Love, family and meatballs showcased in alumna's children's book
Abby Paine, who graduated from Chapman in May with a degree in psychology and creative writing, sat down with The Panther to discuss her children's book 'Papa and the World's Largest Meatball,' which will be released on Nov. 25. Photo courtesy of Abby Paine
Meatballs do indeed get more adoration than any other Italian food. Spotlighted in pieces of media from "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" to "Lady and the Tramp," there is no doubt that ground meat rolled into a ball makes the crowds go wild.
That is no exception when Chapman alumna Abby Paine witnessed her grandpa receiving the Guiness World Record for the World's Largest Meatball in 2017.
The qualifications for the meatball were simple — it had to be cooked all the way through and it needed to beat the previous recordholder's weight, which was 1,100 pounds. After cooking for five days in its custom-made oven, Paine, her family and the crowd anxiously awaited the Guiness World Record judge's ruling.
"It felt like a TV show, with the judge coming out and everyone waiting — it was a nail biter," Paine told The Panther. "That's how it felt like a story. I'm like, ‘This needs to be a movie, a story or something because this is just so crazy.’”
Luckily, Paine's grandfather beat the world record, with the meatball weighing 1,707 pounds. After the meatball was sliced into chunks and donated to homeless shelters, Paine felt immense inspiration from her grandfather's accomplishment. Paine, who received her degree in psychology and creative writing in May, decided that her senior capstone project for her creative writing major would be a children's book based on her grandfather's world record.
"I had this idea for a while of how I am going to commemorate this big event that happened for my grandfather," Paine said. "There's nothing more loving than meatballs and grandparents and the audience for those things is children. So I took my first attempt at a children's book my senior year."
The book, titled "Papa and the World's Largest Meatball," is 44 pages and took Abby almost the entirety of her senior year to write. With some of her favorite books from childhood being the Mercer Mayer books "Just Grandpa and Me," her story emphasizes the same importance of family.
"Papa and the World's Largest Meatball" will be available to purchase on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Target on Nov. 25 and is also currently available to order on Paine's publishing site. Image courtesy of Abby Paine
"('Papa and the World's Largest Meatball') talks about heritage, it talks about family, it talks about food, talks about support (and) it talks about chasing your dreams," Paine said. "I think that it's like an extremely neutral and just very happy story that anyone with a grandparent would love."
Since her creative writing experience previously consisted of short stories and poetry, writing in a voice catered to children was an unfamiliar task. Paine told The Panther she received guidance from her Chapman professors and her previous knowledge of writing she had developed during school.
"(My professor was) like, 'Write it how you usually write, just write it in your language' which was the best advice," Paine said. "So I just wrote a full paper basically, and then started to break it up from there and then go through envisioning what each page would look like. Because it's for children, an illustration would also speak to the reader just as much as the words would."
While she was finalizing the text, Paine had to find an illustrator that could make her vision come to life. Through her Chapman connections, she found senior graphic design major Henry Littleworth. Littleworth and Paine met up every single week last spring semester to develop character concepts, sketches and lay out the pages together.
"Something that I loved immediately was how timeless the (illustrations) seem," Paine said. "They're not like caricatures or like comics either, just beautiful sketches with color and I love that."
Even though Littleworth's design style typically gravitates toward a grungier look, he said that the project broadened his skills and boosted confidence in taking on more laborious projects.
"I didn't ever think I would be able to draw a 40-page children's book," Littleworth told The Panther. "I guess that kind of just relates to the theme of the book — that if you want to, you can do anything."
The final layout of the book was finished before Paine graduated so she could present it to her creative writing peers. After graduation, it was now time to find a publisher. With Paine just beginning graduate school at Merrimack College in Massachusetts, she said the self-publishing route was a much simpler process instead of working with a specific publishing house.
Paine said her favorite character in the book would have to be the one based on her grandmother – simply because it displays how family can empower someone to excel in their goals.
"Although it's all about my grandfather and his accomplishment, my goal was to also show the power of support," Paine said. "So she was there the whole time. She's in the little side of every illustration, cheering them on. I feel like that was also a main point that I hope people got that was you can't do anything without your family."
Despite Paine studying clinical mental health counseling in graduate school and plans on becoming a certified therapist for college students, she does not want to give up on her passion for writing anytime soon.
"In my career, I want to be helping people,” Paine said. “That's the main purpose of my life. So if I can brighten someone's childhood with writing, I think that's a whole new facet to helping someone and just to think about that is so awesome."
While the idea that children could grow up eagerly wanting their parents to read "Papa and the World's Largest Meatball” each and every night sounds surreal to her, Paine said she hopes families connect to the message that no dream is intangible, especially with your loved ones by your side.
"It's never too late to have an idea," Paine said. "It's never too late to try something new. My grandfather is 85 right now and he (made the meatball) when he was 80. I hope to continue to create new ideas and passions at that age. Although for kids it's hard to think that far ahead, I just want them to be like, 'Oh, tomorrow's a new day, I can have a new idea. I can literally do anything.'"
"Papa and the World's Largest Meatball" will be available to purchase on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Target on Nov. 25 and is also currently available to order on Paine's publishing site.