Dani Callanzano is thirteen. It is summer, her best friend has left town and her parents are going through an ugly divorce. The only way Dani is going to survive is by going to the movies — at the Little Art movie theatre, which is showing all her favorite noir mysteries. When mystery turns up in Dani’s own life, she takes inspiration from femme fatale Rita Hayworth and sets out to solve it.

Dani Noir is New York writer Nova Ren Suma’s debut novel. Released in October by Simon and Schuster’s Aladdin imprint, it had already made Amazon’s list of 10 Best Books for 2009: Middle Readers by November. Suma’s feisty heroine is capturing the hearts and minds of ‘tween readers, and those of slightly older ones too.

I asked the author some questions about Dani Noir:

Charlotte Otter: The story is set in Shanosha, a very small town in upstate New York. Does Shanosha exist? What is it about this part of the country that particularly inspires your author’s imagination?

Nova Ren Suma: As you guessed, Shanosha is a small Catskill Mountain town that exists only in my imagination. It’s inspired by a few towns where I grew up. When I was thirteen, Dani’s age in the novel, I lived in an upstate mountain town called Kerhonkson. The house we were renting there was very, very isolated, and from the rooftop, all you could see in any direction were trees, just how Dani describes the rooftop of her house. The main drag of Shanosha looks, to my mind, like a town near where I went to school: Phoenicia, New York, where you could go tubing down the Esopus River, an activity I tried to avoid as much as possible, and Dani and I have that in common. The places in Shanosha are inspired by real places from Woodstock, New York, where I lived during high school — for example, there really is a Taco Juan’s in Woodstock, and if you’re there on a hot summer’s day, I suggest you visit their ice cream counter which serves Jane’s Ice Cream, made locally in the Hudson Valley. Delicious! All that said, Shanosha may be imaginary, but it’s based very clearly on real towns in upstate New York. I haven’t lived there for years and years — I’ve lived in New York City for over a decade — but I tend to write about the Hudson Valley more than anywhere else. It’s funny: When I lived there as a kid, I felt trapped and dreamed constantly of escape, and now that I have escaped, almost all my stories are set there. I think this shows how connected I am to the place. Hmm, maybe I should move back…

CO: In the course of the book, Dani finds escape, inspiration and healing in the movies. What is it, do you think, about the alternative reality film provides that is so appealing?

NRS: When you’re sitting in a dark theater watching a movie unfold across the screen, you let go. A good movie transports you out of that seat — away from the popcorn in your lap even — and into the story. It’s magic, really, and that’s what draws Dani in. Only at the movies can Dani escape her boring life where nothing ever happens (or so she tells herself) into the exciting world of mysteries and femmes fatales and dark, steamy secrets. I imagine that’s what’s so appealing to her: how real it seems, all while being so separate. It’s not really happening — not to her, anyway — not yet.

CO: Dani’s parents are in the throes of a messy divorce, and her father is about to remarry. Was there a particular message you wanted underscored here for your ‘tween readers?

NRS: I wanted to tell a story from that point of confusion, when the grown-ups all around you are off making their messes and acting like the kids in their lives shouldn’t be so affected by it. The fact is, when I was young, I paid attention, and a lot of what I witnessed may have made no sense at the time, but I haven’t forgotten how it felt to be kept in the dark. Dani is a lot more forceful in the things she does — she has the guts I didn’t back when I was thirteen! So I’d say it wasn’t so much a message I wanted underscore but a feeling I remembered and wanted to write about.

CO: One of the themes in Dani Noir is friendship — old friends, new friends, old enemies who become new friends… Can you talk a little about why you chose this theme?

NRS: So much about being thirteen centers around friends: friends you have and think are forever, friends you lost, friends you wish you could have, friends you’re embarrassed to admit you ever hung around with… I couldn’t imagine writing about that time without all the drama surrounding friendships. And maybe there’s a part of me who might regret how I handled some friendships of my own way back in junior high, or haven’t been able to let go of some things that happened with friends I thought I had. This was a theme that fell naturally into this novel, and the more I wrote, the more it began to propel the plot.

CO: Dani’s favorite femme fatale is Rita Hayworth. Who is yours?

NRS: Dani and I have that in common: We both adore Rita Hayworth.

CO: One of the things that struck me in the book is how much can change in a summer. Could you talk a little about the function of the summer vacation in the American teen imagination?

NRS: Summer break is about two months, but those couple of months can change absolutely everything, and it’s not all about physical transformations either. Spend one summer apart from school and you can become a whole new person. I think that’s what you hope for, really — to go away for the summer and come back a better, cooler you, someone all the kids who never talked to you last year now want to be friends with. And maybe that doesn’t happen often, but it’s there, that inkling of a possibility, and each summer gives you the chance to try for it again.

CO: What do you think Dani will be when she grows up?

NRS: If I could have a dream for Dani, I would want her to be a film director. The idea of her picking up a camera and making her own movies thrills me. Maybe the ‘tween readers who read this book might gain a little inspiration in that direction too.

Nova Ren Suma will be signing copies of Dani Noir at the independent bookstore the Golden Notebook in Woodstock, New York, at 12:00pm on November 27th. The book’s official website is here.