By Amy Batista, Special Writer
MANSFIELD — A New Jersey sports author visited with Mansfield Township Elementary School students Friday.
The event, “A Day in the Life of Author,” featured writer Dan Gutman.
He spoke to Mansfield students, many of whom were decked in sports apparel, during a school assembly Friday.
”Hey, you know what my favorite book was in fifth and sixth grade?” Mr. Gutman asked students. “Didn’t have one because when I was your age, I was one of the kids who hated to read.”
He continued, “I became a sports fan, and suddenly I wanted to know everything about sports” around the time of fourth grade. I started reading the sport section in my newspaper, and that’s what got me interested in reading. My mother was amazed when I grew up and became a professional writer.”
Mr. Gutman is the author of the “My Weird School” series, “Honus & Me,” “The Kid Who Ran for President,” “The Million Dollar Shot,” “The Genius Files” series, a baseball card adventure series and many more.
According to Mr. Gutman, he has written 105 books in his career.
Mr. Gutman said he uses white index cards to help plan his books.
”Some authors just sit at their computers and just start typing,” he said. “I can’t work that way. I rather plan out my whole story from start to finish.”
According to Mr. Gutman, the first publishing company he sent his manuscript to was Scholastic, which rejected his book. He then showed the students a binder of rejection letters.
The letters held lines such as “the plot is too predictable” and “the story is overshadowed by the historical information. “
”I get rejected a lot,” Mr. Gutman told Mansfield students.
Mr. Gutman said he spent two years of rejection from 10 different publishers before receiving a phone call of acceptance.
”I never give up,” Mr. Gutman said.
Mr. Gutman followed his presentation with a slide show, which he called “A Day in the Life of an Author,” in which he gave the students a first-hand perspective of a what a typical day is like in his household with his family — wife, Nina, daughter, Emma, and son, Sam, in Haddonfield — from waking up, to feeding the cats, to where he goes to write, to meals with the family.
”Sam had inspired my whole career,” Mr. Gutman said as he showed a slide of his son when he was a newborn. “When Sam was first born, I was writing for grown-ups.”
According to Mr. Gutman, after the birth of his son, he turned to children’s books.
”I began writing for kids, and I thought, ‘this is what I am good at,’” Mr. Gutman said.
At the end of the presentation, Mr. Gutman spent some time answering questions from the students and teachers.
”I think the students really did a nice job asking him the level of their questions,” Principal Joseph Mersinger said. “They were asking thoughtful questions.”
He added, “We tried to tie it in with the writing process. I really liked how he talked about the revising and editing because that’s what we struggle with most with the students.”
Principal Mersinger said it was a “good life lesson” for Mr. Gutman to share his rejection letters.
For lunch, Mr. Gutman joined the winners of a student essay contest, including Cara Gibbons, Sean Donoher, Asim Khan, Kenny Hoppe, Saniya Nagali, Rachel Quigley, Nick Varava, Bryce Barron, Simone Gonzalez and Titus Ibe.
Mr. Gutman also signed more than 365 of his books in the library.
For the essay, students were asked, “Why would you like to have lunch with Dan Gutman?”
According to Principal Mersinger, there were approximately 100 entries, and 10 students were chosen.
”To me it is a nice honor,” Principal Mersinger said of the winners. “We read through them.”
Essay winner Kenny, 9, of Columbus, a fourth-grader, said, “I think it’s pretty amazing.”
He called the experience a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” and added that his favorite book is “Babe & Me.”
Saniya Nagali, 9, of Mansfield, also a fourth-grader, added, “It’s very honoring.”
According to Saniya, her favorite book is “Mr. Sunny Is Funny” from the “My Weird School” series.
”My favorite part is, every so often a kid will say, ‘I hated to read, and then I picked up one of your books, and now all I want to do is read,’” Mr. Gutman said. “That is really gratifying,”
To learn more about the work of Mr. Gutman, visit www.dangutman.com.
