An Interview With Nicole Melleby, Debut Author of Hurricane Season

Nicole Melleby’s novel tells the story of Fig, a young girl dealing with her father’s mental illness as the looming threat of hurricane season hangs over their beachside town. It’s a beautifully written and emotional story, tackling important topics for middle grade readers like art, mental illness, and acceptance. Melleby tells us about her desire to write a story about a father and daughter, how the life of artist Vincent Van Gogh shaped the book, and a little bit about her own life as a writer and reader.

Hurricane Season is a story about the relationship between a daughter and father, struggling to stay afloat in the face of his bipolar disorder. Before I had a plot, or even knew what the story was going to be about, I knew that I wanted to write about a daughter and father relationship, where it felt like it was them against the world.

Fig’s father struggles with mental illness. Why did you decide to tackle this subject for young readers?

Young readers deal with mental illness, that’s just a fact. Sometimes it’s the people they love, sometimes it’s themselves. For me, it was never a question of “what can young readers handle” but more, “how can I tell this story in a way that will feel true to them.”

Vincent Van Gogh becomes a big part of Fig’s story and how she copes with her father’s illness. What drew you to his work and is there anything you learned about Vincent Van Gogh in your research that inspired the plot?

In spring 2017, my cousin was studying abroad in London. My aunt and uncle were planning a vacation to go out for a week to see him, and I pretty much decided I was going to crash their trip. At the time, I was coming out of a low period emotionally, and hadn’t really been writing anything much, but I was ready to try something new. I wasn’t planning on writing while on vacation—the plan was to go, clear my head, and when I got home try again—but I adjusted to the jet lag pretty quickly, and my family decidedly did not. Because of that, I had my mornings to myself and I knew that the National Gallery in London was free, so I decided to check it out.

When I got to the Van Gogh paintings, there was a tour guide talking about Van Gogh’s mental illness, and there was just…something so unbelievable relatable about what he was saying. I ended up going to the gift shop and buying a book of Van Gogh’s letters. I read them all on the plane ride home, and I knew exactly what I wanted to write by the time we landed.

Do you have a favorite Van Gogh painting?  

Yes! My favorite is a painting called Wheat Fields with Cypresses. It was one that Van Gogh painted while in the St. Remy asylum.

Speaking of Van Goh, can you tell us about the gorgeous cover for Hurricane Season?

Oh my gosh, it’s gorgeous! I mean, that sky! David Litchfield illustrated it, and it invokes everything I love about a Van Gogh painting—mixed with the beaches I call home. I set the story in the beach town right around where I grew up, and the actual beach on the cover—the dunes and fences and ocean—captures it perfectly.

Harriet the Spy

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Harriet the Spy

By Louise Fitzhugh

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Tell us a little bit about you as a writer. What is your first memory of storytelling?

Tell us a little bit about you as a writer. What is your first memory of storytelling?

When I was around eight, I watched the Nickelodeon movie adaptation of Harriet the Spy. In it, Harriet carries around a notebook that she writes down everything in. After I saw it, I immediately begged my parents to buy me notebooks so I could write down everything, too. I’ve wanted to be a writer ever since.

Those early notebooks were filled with little adventure stories starring me and my cousin, that were weird little Men in Black/Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing mashups, basically!

Where do you write?

I know everyone says not to do this—but I do my best writing in bed! I like being extra comfy, and usually I need a nice (read: huge) big cup of coffee right next to me. Usually with my cat, Gillian, in some sort of awkward position in my lap. I don’t write to music, but I do usually have the Food Network on the TV in the background!

What other works of art or media inspire your writing?

I’m actually a really big soap opera fan. I used to schedule my college classes around One Life to Live and General Hospital—and my undergrad degree is actually a TV/Film degree, because I wanted to write for soaps. At their heart, soaps are about the characters, and their relationships and histories with one another. I’m very much a “character first, plot later” writer, and I get a lot of that from my love of soaps.

What books inspired you as a young reader?

I vividly remember using Little Women as a book report book two years in a row. I was really drawn to Jo, and her relationship to her family.

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Ivy Aberdeen’s Letter to the World by Ashley Herring Blake, and Where the Watermelons Grow by Cindy Baldwin. And I just finished reading Naked Mole Rat Saves the World by Karen Rivers, which is out this fall, that I absolutely adored and highly recommend.

What are you working on now?

My second book, which comes out next spring! Playing off of my love of soap operas, it’s about a soap-loving 13-year-old Catholic school student. I keep referring to it as a middle grade Lady Bird meets Simon Vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda.

Hurricane Season is on B&N bookshelves now.