Friday 31 October 2014

Ten Children's Books for Halloween - by Emma Barnes

From ghoulies and ghosties
And long-leggedy beasties
And things that go bump in the night...

It's Halloween, and the perfect time to choose some spooky stories.  Witches, wizards and ghosties...read on for some mainly funny, occasionally frightening, books featuring witches, wizards and other Halloween happenings.  I've organized them roughly by age of reader and slipped in a book of my own.

Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson and Axel Schlieffer

Julia Donaldson is the queen of the rhyming picture book, and this one is features a wonderfully traditional (if benevolent) warty-nosed witch, complete with cat and a very over-crowded broomstick...


Winnie the Witch by Valerie Bierman and Korky Paul

It's Wilbur the cat and the wonderful illustrations - veering from all dark, to a world of colour - that absolutely make this book for me.

The Worst Witch by Jill Murphy

The classic adventures of the accident-prone Mildred Hubble at Miss Cackle's Academy are ever-fresh and delightful.

The Best Halloween Ever - by Barbara Robinson

I have to admit I haven't actually read this yet - in fact I only just discovered it existed.  But it's by one of the funniest childrens' writers ever, Barbara Robinson, about one of the funniest families ever, the Herdmans.  They produced a hilarious Christmas Pageant so I'm looking forward to what they'll do with Halloween...

Bella Donna by Ruth Symes

An ordinary girl, who just happens to be a witch...or rather a witchling.  A contemporary take on witches.

Witch Baby by Debi Gliori

I think this would be a book my own Wild Thing character would enjoy - because, like her story, it concerns a little sister whose behaviour is driving her older sister crazy.  Only this little sister is a witch.  Sibling rivalry with a big dose of magic thrown in.

Jessica Haggerthwaite: Witch Dispatcher by Emma Barnes

Yes, this one's by me!  Jessica Haggerthwaite wants to be a famous scientist and is determined to foil her mother, Mrs Haggerthwaite's, witchcraft business.  Her plans come to a head at a disastrous Halloween Party for her mother's magical pals and their familiars.


Charmed Life by Diana Wynne Jones

DWJ is my favourite fantasy author and I could have chosen several of her books: Witch Week or The Time of the Ghost or Howl's Moving Castle.  Charmed Life is one of the Chrestmanci series, and is perfect for Halloween as it is during a grand dinner party at Chrestomanci Castle ("because they always do lots of entertaining around Halloween") that the magic really goes awry, with the help of a pinch of dragon's blood.  A truly wonderful book.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by JK Rowling


The most famous boy wizard of all, and Azkaban is my favourite of his adventures, because that time changing plot is just so fiendishly clever.

The Midnight Folk by John Masefield

Older and darker in tone, this classic novel is one of my all-time favourites.  The witches, including the terrifying Mrs Pouncer and her friends, are genuinely scary, as is Abner Brown.  There is a wildness to time and setting.  And Nibbins the cat is probably my favourite Witch's cat of all.


Coraline by Neil Gaiman

A bit of a change of subject matter here, as most of my list is funny rather than terrifying, but if you want something truly spinechilling then Coraline fits the bill.  Just why is that mother with the button eyes so disturbing?  But don't blame me if you (or they) get nightmares.


What have I forgotten?  Please nominate your favourite Halloween reads.



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Emma's new series for 8+ Wild Thing about the naughtiest little sister ever (and her bottom-biting ways) is out now from Scholastic. 
"Hilarious and heart-warming" The Scotsman

 Wolfie is published by Strident.   Sometimes a Girl’s Best Friend is…a Wolf. 
"A real cracker of a book" Armadillo 
"Funny, clever and satisfying...thoroughly recommended" Books for Keeps


Emma's Website
Emma’s Facebook Fanpage
Emma on Twitter - @EmmaBarnesWrite

Thursday 30 October 2014

The not-writing bits of a writer’s day - Lari Don

I love writing, but I can’t do it for long.

I do it in quick bursts (30 or 40 minutes is usually enough) then I need a break, partly to recover emotionally from the fight or chase or argument I’ve just written, partly to get up from the chair and keyboard to give my body a change of posture, and partly to give my brain time to consider solutions to the questions and problems that particular burst of writing has thrown up.

