Speaker 1: I guess what will What's So? Did you know that
Speaker 1: Lafayette started wearing a wig at age thirteen? You know,
Speaker 1: I have a list of when everyone starts wearing their wigs,
Speaker 1: but Lafayette's not on there for some reason. I also
Speaker 1: didn't know that kids used to make fun of him
Speaker 1: for riding his horse like a goose, because he apparently
Speaker 1: he was a goose rider. But I only know this
Speaker 1: because my son is obsessed with these history books called
Speaker 1: Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales, and he keeps quizzing me on
Speaker 1: all this trivia about historical figures, and I kind of
Speaker 1: love it. I mean, it is kind of in the
Speaker 1: family business, if you want to be honest about it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But you know, for a long time, Henry was not
Speaker 1: a reader, and it kind of stunned me because Lizzie
Speaker 1: and I both read a ton and he just wasn't
Speaker 1: excited by reading. But then his aunt gave him this
Speaker 1: Nathan Hale series, and it was almost like it unlocked
Speaker 1: a new part of his personality, Like he just started
Speaker 1: devouring nonfiction and graphic novels and reading all sorts of
Speaker 1: other books and then telling me about French boys and
Speaker 1: powdered wigs. But you know the books he keeps going
Speaker 1: back to and rereading is this Nathan Hale series. Alright,
Speaker 1: so so why don't you tell us what are the
Speaker 1: books all about? I mean everything from history, for like,
Speaker 1: Harriet Tubman is one. He got really into ironclads, those ships.
Speaker 1: He started talking about World War one and two. But
Speaker 1: the character he's completely obsessed with right now is Lafayette.
Speaker 1: But you know, since we haven't had an author on
Speaker 1: in a while, I thought be really fun to invite
Speaker 1: Nathan Hale on to talk about how he draws these books,
Speaker 1: how he can relate grim history in just such a
Speaker 1: funny way, and also to thank them for keeping my
Speaker 1: son occupied for long swaths of time so I don't
Speaker 1: have to parent as much. But let's dive in their podcast. Listeners,
Speaker 1: Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson, and as
Speaker 1: always I'm joined by my good friend Manguesh Ticketer and
Speaker 1: sitting behind the soundproof glass wearing a tri corner hat
Speaker 1: that he made from paper mache mangle by hand. Is
Speaker 1: the fun, impressive and I think he's actually doing a
Speaker 1: celebritory minuet. Is that right? Tristan it's impressive. That's our
Speaker 1: friend and producer Tristan McNeil. So today we're just going
Speaker 1: to dive right in because we've got the best selling
Speaker 1: author of the kids graphic novel history series, Nathan Hale's
Speaker 1: Hazardous Tales, on the line with us today. Nathan Hale,
Speaker 1: Welcome to Part Time Genius. Well, hello, I'm happy to
Speaker 1: be here. So we want to talk to you about
Speaker 1: your latest book in your series. It's Lafayette. So I'm
Speaker 1: excited about that one. It just came out last fall,
Speaker 1: and it's been interesting to see because of the eighth
Speaker 1: in the series. And when I meet with readers with
Speaker 1: kids to read the books, I always asked them what
Speaker 1: their favorite is, and lately I've been getting a lot
Speaker 1: of kids in his favorite one. It's weird how much
Speaker 1: they've taken off because I did not expect them to
Speaker 1: be popular. And in children's publishing. The two thousand five
Speaker 1: is my fourteen year and children's publishing, and I've had
Speaker 1: a lot of kind of dead ends, and it was
Speaker 1: shocking when I thought, you know, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: chase trends anymore. I'm just gonna do my own thing,
Speaker 1: and I'm interested in history. I'm just gonna try. It's
Speaker 1: going to fail, but I'm gonna try it. And then
Speaker 1: seeing kids just light up and get into American history,
Speaker 1: that's that's never happened, but it's been fun. And do
Speaker 1: you do you enjoy the writing word the drawing? Um?
