Eric kahn gale biography center

As a teenager, Eric Kahn Gale, author of “The Wizard’s Dog,” loved acting. He was in every play and musical presented by his middle school. He was usually in the chorus, and playing service-people roles became his specialty. He didn’t mind those roles, but as much as he loved the art of acting, he found the material lacking. That all changed when a friend made a suggestion — they could write their own play to act in.

“This had never occurred to me,” Eric told Cracking the Cover. “We wrote film scripts and a few short plays. By college, I’d written a full play that I was really proud of, but I couldn’t get a production mounted anywhere. Plays took money to produce, and I was unable to produce any money. If this play were instead a novel, I realized, it would cost me about 10 cents a page to print it out at Fedex office and I would have a complete work of art.”

That realization pointed Eric in the direction of book writing, and 10 years later, that play became his second novel, “The Zoo at the Edge of the World.”

It was when Eric was pitching his first book, “The Bully Book” to publishers that he realized his writing would appeal to young readers. From there, his choice of audience just seemed natural.

“I embarked on a school tour in support of ‘The Bully B

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