So on the rare and wonderful days when I have all day to write, I don’t spend all day writing. I do a variety of things to take a break, at least once an hour. And over the years, I’ve discovered things which REALLY don’t work as breaks from writing:

Logging on to my email or twitter or facebook or even lovely blogs like this, because I get involved in conversations then feel rude if I break them off to get back to writing, and anyway it doesn’t give me a break from the screen and keyboard.

Reading a novel, because if the novel is any good, 10 minutes isn’t enough, and I risk getting sucked into that world, forgetting the time, forgetting the book I’m trying to write…

Doing a bit of housework, which usually annoys me more than it relaxes or inspires me, so I do as little housework as possible (this is a life rule, not just a writing day one!)

So this month, I made a new resolution (why make them in January? October can be a new start too) and I’m trying to find other things to give me a quick mental and physical break, then send me back into the story refreshed and possibly even inspired. And so far, these have worked:
 
Reading poetry, short stories or collections of art and photos. Much less likely to suck me in than a novel, and also a chance to widen my reading. So I’ve started a shelf of books specifically chosen for glancing at for 10 minutes (and yes, that is a book of Joan Lennon’s poetry…)

Stitching or sewing something. I’ve dug out a cushion cover I started to design decades ago, and now I’m working on it in very small sections. Working with wool is so different from working with words, that it seems like the perfect break.

Baking bread or cooking. It’s not housework, but it still makes me feel domestically useful, and kneading bread is particularly satisfying.

Going for a run. This is the best way to clear my head, and to deal with the dangers of a sitting down job. But it only works once a day, and only when I can be bothered! 

Sight reading a few of my daughter’s scales / exercises / pieces on the piano. (Not particularly well, but with a bit of verve!)

I’m sure if did all of these (run, bake, sew, play music, read poetry…) in one day, I’d probably not write any words of my own at all. But having all of those options certainly beats hanging socks between chapters…



Lari Don is the award-winning author of 22 books for all ages, including a teen thriller, fantasy novels for 8 – 12s, picture books, retellings of traditional tales and novellas for reluctant readers. 

Wednesday 29 October 2014

A Dog Isn't Just For Christmas . . . by Anna Wilson

I have written quite a few books which include canine characters and thus often find myself asked to do strange things in the name of publicity. I have judged dog competitions, judged short story competitions about dogs, been to visit a veterinary surgery with a reader, taken my own dog to an event to publicise my books and "meet" my readers. However, by far and away the strangest event I was invited to was one sponsored by the Kennel Club called "Bark and Read".


In schools where there are a number of children who have difficulty reading aloud, specially trained dogs from the Pets As Therapy scheme can be sent in at lunchtime to sit and listen to children read. I was asked to attend such a session at Vallis First School in Frome in Somerset, near where I live. I took some of my books and was asked to read some of my stories to the visiting dog, Percy, a Clumber Spaniel. Percy was adorably gentle and quiet and sat and listened attentively as I read about my fictional dogs having adventures, getting into scrapes, and solving mysteries. When I finished, Percy patted an electronic button which announced I had done a "Good Job!" The children, who were extremely shy at meeting me, relaxed when they saw Percy listening to me read and were soon clamouring to have a go themselves. The teacher explained to me afterwards that the children in the group all had learning difficulties or were suffering with tricky home lives, and that this time with Percy once a week was giving them a quiet space in which to practise reading aloud and enjoying stories without worrying if they were making mistakes or reading books that were "too babyish" for them, etc.



Recently my sister mentioned that my nephew was not enjoying reading aloud and was becoming quite anxious when asked to do so at school. His teachers had suggested he practise at home, but he was reluctant to do that too. I told her about the Bark and Read scheme as my sister has two lovely Labradors who I thought might be good listeners. She immediately jumped at the idea of her son reading to the pets. And it has worked! My nephew now asks if he can read aloud to Scooby and Teasel, the Labs (and the cat, Wormy, not to be outdone, has slinked his way in on the act as well).





I would highly recommend this approach to anyone who has a child struggling with reading. I have a feeling that any pet would enjoy a good book. I know our tortoise is not averse to a bit of bedtime storytelling. So if you have a reluctant reader and can get your hands on a willing pet, put the two together and you might just see something magical happen.

If you are interested in the Bark and Read Scheme or Read2Dogs with Pets As Therapy, visit these websites:

Anna Wilson

Tuesday 28 October 2014

Memories of then, and writing now - Clémentine Beauvais

Today, three stories, followed by a few thoughts...

