Joy Wieder (Catherine Pfau)
By Beth Lipoff / Contributing Writer
If you’re looking for a new tale to tell your kids about the mechanics of Passover, Kansas City native Joy Nelkin Wieder has one for you with “The Passover Mouse.” The tiny creature causes havoc by running around a village getting ready for Passover with a purloined piece of bread.
It’s not Wieder’s first time writing stories with Jewish themes. One of her previous books is “The Great Potato Plan,” a story based on her family’s history in Poland during World War I. Another was “The Secret Tunnel.”
It was while doing research for the latter, a story set in the time of the Temple in Jerusalem, that she stumbled upon a passage in the Talmud that inspired this story. In it, the scholars discuss what would happen if a mouse carrying a piece of bread enters a house that has already been cleaned for Passover.
“When I came across that passage, that story just popped in my head with the mouse running amok, and the cat and the villagers creating chaos,” she said.
To have a village presence in the tale, “the shtetl seemed like the most obvious setting for that story to unfold,” Wieder said.
The beginning of the story lays out all the preparations the main character, Rivka, needs to make for Passover.
“My grandmother when I was growing up did keep kosher, and we helped her prepare for Passover, and it is a ton of work,” Wieder said. “I wanted to have the set-up of how important it was, how much effort it takes to clear your home of chametz… It ups the stakes.”
Despite all the work it takes, Wieder said Passover is her favorite Jewish holiday.
“It’s in your home. You’re celebrating it together. And the seder — it’s a story, and obviously, I love narratives — and you get four glasses of wine,” she said.
It’s her first time publishing a picture book. Her previous children’s books have been for slightly older readers. Wieder has always wanted to publish a picture book.
“A picture book is definitely a specific format that has its own rules. For one thing, the pictures and the text have to work together to tell the story,” she said. “Every word counts.”
It’s been a long time coming. She started writing the book in 2002, and in 2004, she entered it in a competition. Wieder won, and the prize was that four editors, two from mainstream publishing houses and two from Jewish ones, would read it for possible publication.
“They all turned it down for various reasons. I was really crushed. It was award-winning, and I couldn’t find a home for it,” Wieder said. “I just packed it up, and it collected dust for many years.”
In 2018, she heard about a contest put on by the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and PJ Library. Their goal was to find new Jewish books for young readers.
Entering her manuscript in that competition, then titled “Rivka and the Mice,” she won an honorable mention and subsequently got the publication offer she wanted.
“When I read the email about receiving the honorable mention, I just burst into tears, because I felt this would really be the big break I’ve been looking for all these years,” she said.
Wieder is also an illustrator, though she didn’t illustrate this book. Her editor at Doubleday “wanted to go in a different direction” from Wieder’s proposed images, and Wieder said she’s been pleased with the finished product.
“I really like how (illustrator Shahar Kober) portrayed the scene where the entire village is arguing, I thought that was a very clever way of doing that,” Wieder said. “I’m really happy with the way he created all the characters. His style is different than mine — it’s hard to compare.”
Wieder grew up in the Kansas City area, graduating from Shawnee Mission South High School in 1978. She had her bat mitzvah at The Temple, Congregation B’nai Jehudah. After attending art school at Washington University in St. Louis, she moved with her now-husband to the Boston area, where she still lives today.
One Jewish experience that has stuck with her from her teen years is a trip she took to Israel with fellow students at Hebrew High.
“There were kids from all the synagogues. Everybody went together in a big group for six weeks. We really traveled the whole country, and it was an amazing experience,” she said.
The future is looking good for Wieder, who is working on a Purim story also set in Rivka’s shtetl.
“My editor loved this book so much, she wanted a follow-up book,” she said.