Speaker 1: There are two such different things. The research so fascinating,
Speaker 1: and it's hard to kind of take all of these
Speaker 1: little stories and then have to decide which ones you
Speaker 1: have to cut to make it all fit. And then
Speaker 1: since the books are all dialogue, it's not only how
Speaker 1: do we cut it, but how do we show it
Speaker 1: and tell it in just dialogue? So the writing is
Speaker 1: pretty nerve racking, but the drawing takes forever. So it's
Speaker 1: kind of a toss up. You know, they're both awful
Speaker 1: and they're a little fun in their way, but they're
Speaker 1: both awful in the Yeah, be awesome. So did having
Speaker 1: the name Nathan Hale get you into history as a
Speaker 1: kid or was that just kind of a convenient way
Speaker 1: in You know how every every day at the first
Speaker 1: day of school, when the teacher you're meeting your new teacher,
Speaker 1: My teacher would always be like, oh, we have a
Speaker 1: famous patriot in our class. And Hale and say, oh
Speaker 1: what you said, give me liberty or give me death?
Speaker 1: And I'd be like, no, that was Patrick Henry. I said,
Speaker 1: I regret that I had but one life to give
Speaker 1: for my country every every year. Maybe that's uh, maybe
Speaker 1: that's where you developed your sense of humor. You know,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's fun saying that these books are literally
Speaker 1: gallows humor, and they're you know, narrated by Nathan Hale
Speaker 1: trying to procrastinate his death and telling all these great
Speaker 1: history stories. And I was just curious, how did that
Speaker 1: come about. The funny thing is I had a feel
Speaker 1: in place for a history series before we came up
Speaker 1: with the conceit of the spine. Nathan Hale being are
Speaker 1: kind of omnipotent narrator, but my editor insist that we
Speaker 1: have a narrator. So I was brainstorming on ideas for
Speaker 1: what kind of narrator would be good, and then we
Speaker 1: were going back and forth on cover elements, and I
Speaker 1: was like, can we cut one of those things if
Speaker 1: we combined the opera name into the series title? And
Speaker 1: then I was like, hang on, hang on, what if
Speaker 1: you know there was this Spineynhale from British and he
Speaker 1: was executed by the British. Hang On, hang on, And
Speaker 1: my editor was like, I don't know what you're talking about,
Speaker 1: but I like the sound of it. Hang up and
Speaker 1: write this now. And that Hangman character is so funny,
Speaker 1: like and and just breaks up the story really nicely.
Speaker 1: I am not actually into military history, like I I
Speaker 1: love history, but some of the military stuff has just
Speaker 1: never really been that appealing to me. But it's fine
Speaker 1: to see my kids just spouting all these facts about
Speaker 1: various wars and and be so into like iron clads
Speaker 1: and whatever. And and you know, I am curious, like,
Speaker 1: how do you choose what stories to turn into books?
Speaker 1: And how do you balance humor with some of these
Speaker 1: very serious topics. I never super interested in military specific
Speaker 1: history either, But every time I find a story that
Speaker 1: I'm excited about, I go, oh, this is the military story.
Speaker 1: And it's funny because I've I've been to some schools,
Speaker 1: whether the parents are like, we love all of your books.
Speaker 1: We're a couple of hippies and our children are still
Speaker 1: militants about this World War One stuff. I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's terrifying or exciting that so many third and
Speaker 1: fourth and fifth graders kind of love the structure of
Speaker 1: a military story. I don't know what it is, and
Speaker 1: I won't say that our lay that book has anything
Speaker 1: to do with a certain musical, but that may have
Speaker 1: come into plant. Well. Actually that that was my My
Speaker 1: next question was because I do want to focus on
Speaker 1: the Lafayette story, which is fascinating, but I guess like
Speaker 1: he's one of these characters we kind of know about
Speaker 1: as as a hero of the Revolutionary War, but his really,
Speaker 1: his full story isn't that well known. When I started
Speaker 1: this book, I was a little nervous about it because
Speaker 1: Lafayette could not be a more privileged person. I mean,
Speaker 1: he was aristocracy, and you know, the stories people are
Speaker 1: interested in right now are not stories about the world's wealthiest.
Speaker 1: The most privileged people are certainly not. But Lafayette himself
Speaker 1: was in aristocratic French family that went back to the Crusades,
Speaker 1: back to geordal Vark. He was friends with Marie Antoinette,
Speaker 1: his friends with all of the wealthiest people in France.