Story 1. The hole.
In my parents’ building in Paris, where I spent most of my childhood, there’s a hole in the wall near the ground - a hole big enough for a child to crawl through, and as a child I would always do so instead of using the door. Most of the time I’d already wriggled through the hole before my parents had found their keys - and I’d open the glass door from the inside, extremely dusty but very conscious of my power.
As time went by, I somehow stopped crawling through the hole. 
One day, when I got home from school, I realised I’d forgotten my keys. No problem, I thought, I can just go through the hole. But of course when I tried I couldn’t - it was too narrow for my shoulders.
It didn’t make me sad. But for some time afterwards, when I thought about it, I confusedly wondered - was it really because I’d grown too big for it that I couldn’t go through the hole anymore, or was it because I’d stopped going through the hole that I’d grown too big for it?

Story 2. The spatula.


As a child I was constantly, voraciously hungry. I would actually dream that I was eating roast chicken with cream, or Nutella crêpes or cheese. Only pride would prevent me from crying if I had any reason to believe that another child, or indeed adult, had been given more food than me. I couldn’t focus on anything if there was a vending machine in sight, especially if it sold Kinder Bueno, my favourite chocolate bar and an absolute torture, as I was always divided between the desire to eat each chunk in one go and the temptation to open them up like little boxes and lick the cream inside.
I had a friend whose mum made excellent cakes every day. I often stayed with them on holiday, and my friend and I would prowl like vulture around the kitchen table as her mum finished scraping the dough out of the mixing bowl and into the cake dish with a spoon. Then we’d fight furiously over the remnants of dough in the bowl, with fingers, tongues and chins.
One day, her mum bought a silicon spatula. I’d never seen a silicon spatula before. 
We watched in horror as the ruthlessly efficient implement left barely a trail of cake dough in the mixing bowl. Every day after that, we swallowed back tears, and I clearly remember my head spinning with frustrated desire, as increasingly spotless mixing bowls ended up in the sink to be washed. We prayed and implored my friend’s mum to leave us at least a tiny bit, but she was under the impression that it was less useful to us raw than baked. 
We devised the perfect crime: we pushed the spatula all the way to the bottom of the cutlery drawer and it fell behind it, and behind the freezer beneath the drawer, with a satisfying CLACK, joining dozens of lost spoons, scissors and other expatriates from the overfilled drawer.
For the next few days the wooden spoon returned and with it the minutes of bowl-licking. Then they bought another spatula.

Story 3. The castle.
My mother was pregnant with my sister; I was five and a half years old. We had an absolutely tiny flat in Paris and my parents were looking for a less absolutely tiny flat. I knew how much they wanted to spend on it, and I ‘helped’ by looking at ads in the windows of estate agencies.
Suddenly I spotted an ad for a castle, a castle, for sale at a much lower price than the one my parents were ready to put into the new flat. It had turrets, an immense garden, a forest.
I listened, without understanding, as my mother explained that they didn’t want a castle, because they wanted to live in Paris. I pointed out that the ad said that it was only half and hour from Paris. My mother laughed and said no, Clementine, listen, we’re not buying a castle. We’re buying a flat in Paris.
I remember thinking, distinctly and with real alarm, feeling that this realisation would have an enormous impact on my future life: my parents are mad. I live with people who are mad.

***

I have three silicon spatulas now, and when I finally get a permanent job I will likely buy a small house or a flat. Not a castle.
It was ‘us’ children versus ‘them’ adults once upon a time, and now it’s the opposite. They’re really not like us, are they? I’m just not that hungry anymore. Sure, the memory of that hunger prevents me from getting too annoyed at them when they steal bits of mozzarella from the salads before they get to the table (arrghh!!!), or when they fly into a tantrum for an ice cream. 
And I think it’s amazing that I once wanted a castle. Amazingly mad.
Don't you think? 
It would be possible to write children's stories from all those intense memories, and to write them as if we truly believed that castles should indeed be bought and that cakes should preferably be eaten raw. But would it be true? Would it be honest? We don't... do that anymore. 
Would they be our stories now, these nostalgic recollections?
How do we write for children, having changed so much? 

Do we want to sound, when we write, like we're imagining that we can still go through the hole? That would leave our whole bodies behind, and what made them grow...

_____________________________________

Clémentine Beauvais writes books in both French and English. The former are of all kinds and shapes for all ages, and the latter humour and adventure stories with Hodder and Bloomsbury. She blogs here about children's literature and academia and is on Twitter @blueclementine.  

