Antonia Cardella

I was born and raised (and still live) in the desert southwest. One of my first memories is of sitting at a long table in Mrs. Wherrill’s kindergarten, trying to copy a picture of a baby goat from Garth Williams’ book, Baby Farm Animals. I drew and erased, drew and erased until there were holes in the paper. I knew if I worked hard enough, my copy would be exactly like the original. Years later, when I was working at trespassers william bookstore, I had the honor of meeting Mr. Williams and telling him the story. He signed a copy of the book for me and it is one of my most prized possessions.

A parade of animals have graced my life, including a rabbit named Christopher (later changed to Christine), a turtle (Yertle), two golden hamsters (Squeaky I and Squeaky II), a guinea pig (Katie), dogs (Spunky, Missy, Blossom, Tater, Xero, Genny, Maera, Samwise, and Griffin) cats (Silver, Willow, Goblin, Merry and Pippin) and horses (Porter, Maja, and Maeve). Only Maeve is technically “my horse”, but all of them were dear to me and taught me so much about myself. Right now, Merry and Pippin share my home, and little do they know, a Corgi puppy will be joining the mix in June.

Books! I love books. I wrote my first novel, Arrowhead, the story of a Horse, when I was ten. I really wish I still had a copy of it. I’m sure it was dreadful, but I’d still like to read it! I’m an avid reader of just about anything, although my taste tends toward fantasy and faerie tales most of the time. I also enjoy reading history, biography, and poetry. I’ve been fortunate enough to work in several bookstores, and my book collection is enormous. Even though I may not read some of them again, I find it hard to part with a book once it lives on one of my shelves, and I perfectly understand Gollum’s comment, “my precious.”

I wrote and illustrated two picture books for Random House; Two Fine Ladies Have a Tiff and Two Fine Ladies Tea for Three. I've also illustrated coloring books for the Zen Doodle series. 1348: the End of the World is my first novel. Much of what I’ve written is historical fact: boys were often apprenticed to artists in the middle ages—but Salvatore, Marco Tullio, and Pino are all fictional characters. That doesn’t make them any less real to me though. I hope that I’ve made them real for you.

Regarding 1348, my minor in college was Medieval Studies, and it seemed like everything I read had some reference to the journalist, Agnolo di Tura. He is quoted on a regular basis in books about the Black Death. When I first read, “E io, Agnolo di Tura, detto il Grasso, sotterai cinque miei figiuoli co’le mie mani” (and I, Agnolo di Tura, called the Fat, buried my five sons with my own hands), it was like he had reached through the centuries and grabbed my heart. I had to tell his story along with Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s. They did know each other—Agnolo said that Ambrogio spoke well at a meeting of the Nove. It wasn’t a stretch for me to write about them as friends.

As is so often true of characters in novels, especially first novels, Salvatore is a lot like me. I have also struggled with what gets my attention, my writing or my art. Apprenticeship has always fascinated me. I'm about to finish my Master's degree in Rhetoric and Writing, and then I will be tackling Apprentices Book Two, Sister Son, which is about an apprentice swordsmith in East Anglia in the mid-830s.