#the anatomy of curiosity

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Today is the release date of The Anatomy of Curiosity.

I’m going to tell you a story about this book and how it nearly didn’t exist. It involves magic, blood, and friendship and is completely true.

Once upon a time, there were three friends, Brenna Yovanoff, Maggie Stiefvater, and Tessa Gratton, and they were witches.

No, I began that wrong.

Once upon a time, there were three friends, Brenna Yovanoff, Maggie Stiefvater, and Tessa Gratton, and they were writers.

They had been writers for as long as they could remember and friends for only a little less. The idea for the Anatomy of Curiosity — a show-and-tell writer’s guide for teen writers — was spurred years ago, when Tessa and Maggie were in the middle of an epic fight. The fight spanned states and months and involved battles with dragons in the Kansas sky, and it was mostly Maggie’s fault. I can say that, because I am Maggie.

Finally, when all parties were spent and bleeding out, the two witches reached over and clasped argument-bloodied hands.

“Let’s make a book together,” Maggie said. “That will fix all our problems.”

“You’re a problem,” Tessa replied, which meant yes.

And Brenna was tired of the bad weather, so she patted Maggie and Tessa’s heads and the book was born in the blood of friends. The problem with ideas made under duress, however, is that they are often incomplete, and the project fumbled and faltered even as the battle that spawned it was mostly forgotten. The thing that made the book the most interesting to us — that we were three different writers with three very different approaches to writing — was also what made developing a useful format impossible. How to balance teaching and entertainment? How to show three entirely different ways to get to a story?

By summer of 2014, we were on the verge of calling our agents and canceling it. It was a fraught summer anyway. The three of us were on a road trip — this was Maggie’s fault, and I can say that, because I am Maggie — in a sky blue ‘73 Camaro that was too small for three adults and too broken for a 7,000 mile road trip. Maggie didn’t believe in the concept of impossibility, though, and Brenna and Tessa believed in Maggie, so they were doing it anyway.

We were soaring across the Nevada desert when a raven flew over the top of the car. The Camaro’s engine bucked once. No, thought Maggie. We proceeded for several dozen more miles without incident, and then a second raven flew over the top of the car. The Camaro’s engine bucked again, and then it shuddered in a death rattle.

We coasted into Winnemucca, Nevada.

The car made it to the shade beneath the only tree growing in Winnemucca. We climbed into the bristling hot day and I threw open the hood. As I discovered that a single bolt had fallen from the alternator and stopped us, we heard a laugh. A third raven was sitting in the only tree growing in Winnemucca, Nevada, and it was laughing at us.

The bolt was gone, of course. It had probably fallen out on the highway back when the first raven had flipped us the bird.

We began to walk. It was over one hundred degrees. There was no one else in Winnemucca. They had probably all died. It was just us and the raven. We walked a mile to the closest auto parts store, where we bought a bolt and some lock nuts. On the way back, a Jack in the Box rippled into view. We recognized a mystical oasis when we saw one, so we entered and ordered drinks. As we melted, we talked Anatomy. This, we felt, was the moment of truth. We were stranded in Winnemucca, which might have not even been a real place, and it seemed like we might never escape if we didn’t solve the riddle. Did we choose to hurl ourselves against it one more time or did we choose to give up?

This is the release date of the book, so, spoiler.

We walked back to the Camaro, certain in our new plan. I put in the brand-new bolt and the Camaro started at once. The shade had moved from the only tree in Winnemucca and the raven was gone.

Fast forward to this fall. Tessa, Brenna, and Maggie are still friends, and still writers. The book is about to come out. I am in Virginia, states away from both of them, but I’m thinking about them. I have just come back from Colorado, where Brenna lives, and I have my eyes on my next trip to Kansas, where Tessa lives. I am rummaging in one of my backpacks for a hair band and my fingers touch something cold in the bottom. It’s heavy, and it’s cold, and it is not a hair band. I can’t imagine what it would be — this is just my tiny backpack that I carry clothing in for my overnight trips, and I had just emptied it the weekend before.

I take the object out.