Speaker 1: But at heart he was like a country kids who
Speaker 1: liked exploring, and he liked adventures, and more than anything else,
Speaker 1: he wanted to be part of his family's the leftest
Speaker 1: line of you know, warriors, and when he saw that
Speaker 1: the Americans were fighting the British, he was like, well,
Speaker 1: maybe I'll go over there. And when he watches up
Speaker 1: in America because of his back, Barnman as well bumps
Speaker 1: straight up in the George Washington's company because everybody was like,
Speaker 1: we don't know anything about this kid, but he is
Speaker 1: richer than anyone in this country. Maybe we can manipulate that.
Speaker 1: And then the crazy Blue kids. He turned out to
Speaker 1: be pretty talented at battle. Nathan Hale I love hearing
Speaker 1: about Lafayette. But first a quick ad break. Welcome back
Speaker 1: to part time Jeeves. We were talking with author Nathan
Speaker 1: Hale about his book Lafayette and just about writing graphic
Speaker 1: novels in general. You know, the stories that you tell here,
Speaker 1: there's some some pretty wild ones. You know. You've got
Speaker 1: this story about Lafayette falling on his face on the
Speaker 1: dance floor and one about him writing a kid's book
Speaker 1: with Ben Franklin. I'm just curious, you know, in the
Speaker 1: writing process, how do you find and then fact check
Speaker 1: stories like those? I read and read and read. I's
Speaker 1: try to get my hands on as many kind of
Speaker 1: primary stories as possible. I read a lot of contemporary
Speaker 1: books and articles on these people, and I'm always just
Speaker 1: kind of combing over it for the big picture of
Speaker 1: the history store, but also for the wacky stuff. The
Speaker 1: fact that he did team up with Benjamin Franklin to
Speaker 1: write a story of a picture book for children about
Speaker 1: how evil the British were. That that's something they talked.
Speaker 1: They never pulled it off, but they did talk about it.
Speaker 1: I do as careful of research as I can, and
Speaker 1: then when I send it into the publisher, before I
Speaker 1: do any drawings, basically write the whole manuscripts, and I
Speaker 1: spend the manuscripts into the publisher, and they do you know,
Speaker 1: they take it through proop reading and editorial, and then
Speaker 1: they kick it over to the publisher's fact checkers. And
Speaker 1: even with their really excellent fact stecting and all of
Speaker 1: the research that I do, I'll still run into a
Speaker 1: third grade if it's like, hey, you got this wrong,
Speaker 1: and then they'll point it out and I'll find it
Speaker 1: and be like, you've got kids. Yeah. One of the
Speaker 1: things I really liked was that story of his being
Speaker 1: an orphan really plays into it. Of his admiration for Washington, right, Yeah, So, Um,
Speaker 1: one of the interesting things about his relations they were
Speaker 1: very very close. Washington had this this thing. There's a
Speaker 1: page in the book that I really enjoyed. Um, after
Speaker 1: one of the longest battles of the Revolutes, they would
Speaker 1: have been all day, nobody could find Lafanta, Like, where's Laffant,
Speaker 1: where's the general? Where where George Washington couldn't find either
Speaker 1: one of them. And they found them in a little
Speaker 1: clearing and they had just been fighting and racing them
Speaker 1: back and forth and doing all this stuff all day.
Speaker 1: And George Washington had spread his cloaks down on the
Speaker 1: ground and just znked out and fell asleep, and Laffatte
Speaker 1: was right there with them, just the two of them,
Speaker 1: just sleeping with all of the battle gear on. So,
Speaker 1: and it's incredibly close relationship. I think a lot of
Speaker 1: people have read into the fact that Lafayette was kind
Speaker 1: of looking for a father's figure since he didn't have one,
Speaker 1: and you know, he saw George Washington is powerful, charismatic
Speaker 1: military leader and probably saw you know, a father's figure there,
Speaker 1: and then, um, Washington has lost children of his own.