Monday 27 October 2014

Geopolitics: Lily Hyde

(Due to unforeseen circumstances, Lily was unable to post this month. So I've re-posted something she wrote in July. I've done this because I found this a very moving and resonant piece, and I'm glad to be able to give it another airing. Sue Purkiss)

This time last year I wrote a cheerful ABBA post from high in the Carpathian mountains in west Ukraine. I’d been listening to sad and fascinating family stories that are not just stories, from the woman who is and is not Lesya, and thinking I should write them down somehow. 

They were not just stories, although they felt like it to me a year ago. This now is not exactly a story either. 


I went to the village market early, down by the bridge where the icy river rushes along its bed of pale pebbles. The bridge was still in the shade, the sun not yet clear of the pine-green, copper-green mountains. 
The woman who sells there glass jars of bilberries sat as always in her faded apron, her daughter at her side – and this morning the woman was weeping and wailing, her salty tears running down into the jars. The little girl fiddled with the apron strings with fingers berry-stained blue, and said sternly, stop crying, Mama. Stop it. 
There was no need to ask why she was crying. But in the Russian she learned at school, peppered with words from Ukrainian, Hungarian, Slovak and Romanian, the woman told me anyway. 
Yesterday she was out on the polyana, the high Carpathian mountain pasture where the village sheep flocks wander all summer. She looked up from the bilberry bushes and watched the animals feeding on the steep slopes, like a handful of white and brown beads scattering from a broken string. 
This was what her great-grandfather saw each summer, here on these same mountains, before he was taken off to serve in the Austro-Hungarian army in 1914 and never came back. This is what her grandfather saw, before he was mobilised in 1938 by the Czechoslovak army, and what, via Hungarian, German and Soviet armies, he at last came home to. 
This is what she grew up with, this woman I’ll call Lesya. Her husband grew up with it; their daughter will grow up with it, maybe, although this traditional way of life is dying out at last and anyway Lesya wants something better for their daughter: Europe, travel, civilization, not smelly sheep on high pastures and a hard struggle for existence that hasn’t changed for centuries. 
That doesn’t stop Lesya thinking it’s the most beautiful and precious thing in the world; it is her world, her country, these sheep strung out over the green mountainside, the crystal air flush with their bleating and their ringing collar bells.    
She watched the sheep, and then she turned back to picking bilberries because her husband’s pay as a mobilised soldier in the Ukrainian army isn’t much. As well as jar-fulls at the market she can sell berries by the kilo to traders, who haul them off in refrigerated lorries to far-away Kyiv, maybe even to where her husband is now in further-away east Ukraine, a world she’s never seen though it is part of her country too, apparently. 
You already know how the rest of this story goes. While Lesya was picking bilberries, her husband was killed yesterday in that far-off East Ukraine war. She came home in the evening down the familiar paths to the village, when the news was already old. Early this morning she walked to market to sell those berries she was picking at the time her husband died, because what else can she do? 
And I bought them, because what else could I do? I bought the glass jar they were in too, for much more money than it is worth. I hold it in my hands now, full of tears stained berry blue, as I listen to that stern little girl’s voice saying, stop crying, stop it. 

www.lilyhyde.com
                        

Sunday 26 October 2014

The Future Golden Age of British Comics - Cavan Scott

Recently, I was interviewed for the paper about the importance of comics in child literacy. It's a subject that has received a lot of coverage of late, from Neill Cameron's wonderful series of articles on the subject to the creation of the UK's first Comics Laureate.

One question that never got into the article was 'what happened to the mainstream UK comic scene?' The answer is that it's still there, but it's changed, maybe forever.

I know what the interviewer meant. Back when I was a kid, newsagents were filled with titles such as Whizzer and Chips, Buster, Beezer, Whoopie and, my personal favourite, Nutty. Then in the '90s they started to disappear, replaced by magazines that had seriously reduced comic content. Most of the titles on the shelf were linked to toy or TV brands and were largely made up of puzzles or fact-files.

And then free gifts started appearing on the covers. Once, a free gift was a special event. Now, hardly an issue goes by without a free gift or a bag. That's how kids - and parents - choose which comic they're going to buy.

And so, here we are with only The Beano surviving from the hay-day of British humour comics. And we gnash our teeth and shake fists at WH Smith's kids' section. What happened to all those comics? Why did the nasty publishers stop printing them?

