[Tiffany Stuckey]

Hello!  We just read Masterminds in our family book club and loved it!  My son and I devoured the two other books in the series as well.  (We are big fans of your books in our family!) When all the group met to discuss the book, we had a Serenity picnic themed dinner, along with Tori's favorite mac and cheese with spicy breadcrumbs.  The kids had a thoughtful discussion on the big themes from the book like nature vs nurture and the idea of censorship.  We had them participate in  some of the races and games that kids would have played at Serenity Day to get their blood flowing.  We ended the evening with a group creating their favorite scene from the book with Legos (the chopper chasing down the truck) and a group creating a poster with the names of the characters woven around the Serenity Cup.  They all came up with a question for you.  Here are their questions:

1)  Why do you write your books from multiple perspectives?

2)  Why did you choose to write about clones?

3)  Do you write anything from your own personal life experience?

4)  What inspired you to become an author?

5)  How do you come up with the topics from your books?

6)  Why did you end this book on a cliffhanger?

7)  What inspired you to write Masterminds?

8)  Why did you choose to name the town in the book Serenity?

Thanks for writing!  We are so grateful to have your books!   All the best from Pennsylvania!

Hi,Tiffany & Family,

Thanks for reaching out. I'm pleased to note that MASTERMINDS made such an impression with the family book club.

Your questions:  1) Multiple perspectives gives a fuller version of the action if you see it through lots of eyes.  2) Not sure. Clones were something that interested me. And then the story worked itself out in my head.  3) My stuff is pretty much fiction, although I guess the odd item here and there might be a real-life event.  4) Inspiration: a wild desire to pass 7th grade English! I was 12 when I wrote the first one, titled THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING AT MACDONALD HALL.  5) The topics and stories and characters come from plain old hard work and a lot of thinking and plotting. No big mystery. It's just work.  6) I ended it on a cliffhanger (your word, not mine!) beause it wasn't the end of the story. I wanted you to read on.  7) Most authors don't require what you call "inspiration." We write because we have something to say, a story to tell. That's just about all it takes to start us scribbling. 8) Serenity: a state of utter calm and unruffled repose. That's why. They raised clones of often violent people in an atmosphere of utter calm, etc. It was a great name for the town, in view of the nature or nurture experiment.

OK? Hope that's eveything. If not, you know where to find me.                     -----Gordon Korman-----