Speaker 1: There's a story I didn't get to use in the
Speaker 1: book that I really liked. I guess Washington was like
Speaker 1: that he did not like physical contact. And one of
Speaker 1: one of his generals was talking and I was like,
Speaker 1: I will bet you everybody in this room, I'll buy
Speaker 1: you all a drink. Yes, Washington comes in and I
Speaker 1: touched him on the shoulder and Washington doesn't care. But
Speaker 1: Washington came in and you know, he touched him on
Speaker 1: the shoulder. In Washington jet like gave him just the
Speaker 1: meanest cold of stare ever been to drink. And then
Speaker 1: Lafayette comes into the room and you know, throws his
Speaker 1: arms around and kisses him on both cheeks and nothing,
Speaker 1: you know, no problem. They definitely had a that's that's uh,
Speaker 1: that's pretty interesting. You know. One of the things that
Speaker 1: struck me about Lafaette's character in the book is that
Speaker 1: he kind of comes across his both this military genius,
Speaker 1: you know, being very brave and wily, but it also
Speaker 1: comes across a like completely trusting and innocent. And I'm curious,
Speaker 1: is that how you see him as well? Yeah? I um.
Speaker 1: One of the cool things about Lafayette is when you
Speaker 1: have a lot of his letters that he wrote in
Speaker 1: English that he was learning English as fast as he
Speaker 1: could when he got to the States, but he did
Speaker 1: not arrive with great English. But we have letters that
Speaker 1: he wrote, so you can read his actual letters, and
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's just because he didn't have
Speaker 1: a grasp on the language, but he comes across as
Speaker 1: really kind of sweet and almost I don't a little
Speaker 1: bit silly, because you know, he's kind of grabbing it
Speaker 1: that language, and he's just he's one of these people
Speaker 1: that when you read his actual letters to people, that
Speaker 1: personality just comes shining through. And you know, I could
Speaker 1: have a totally wrong but to me, he just seemed
Speaker 1: like just like a fun guy, like a fun and
Speaker 1: silly but brave and crazy the sweetheart. You know. But
Speaker 1: maybe maybe that's the wrong read. Maybe he's stut with
Speaker 1: language and that's way sings across that way, but he
Speaker 1: just kind of bubbly and enthusiastic and a little bit goofy.
Speaker 1: I was surprised by um and and really came away
Speaker 1: admiring how many times he ends up going into battle
Speaker 1: just being so incredibly brave. I was curious when does
Speaker 1: Lafayette actually become a star in France, because I know
Speaker 1: that's a part of this story too, write like when
Speaker 1: does news of his bravery end up coming back home
Speaker 1: and he gets celebrated there. So the slow news going
Speaker 1: back and forth, you know, traveling by ship, but of
Speaker 1: course when the news gets to France, they're making a
Speaker 1: way bigger deal out of it. You know. The by
Speaker 1: the time the stories getting to f him, you know,
Speaker 1: he's practically leading the enemies and he's the biggest deal ever. Um.
Speaker 1: And so you know when he came to the United
Speaker 1: thanks be in the United States for years at the time,
Speaker 1: he did go home for period during the Revolutionary War
Speaker 1: because they were like, sure, he's great, we like him here,
Speaker 1: but he'd be more valuable to us if he was
Speaker 1: talking up um he was getting at that French money,
Speaker 1: getting the French alliance put together. I mean, the story
Speaker 1: is just constantly him wanting to fight and be in
Speaker 1: the battles, but Washington and everybody else wanting France's armies
Speaker 1: to come and help, you know. So it's just a
Speaker 1: lot of back and forth and they you know, when
Speaker 1: the French armies and ships finally show up, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes it pans out, sometimes it doesn't, but it's you know,
Speaker 1: I think one thing that's interesting that kids when they
Speaker 1: read it, it's just seeing how many other, how many
Speaker 1: of these huge plans put together by Washington, which just
Speaker 1: kind of belly flop. You know, France would send a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of troops but they're all too sick to
Speaker 1: get off the ship, or you know, they just one.
Speaker 1: You know, they finally get finally get a French navy
Speaker 1: to come and help, and then a big storm comes
Speaker 1: up and you know breaks them all down. Just so
Speaker 1: many failed attempts, over and over. In fact, I was
Speaker 1: worried when I wrote the book. I'm like, no, man,
Speaker 1: so many of these things that they try to just colossal.
