Dr. Nancy McCabe is entering fresh territory with her seventh and newest book, “Vaulting Through Time,” a young adult novel that will be published July 25, when the Bradford Area Public Library will host a book launch party.
The University of Pittsburgh at Bradford professor of writing found success with five of her books authoring autobiographical stories. In 2016, she published her first novel, “Following Disasters.” Now she’s tackling young adult fiction and time travel simultaneously.
“I wrote fiction for many years – often very autobiographical stories, McCabe said about her leap into a new genre. “Then, I started writing nonfiction because I realized that those stories were already dramatic enough and gained power from the fact that they were true. But there’s also something freeing about telling stories in which you can make things up, too, and some essential truths that are easier to get at in fiction, so I’ve gradually come back to fiction, too.”
She said her college students were one of her inspirations for exploring time travel.
“I have been inspired by and learned from many students over the years who are interested in speculative work. And I've always been fascinated by time travel as it occurs across genres, its potential for social and cultural commentary and historical recreation, the way it can explore the effect of the past on the present and the present on the future.”
McCabe was teaching a class on time travel fiction when her daughter was a teenager competing on the YMCA gymnastics team, the Bradford Flames.
“So, I thought, what if I brought all these things together and wrote a YA novel about a time traveling gymnast?”
The protagonist of McCabe’s new book for young people aged 13 to 18 is Elizabeth Arlington, a 16-year-old competitive gymnast with fear issues when it comes to throwing herself over a vault table. But then Elizabeth finds that she has much bigger problems when she discovers a mystery surrounding her birth.
With the help of a watch that turns out to be a time machine, she catapults into the past —through her family history and great moments in gymnastics history — to solve that mystery and stop a fellow time traveler whose actions may prevent her from being born at all. Her quest takes her to the 1988 Olympic Trials, where she’ll have to perform the vault of her life to save her loved ones — and herself.
“There’s really not much difference in complexity and sophistication in YA novels versus adult novels,” McCabe said. “It’s just that YA novels deal with younger characters and are more likely to focus on issues related to identity and independence, which is also true of ‘Vaulting through Time.’”
Publisher CamCat Books will release “Vaulting through Time” July 25 in hardcover, large print and digital formats as well as in an audiobook narrated by voiceover actress Sura Siu.
The Bradford Area Public Library will hold a launch party that day at 6 p.m. The party is free and open to the public. Copies of the book will be available at the library. Additionally, McCabe will be at the Good Neighbors Bookstore in Lakewood, N.Y., from 1 to 3 p.m. Aug. 26.
McCabe noted that much of the story takes place in Bradford in 1929, 1972 and 2018.
McCabe’s next two books are already in the works. “The Pamela Papers,” a comic novel with speculative elements about a small college campus during the pandemic, will be out from Outpost 19 next year.
“Fires Burning Underground” is a contemporary middle-grades novel with supernatural elements that will be published by Fitzroy/Regal House in 2025.
In addition to her books, McCabe has published essays in numerous magazines, received a Pushcart Prize and been selected for annual lists of the most notable American essays nine times by Best American anthologies.
To learn more about McCabe or her writing, visit www.nancymccabe.net.