Well, probably because the readers stopped reading them. When I talk about this in public, parents often say how dreadful it is that such comics have all but disappeared, but the cold fact is that if people had carried on buying them, they would probably still be here. Publishers didn't publish comics out of the goodness of their hearts, they published them because they were businesses. And producing comics ain't cheap!

Perhaps parents and teachers and librarians at the time dismissed our traditional humour papers as disposable pap with no real merit. Thankfully, we live in a time where we've started to recognise the benefits comics can bring, especially for reluctant readers.

And that's not to knock the kids' magazines of today. There's a lot of really good stuff out there. Magazines full of inventive and stimulating content that stretches the imagination in different ways. And I would never dismiss the power of a recognisable toy or TV or game brand in getting kids to pick up books or magazines and read. I'd be a hypocrite if I did, as it's how I largely earn my living.

But I miss humour comics. Really, really miss them. And it's more than just nostalgia. Though school visits and the like, I see first hand the effect they can have on kids, how children engage with them, reading for readings sake, unaware that it's helping their literacy as they giggle and laugh.

Can I see a return to those heady pre-90s days? Maybe not, but if we want British comics to have a future, we need to support British comics. Buying the likes of the Beano and The Pheonix or making sure that librarians and schools know their worth. If they succeed, then publishers will want to mirror that success and you never know, a second golden age of British Comics may be upon us.

What do you think? Wishful thinking or a possible future? Let me know in the comments section below...

Saturday 25 October 2014

Scene-itis by Tamsyn Murray

I'm at London Screenwriters' Festival this weekend. One of the things I like best about studying screenwriting is the way it makes me think about book writing. For example, in a session about non-linear stories yesterday, I realised that the next YA book I write will probably start in an unconventional place for a novel. During a panel event about attracting a killer cast to your screenplay, I was reminded by casting director Lucy Bevan that 'What comes from the heart goes to the heart.' Which is a timely reminder to write what you love and not to worry about chasing the market. And during Charlie Brooker's session, I remembered that my primary objective in writing, whatever I'm writing, is to entertain.

My real light bulb moment of the day was at the end, however, in a session with screenwriter David Reynolds (who has worked on the Toy Story movies, Finding Nemo, The Emperor's New Groove amongst many many other things). David was talking about collaboration in comedy writing, and the way that writing funny things with someone else can help gauge how good a joke is: if you both laugh, it's a humour litmus test. And he went on to say that when you see the same jokes over and over, they start to appear flat and unfunny. Almost straight away, my light-bulb flashed, because when looking over my first Cassidy Bond book recently (published March 2015), I had a sudden cold uneasiness that the writing was not funny. Worse than that, it was flat and whiny. So when David explained that it was possible to get over-exposed to your own brand of humour, it was as though someone really had switched on a light. Maybe it wasn't that my book was unfunny...

I went and chatted to him afterwards, to thank him for making me feel a little better. I told him I had a book coming out, a book that had taken longer than normal to reach publication stage and that I had been worried about it. He explained that I had the book version scene-it is, something that happens in scriptwriting when you see a scene over and over again until you can't see the merit in it. I said that I was sure my book had been funny once, that I was fairly sure I was still funny occasionally and I walked away feeling better about Cassidy.

So if you find yourself looking at your work with flat disinterested eyes, it doesn't mean you've lost your touch. Maybe you've just got scene-it is.

Friday 24 October 2014

Only Disconnect - Liz Kessler

As writers, one of the things that lies at the heart of our intentions is connection. We write books that we want people to read. We share our thoughts, our fantasies, the products of our imagination, sometimes our biggest secrets and the deepest angst in our souls - and we put it all out there for the world to read about.

‘Only connect,’ said EM Forster, and, over a hundred years later, this is still what drives us. And I don’t think this desire is restricted to writers. We all want it. That’s why telephones were invented. It’s why the internet has pretty much taken over the world. It’s why Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat etc etc etc are as massively popular as they are. They allow us to reach out, communicate, share, meet, interact…connect.

So what happened? How did these means of connection suddenly become the very things that keep us isolated and disconnected?

Actually, it didn’t happen suddenly at all. It sneaked up on us so gradually that most of us don’t even realise that it has happened to us.

I used to live on a narrowboat on the canal. I remember the day BT put a line across the farmer’s field and I plugged a phone into it. Out there, on a boat on a canal in pretty much the middle of nowhere, I was connected. It was incredible. (Till the day the farmer ploughed his field and cut the line to shreds – but that’s a different story.)

