Sherman teachers living their dreams
Book series teaches ‘good moral messages and good moral value’
Christopher Carlone and Michelle Baird turned their fantasies into reality. The Sherman School teachers dreamed of becoming an author and editor and worked on a series of fantasy books with good moral messages and values, Carlone said.
The first book in the series is “The Fall from Lunathal,” which Carlone described as a characterdriven story about two unlikely people who live in a self-contained bubble in the treetop city of Lunathal.
Carlone said the characters are plunged into an adventure in which they realize the world is much more vast and complicated than they realized.
Carlone said his book was what he and Baird are calling “indie published,” which means he has a contract to publish his book through Amazon.com, KDP and Kindle Direct.
Carlone said the contract means he has given the companies exclusive rights to sell the book. “The Fall from Lunathal” can be ordered through Carlone’s website, www.christophercarlone.com.
Idea, writing process
Carlone said he his idea for “The Fall from Luthanal” arrived in July and he worked on the story while visiting family in Italy before handing a rough draft to Baird in August.
“When you have these ideas and you’re so motivated, all it can take is one person to kind of leap that imposter syndrome and take the wind from your creative sails,” Carlone said, “and Michelle is the opposite of that.”
Carlone said he related the book idea to Sherman since Sherman is a small town and students leaving Sherman realize “the world is a lot bigger, a lot more beautiful place, but there’s always
this call to home.”
He said he tried to create a story that has good morals after seeing the COVID-19 pandemic’s effect on children and preteens.
“I really wanted to write a story that has strong, optimistic morals and really make sure that kids realize they have a gift to be here and not to waste it,” said Carlone, a graduate of New Milford Public Schools.
He has been teaching band and instruments to students in grades 4 to 8 for seven years. Carlone received his bachelor’s degree in music education from the University of New Hampshire in 2014 and his master’s degree in music
from the University of Massachusetts in 2016.
In addition to teaching at The Sherman School, he writes music for films, TV series and games.
Carlone said teaching motivated him to pursue his dream of writing a book, and his students motivated him to write something that “caters to them and can get their foot in the door for great books like ‘The Hobbit,’ ‘Narnia’ and ‘Eragon.’ ”
Carlone said he grew up playing Dungeons & Dragons, a game he said has since become “the cool thing to do” after it was featured in the Netflix series “Stranger Things.”
“All my students are really into it, so I wanted to create an adventure that’s in a fantasy world where people feel like they’re a part of it,” Carlone said.
Carlone said Baird offered to edit his book and help Carlone format it.
Baird said she always wanted to be an editor and it was one of the career paths she contemplated in college. She said she was vacationing in Narragansett, R.I., when she got Carlone’s copy and spent her mornings reading it. Baird lives in Sherman and has been teaching language arts to seventh and eighth grade students for 17 years.
“The Fall from Lunathal” was edited and published online in October.
After writing and editing “The Fall from Lunathal,” Carlone and Baird collaborated on Carlone’s novella “The Slippery Skirmish,” which was released in mid-December.
Carlone said “The Slippery Skirmish” is a bridge between “The Fall from Luthanal” and its sequel “The Children of Starlight.” “The Children of Starlight” will be published in the spring.
Accompanying Carlone’s writing and Baird’s editing are illustrations by Carlone’s friend, Emily Lavins, who illustrated “The Slippery Skirmish.”
“She’s always wanted to illustrated books — she’s a longtime animator,” Carlone said, “so there’s a lot of people who blended their talents into this.”
School visits
Since “The Fall from Lunathal” was published, Carlone said he’s visited a couple of local schools and read his book to students and seen them read his story. Teachers have sent Carlone students’ fan art as inspired by his book.
“It’s very, very cool, especially when you know that the story that you’re providing them has good moral messages and good moral value,” Carlone said. “You know you’re doing something to benefit the world, which as a teacher, when you go to bed at night, you never feel you’ve wasted.”