittens for at least as long as I have feared spiders, so there’s something very interesting to me about this spider-kitten situation. Maybe I was trying to work out some of my fear, or maybe I felt a little guilty about not trying harder to make friends with real-life Luigi. I know there are people out there who love spiders; maybe I was trying to imagine what it might be like to be (or to become) one of those people. Maybe I just really liked the idea of someone (like Betty in Luigi) having the kind of wide-open heart that could welcome kittens and spiders with equal enthusiasm.

Underneath it all, however, it’s the idea that people can and will love us for who we really are that feels most important to me. I think many of us struggle, at least sometimes, with believing that we are worthy of being loved for our true selves. Luigi learns that he doesn’t have to try to be something he’s not in order to be loved — which is a lesson I hope all of us can take to heart.

Kevin Hawkes: I had heard that Michelle had a book in the works and that it didn't have an illustrator assigned to it. I was very delighted when Luigi showed up in my inbox but I have to admit I was a little surprised it was about a spider. It was new territory for me!

BTW: This isn’t your first time working on a book together! Would you like to tell us a little about what your collaboration process looks like?

MK: Our collaboration process is actually very separate! Like many picture book writers and illustrators, we worked independently on our parts of the book. This was something it took me a while to get used to, earlier in my career, but now I love the idea that an illustrator will end up bringing things to the table that I would never have thought of myself in a million years. And of course, since I am already such a huge fan of Kevin’s work, I knew that he would create an incredible, lovable Luigi and surprise me with the illustrations in the most delightful ways.

KH: Typically I get a manuscript from a publisher and I do a series of character sketches to get us started. In this case, it took a lot of sketching to get the character, Luigi, just right. Michelle gave a lot of very valuable feedback. In the end, we came up with a cute, like-able spider.

BTW: The artwork here does a phenomenal job of making an infamous creature come across as endearing and feline. Do you want to tell us more about how you developed the art and brought these characters to life?

KH: I had a difficult time creating the character of Luigi. I began by looking at photographs of spiders. Spiders look really menacing up close. All of my first attempts were looking way too spidery and not nearly cute enough. The large bodies and spiky legs were creeping me out.

Eventually I started thinking about kittens and what makes them so appealing. Large head, small bodies, big eyes, soft and furry and tried to apply that to Luigi. It took quite a few revisions — until we shortened the legs and made them furry and finally we had Luigi.

BTW: Of course, I have to ask whether either of you have had pet spiders. Is Luigi based on a particular arachnid, or a particularly spider-ish kitten?

MK: Although I have gotten better at dealing with spiders over the years, thanks to some helpful exposure therapy, I have definitely not reached the point where I would want to have one as a pet. And I wouldn’t call either of my current cats spidery. Although now that I think of it, one of them does like to curl up in dark corners, and she is also very good at catching flies…

KH: I never owned a spider as a pet but I did have two kittens as a child. I do think I used those early memories when creating the kitten-like appearance of Luigi.

BTW: Could you talk a little bit about the role of books and indie bookstores in your life?

MK: I feel so lucky to have an abundance of wonderful independent bookstores where I live (Brooklyn, New York). The challenge is trying to spread my patronage around to support all of them!

I stop by whenever I can, and have connected my Kobo and Libro.fm accounts to support different stores when I buy e-books or audiobooks. I recently treated myself to a year of WORD’s amazing WORD to Your Mailbox program. I still have some books on hold to pick up at Community Bookstore in Park Slope (I promise I’ll come get them soon, you guys!). And I’m having my Luigi launch party at our newest indie store, Lofty Pigeon Books, in my own neighborhood of Kensington. When people ask me how to get signed copies of my books, I immediately direct them to order from a local store where I can head over to sign them before they get shipped out.

I love knowing that every one of these stores is staffed with people who love books as much as I do, and that they can give me great recommendations in my favorite genres and introduce me to new things I might never have come across on my own. I love the programs and community events they hold in their spaces, and I love the way they feel like a vibrant and powerful stronghold against the various forces out there that want to reduce books to “products” and algorithms and a one-size-fits-all mentality.

I was so happy when I heard that Luigi was the #1 pick on the March/April Kids’ Indie Next List. Knowing that booksellers across the country are excited about our new book is a huge honor, and I am so grateful for everything independent bookstores do for all of us who love books.

KH: Books have had a huge impact on my life. I began devouring chapter books in the third grade and have not stopped since. One of the first jobs I had after college was working in a bookstore in the children’s section. It was a great education. Every lunch hour I read stacks of picture books and had a good idea of what was selling and what was new. It motivated me to keep drawing and eventually I started contacting publishers with samples of my work. Even now when I visit a new city, I can’t resist stopping in a bookstore to browse the stacks.

I am so thankful for book-lovers who are promoting and selling books that they love. It thrills me that Luigi is finding a place in bookstores everywhere.