Me on my beloved boat, Jester. Crikey, my hair was short back then.
I remember my first mobile phone. I remember the first time someone showed me how to send an email – and my awe at the notion that the recipient could read it from anywhere in the world moments later. It was all very new at that time, and I’m glad that I am part of a generation that still remembers a time before these things were taken for granted. I still am in awe of the internet and what we can do with it.

But sometimes I wish we could all take a couple of steps back.

Phones today can do SO much – and the problem is that, nowadays, we so often use them to separate ourselves from the world around us, rather than connect us to it.

A couple of examples.

I was catching a train yesterday. Whilst I waited for my train, I looked around. On the platform opposite there were about eight people. A few of them in pairs and a few on their own, waiting for the same train. EVERY SINGLE ONE of them was looking at their phone. Every one. Not talking to the person they were with. Not smiling at a stranger. Not noticing anyone or anything around them. Each of them was locked away on their own with their screen.

The night before that, I’d been to a Lady Gaga concert. (It was amazing, by the way. The woman is utterly bonkers but WOW – what a show she puts on!)

The best decision my partner and I made (other than to buy 'Early Entry' tickets and get a great spot!) was to leave our phones at home. We met a couple of guys on our way in and became instant friends. The four of us watched, listened, sang, danced and loved every minute of the concert. I took it all in. Gaga, the dancers, the crowds, the outfits, the music. I was there.

Around us, probably half the people I could see spent most of the evening holding out their phones to photograph and record the gig – presumably to then share it on some social networking site and say ‘Look, I was there!’

But were they? Were they really there?

Generic photo off the internet - as I didn't have my phone/camera to take a pic!
We’d been chatting with a young woman beside us before the show began. Once it started, she was one of those who brought her phone out. At one point, when Lady Gaga was behind us, the woman videoed her back. At another point, when Gaga was too far away to get a decent shot, she videoed the dark stage with the blurry figure at the edge of it. When Lady Gaga and the dancers were out of our sight completely, the young woman held her phone out at the big screen and videoed that! 

She wasn't the only one; far from it. All these people around us, so busy framing their shots, zooming in, zooming out, focussing, refocussing, they weren't even aware that in their haste to show they were there, they actually weren't there at all. They were watching an event via a tiny screen held up in the air that they could have watched for real if they put their phones away.

This isn’t a criticism of any of these people. Heck, I’ve done it myself. I’ve experienced something and started composing a Facebook status about it in my head before the moment is even over. I’ve half-watched a TV programme whilst on twitter and spent as much time reading tweets about it as taking in the programme itself. I’ve even sent a text to my partner from one end of the sofa to the other, asking for a cup of tea. (Only as a joke, I should point out.)

But I can’t help thinking that we have to start reversing things before it’s too late and we forget the art of human interaction altogether.

Last weekend, I was told about a site that I’d never heard of, but which apparently most people in their twenties already know about/use, called Tinder. The idea is that you log in to the app, tell it who you are looking for (gender, age group etc) and what kind of radius you are interested in, to a minimum of one kilometre, and the app does the rest. Any time someone fitting your wishlist comes into your specified zone, you get a notification. You check out their photos. If you like them, you give them a tick. If they like you, they give you a tick – then you can ‘chat’ and arrange to meet or whatever. (And I imagine that for many of the users, it’s the ‘or whatever’ that interests them.)

At the risk of sounding like the oldest fogiest old fogey in the room….

REALLY?????

What happened to looking around? To conversation? To gradually getting to know someone? I’m not against online dating. Not remotely. I’m not, in fact, against any of this, and like I said, I'm as guilty of iPhone overuse as the next person. But I'm concerned by the constant speeding up of everything, and the taking us out of our surroundings to make us look at a screen instead of the things and the people around us.

So here’s my challenge – and I make it for myself as much as for anyone reading this. It’s not a super-radical idea. It’s about taking small steps.

Each day, use your phone a tiny bit less than you used it the day before. Make one decision a day where you say, ‘No, I won’t take my phone out of my pocket, I’ll smile at a stranger instead.’ Or one occasion where you decide, ‘I will allow myself this experience without having to share it online afterwards’. Just one small decision a day. Before we know it, we’ll all be connecting up again.

On which note I’m off for walkies with my partner, to chat, look at the waves, feel the salty air in my face and throw some stones for the dog.

And no, I’m not taking my phone.

Here's one I took earlier. 


