If you squint a bit, Paul Pitts looks like a twin brother of movie-mogul Stephen Spielberg. In fact, many of Pitts' insights could easily have come from the mouth of the man who gave us "E.T." and "Raiders of the Lost Ark."
"I write for kids because I still have access to the kid inside of me," Pitts will tell you. "Even when I try to write a story for adults, there's always a kid in there running around."Pitts is also the first to say that children are "incredibly critical readers." You have to work overtime just to get their attention. And lately he's been getting their attention with his latest novel, "Racing the Sun" (Avon; $2.50; 150 pages), which is on bookshelves across the country. Its release has also sparked fresh interest in the writer's first novel, "For a Good Time Don't Call Claudia."
And "Racing the Sun" easily deserves the acclaim it's receiving. The book is warm without being mushy, true without being trite. And the prose is tight and bright, keeping the reader clipping along like a pinto pony.
But then Pitts, a high school teacher, spent 15 years on a Navajo reservation just learning how to write this book.
He has done his homework well.
A native of Salt Lake City, Pitts worked with the Navajo people as a missionary, then decided to stay on. And though "Racing the Sun" is his first book about his life there, he claims he has four more Navajo books in the hopper waiting to hop out.
Needless to say, such novels are a gamble. Being a white American writing about another culture is always tricky, but Pitts brings much sensitivity and integrity to the task.
"I wanted to be very careful with this book," he explains. "I wanted several Navajo people to read it before I sent it off. I wanted to make sure the book fit in with other books by and about the Navajos."
"Racing the Sun" is the story of Brandon, a young boy who, in more militant times, would be known as an "apple Indian" - red on the outside, white on the inside. Brandon's dad was raised on the reservation but is now a university professor with few fond memories of reservation life. And Brandon has come to feel comfortable in mainstream society, percolating along like one more drop in the American melting pot. Then, Brandon's dying grandfather comes to stay with his family and the boy's vision of himself, of his father and of the world quickly begins to change.
"The book bubbled around in my head for years and years," explains Pitts. "Then I wrote a rough draft of 12 chapters over the Christmas holidays. I think the theme for the book came from my own life. It's a universal problem, I think, the problem of kids forgetting where they come from. What finally sparked me was seeing so many parents on the reservation going to ceremonial things while the kids insisted on staying home to go 4-wheeling. I wanted to write a book about the traditional Navajo values of family and connection with the universe, principles that apply to us all.
"The book is about finding the good inside of yourself, about having the confidence to be who you are."
Mysticism, magic and spirituality may play a major role in Navajo life, but Pitts is quick to point out that they had little to do with the way the novel came about. That process was all blood, sweat and tears. Faulkner claimed a writer needs a hard backside as much as he needs a good mind, and Pitts agrees.
"We had a room at home we jokingly called `Dad's Office,"' he says, "but it was really just our junk room. I'd work in there and my wife would hear the keys clicking. When they stopped clicking for what she felt was too long she'd call out, `You're not writing, Paul,' and I'd tap a few keys. It was tough going."
Most good writers claim writing is more taxing than being a blacksmith. Pitts would likely agree with that assessment as well. But though he already has two successful books on the market, he's anxious to get back at the anvil.
"We're back in Salt Lake City for a year on a leave of absence," he says, "but my next books will still be about reservation life. I want to explore more Navajo traditions. I have a young Navajo boy named Nelson I'm anxious to write about. His story is about prejudice and reverse prejudice. It's also about friendship. I hope to get it together soon, however. Situations on the reservation can become outdated very quickly."
Readers of all races will be anxiously awaiting that one.
Still, whatever happens in the future to Paul Pitts and his beloved Hogan Heroes, whatever direction his stories take, one thing's for certain: With the publication of "Racing the Sun," he's off and running in the front rank of children's writers.