Speaker 1: To go here more with Nathan Hailer. Right after this break,
Speaker 1: welcome back to part time, James. We were talking with
Speaker 1: my kid's favorite author, Nathan him. So, Nathan, I love
Speaker 1: how you slip in Benedict Arnold's story and as well,
Speaker 1: like as this kind of like an extended sidebar. But
Speaker 1: you know, he's actually a much more sympathetic character than
Speaker 1: than I feel like i'd remembered from history class and
Speaker 1: and never quite gets his due right. He is super
Speaker 1: interesting and when I put him into the book, um,
Speaker 1: he actually appears in the first book in the series,
Speaker 1: one that's by as a hero because he was really
Speaker 1: amazing hero in the American Revolution. For the first several
Speaker 1: years of it, he was just great. But you know,
Speaker 1: through like military jealousy, ees and a long injury that
Speaker 1: kind of worn down and a feeling of not being
Speaker 1: thanked enough for what he did, he was kind of
Speaker 1: put into a position where he was just like, you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm stick of being was treated by Washington's arty,
Speaker 1: and he saw a way out and he he took
Speaker 1: it and he you know, Americans have not liked the
Speaker 1: name Benedict and felt Benedict Cumberbatch came aloy and we
Speaker 1: love it. So my son Henry wrote a list of
Speaker 1: questions for me to prep me for this interview. He
Speaker 1: was just so excited that I was going to get
Speaker 1: to chat with you. But you know, most of the
Speaker 1: questions he had were things like what is One Trick
Speaker 1: Pony about? Or what is Alamo All Stars about? Like
Speaker 1: all the books he hasn't read, he wanted you to
Speaker 1: summarize for him. But one question I liked was who
Speaker 1: is your favorite side character from this book? And who
Speaker 1: do you identify with most? My favorite side character from
Speaker 1: Lafaye yet Um Lafayett. That was one of my favorite
Speaker 1: kind of lesser known American history characters. A guy named
Speaker 1: Henry Knock who was a big kienda being one of
Speaker 1: the big kind of He's a major general by the
Speaker 1: time we get to Lafayett. This guy, Henry Knox was
Speaker 1: a Boston bookstore owner in his twenties and all his
Speaker 1: life he's been fascinated with guns and he just read
Speaker 1: books about them, read books about cannons and artillery. He
Speaker 1: was so into guns that he blew his fingers off
Speaker 1: when he was a kid with a shotgun. But he
Speaker 1: was just fascinated by them and a lot of bookstore
Speaker 1: And when the Revolution broke out, he's like, I'm putting
Speaker 1: the clothes sign on the bookstore and I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: help Washington's army. And he actually does one of these
Speaker 1: the crazier things of the Revolutionary War when he gets
Speaker 1: these guns from Fort Tecton Drug and he's maybe maybe
Speaker 1: a term at thendfore Tychon run and he marches them
Speaker 1: just through the impossible odds across frozen rivers and everything
Speaker 1: to get these guns in place. And he's got a
Speaker 1: couple of little cameos in Las Him a lot there are.
Speaker 1: There's Baron von Steuben, another um for a national who
Speaker 1: came into help, who's an amazing drill sergeant who does
Speaker 1: in school stuff. The British con Act was beating the
Speaker 1: Benedict Donald's traitors wide back to the British guy named
Speaker 1: John andre It was a really cool guy. And when
Speaker 1: they caught him and executed him, he put the noose
Speaker 1: over his own neck. That's how much of a serious
Speaker 1: soldier this guy was. Um. There's lots of lots of
Speaker 1: really good, juicy characters in this story. Yeah. I love
Speaker 1: the way you depict Barren von Steuben in this book,
Speaker 1: where he's just but not only super efficient, but he's
Speaker 1: got this dog with him and he's cursing, and the
Speaker 1: way the curses are shown in the book is just
Speaker 1: so funny. It's really very sweet. But I do want
Speaker 1: to thank you so much for being here today, Nathan,
Speaker 1: and thank you for writing these books and bringing so
Speaker 1: much joy to my kiddo. The books are Nathan Hale's
Speaker 1: adventurous tales. His most recent book is Lafayette and you
Speaker 1: can find them everywhere. Thanks for having me this was
Speaker 1: a lot of fun. Well that's it for today's show
Speaker 1: from Gabe, Tristan, Mango, and me. Thanks so much for
Speaker 1: listening to the l