five more voices
~ five writers, each issue ~
generations of West Virginia creative writing
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Mia Hutchison
Mia and dog Dolly at her writing desk.
"A story's not just words."
Successful adult fiction writers often describe a similar process. Mia listened carefully to a quote from celebrated West Virginia fiction writer, Denise Giardina. “Writing, for me, is kind of like going underwater," Denise said. You come up for air eventually, and everything is more normal again. So I’m not sure when I’m writing that I really know what I’m writing. I’m just telling a story, and I don’t really know what it is.”
“That’s kind of how it happens!” Mia said.
She thinks in color too, in relation to made-up stories, she says. “I'll start out with a certain color in a drawing. And that helps me think about the scenario of what’s going on.” On her ipad, she draws pictures of people who look like they’re in mid-story: a blue woman, a green woman, a brown and pink woman. All three have expressions that suggest story. “Colors can do a lot for, like, the mood. If the story’s scary, the colors are dark.”
At this early age, Mia isn’t sure what she wants to do when she gets older. “I dunno. I’m interested in a lot of things,” she said. “I’m not sure what all I could do.” She knows she wants writing and drawing to be part of her life, but she’s not sure what form it might take.
She says she wants to learn more ways to tell a good story and better ways to draw eyes. She wishes her school would start a poetry club. And she liked the animation a West Virginia Public Broadcasting engineer made from her drawings for her story, “The Sheriff That Changed.” “It would be cool to learn how to do make an animated story,” she said. She wants to learn.
“I think that writing and art and reading will always be a part of Mia,” her mom said. “Reading and stories are engrained in her. It’s too big a passion for her to shove aside or neglected. But as far as it being her profession – and I hope that it is – things can change, and she can go in different directions. But I certainly hope that that’s always a passion of hers.”
West Virginia Public Broadcasting engineers created a charming animation of Mia's story, using her drawings. Mia reads the story on the video. Click on the picture to watch it.
Mia's words jumpstarted the pictures she drew for her winning social studies fair entry on teen anxiety.
How can we encourage
young writers like Mia?
Reading experts advise parents to do certain things if they want their kids to develop a passion for books. Mia's mom does those things. Lucky girl!
"Before you can be a writer, you have to be a reader."
~ Marc Harshman, WV poet laureate
Before Mia could read, her mom read to her
every night. She made it a loving, fun time. “It’s
so important, but it’s been fun for me too,” Shari Hutchison said. “It's fun to do all the voices and act silly and kind of give life to the characters.”
As they read stories, they talked about them.
​"We'd talk about what we thought of characters or what we thought would happen next..."
​They made up their own stories too. Before Mia could read, she and her mom made up stories together and illustrated little books they made of the stories from stapled pieces of paper. They prize the original of “Planet Sparkle Doodle Finds Friends.”
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They visit the library together, “and these days, we’re in the book store a lot,” Shari said. They
each come home with a book.
​Mom lets Mia pick her own books. "She researches books before we go."
​​She lets Mia know she thinks her creative activities are wonderful. She puts her girls' art work and writing up on the refrigerator and walls of the living room and her bedroom, etc. She set up a little desk and made sure Mia has notebooks and colored markers with nice boxes to keep them in. "I think it's important for them to see that I prize their work and want others to see it."​​
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She gives her creative space. Mia's mom leaves her alone, if possible, when she sees that she's in her "creative bubble." "I don't pressure her," she said. "But I do give her what I consider to be healthy nudges to do her best."
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It seems to be working. After hearing about a verbal storytelling game, Mia turned to her mom and said, "Hey, we could do that together!"​​​
"Planet Sparkle Doodle Finds Friends,"
by preschool Mia and her mom.
Here are three links to three "top 10 lists" of suggestions for parents who want to raise book lovers.
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And here are some ideas for encouraging young West Virginia writers in general.
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www.voicesofwv.org. Mia and many other young West Virginians don't realize they come from a state that produces great writers. Introduce them to some role models! Let them know they have a wonderful writing heritage, so that door is open to them!
Take a look at the Voices of West Virginia (www.voicesofwv.org) web site . This site features West Virginia writers who write for people of all ages, so parents should take a look and decide which writers are appropriate for their child, then share.
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Check out the Tamarrack Foundation. Their job is to encourage West Virginia creatives of any age. https://tamarackfoundation.org/
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West Virginia Writers Inc. is a statewide writers' group that connects writers of all ages. They offer regional writing groups and put on a wonderful June conference. https://wvwriters.org/​
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WV Writers Inc Conference. There's a young people's track. Young people can also go to any session. A great way to meet other young writers.
Consider entering contests open to young people: WV Young Writers, Contest, PBS KIDS Writers Contest, WV Writers Inc. Contest, West Virginia Fiction Competition.
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* Look for local classes or camps. Multi-age camps can be great for young people.
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Mia Hutchison is twelve years old, just finishing sixth grade. She has new braces on her teeth, and she’s shy with strangers. But a big smile spread across her face when a stranger asked how she writes stories. "I don't know where they come from," she said. Stories and scenarios roll through her head most days, she says. She doesn't plan them.
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In fifth grade, she won first place in West Virginia Public Radio's Kids Writing Contest. Her story and drawings also won the Readers Choice award.
"The Sheriff That Changed," her story, is about a sheriff who is cruel to two kids who are selling cookies so their mothers can buy food. The experience shames him and changes him!
Was she surprised she won? She blushed. “There’s lots of good writers at my school. I didn’t expect to win.” This year, her writing and drawing won first place in the regional social studies fair. She didn’t expect that either.
This is a young West Virginia writer starting out. There are many more like her. How can we encourage her? “I don’t think she knows she’s talented," her mother, Shari Hutchison, said. “But when she’s writing or when she’s drawing or reading, I feel like she has this bubble around her where it’s like nothing can affect her. She’s just in this protective bubble where she’s creative and very imaginative. It’s a beautiful thing for a mother to see.”
Mia knows how to talk about her process. She likes to draw pictures to go with her words or write words to go with her pictures, whichever comes first. “A story’s not just words,” she said. "There always has to be a scene going on."
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"I’ll be drawing and a story comes to me,” she said, “or I’ll be drawing pictures, and characters for the story come from the pictures. Then I’m like, ‘What does this character do? What is their name? What do they like to do? And it goes from there.”
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She keeps chalks and colored pens her mom gave her tucked into a little desk beside a window where she can sit and see the mountains. “I have what I need,” she said.
When Mia’s teacher at St. Joseph’s School in Huntington invited the class to write a story for the WV Public Radio contest, “I needed ideas, so I started drawing,” Mia said. “After some pictures came, then the words started coming.”​
Her words and pictures often jumpstart each other, she says. “Maybe I start with some words, then a picture comes into my mind.” While she’s drawing that picture, she might think of what happens next in the story or the report, and that leads to another picture, and so on. “I don’t plan it out,” she said. “I just wait and see what happens.”
Kate Long edits five more voices and Voices of West Virginia. A former journalist and writing coach, she has taught writing at multiple newspapers, the WV Governor's School for the Arts, songwriting camps and conferences. Her journalism, fiction, songwriting and radio production have won national awards.
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