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Thursday 23 October 2014

Diversity in Children´s Books - Maeve Friel



I am sure that everyone reading this is aware that Guardian Teen Books recently celebrated a week focussing on diversity in books for children.
By diversity, they mean “books by and about all kinds of people… boys, girls, all different colours, all different races and religions, all different sexualities and all different disabilities and anything else you can think of – so our books don’t leave anyone out.”


Benjamin Zephaniah whose Terror Kid is the Guardian Teen Book Club choice says:
“I love diversity. I love multiculturalism… It makes Britain´s music interesting. It makes our food interesting. It makes our literature interesting and it makes for a more interesting country …   To me it’s not about black, white, Asian; it’s about literature for everybody.”

And there you have it: the criterion must be the quality of the literature. I see little value in writing or publishing books to satisfy some sort of quota to reflect the percentages of ethnic or racial populations or other minorities.






The Guardian published a list of 50 books chosen to represent all manner of cultural diversity, from the amazing Amazing Grace by Mary Hoffman to Oranges in No Man´s Land by Elizabeth Laird.

Here are a few of my favourite books that are outstanding in every way and that also open windows on to different ways of seeing the world.

The Arrival, by Shaun Tan, is a wordless book about the experience of emigration/immigration, following the lonely journey of a man to a new country where everything is different and inexplicable. (He signed my copy when he spoke at a Children´s Books Ireland conference a few years ago and it is one of most treasured possessions.)
















Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, is a graphic novel based on her experiences during the cultural and political upheaval of the Iranian revolution after the overthrown of the Shah.  This is a real eye-opener from the first pages showing tiny girls swathed in unfamiliar and unwanted veils in their school playground.















My Dad´s A Birdman, by David Almond, illustrated joyfully and colourfully by Polly Dunbar, is a terrific book about a young girl and her dad who is so overwhelmed with grief that he goes off the rails. It is suffused with love and tenderness and faith in the act of flying as Dad and daughter take part in a madcap and magical contest to sprout wings and fly across the river.  

Wonder by R.J. Palacio is the story of Auggie, a boy with a shocking facial disfigurement who is
starting 5th grade after years of home schooling: imagine how he is dreading it -  “I won´t describe what I look like. Whatever you´re thinking, it´s probably worse.




I would like to add two more joyful books to the mix:


From Tangerine Books, a wonderful picture book, Larry and Friends,  by Ecuadorian illustrator Carla Torres in collaboration with Belgian/Venezuelan writer Nat Jasper celebrating the modern melting pot that is New York.
Larry, the New York dog, holds a party for all his amazing immigrant friends among them Magpa the pig from Poland who became a tightrope artist, Laila the Iranian entomologist, Edgar the Colombian alligator street musician, Ulises, the Greek cook and  a host of other talented and tolerant newcomers to the city – all apparently based on real people and how they met up.  
The book project was successfully funded by kickstarter – see more about it here.


As you can see, the illustrations are divine - this is Layla, the Iranian entomologist who works at the museum.


And finally, another great classic is The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats (1963), possibly one of the earliest American picture books to feature a young African-American hero – although this is never mentioned in the text. It simply tells the story of a young four year old boy discovering snow in the city for the first time. 






www,maevefriel.com
www.maevefriel.com/blog
You can also find me on Twitter @MaeveFriel

Wednesday 22 October 2014

Top Tips for Tip Top Events - by Nicola Morgan

Lots of hard work goes into producing the best school/library* events - hard work from the author/illustrator* and hard work from the organiser. Based on hundreds of different sorts of events over the years, and after learning more from my mistakes than successes, I thought I'd put together my top tips for each side.

(*I'll just say "school" from now on but I'll mean "school or library etc" and "author" will mean "author, illustrator or storyteller" - btw, see Sarah McIntyre's excellent post about authors/illustrators.)

Top Tips for Organisers

  1. Before sending the invitation: choose your author because you genuinely want that author, not just any bod with a pen; investigate their website so you know what they do; work out your budget; get relevant staff on-side.
  2. In your invitation, say you'd really love to invite them and what for; ask about fees and expenses; say what you are hoping for during the day (eg two workshops for Y4 and Y5 and a ten-minute assembly slot). 
  3. During the conversation, make sure you are clear about year groups, audience size, timings, etc, but be as flexible as you can. The author will know what works for her/him and you'll do no one any favours by making an author jump through hoops if that authors doesn't jump through hoops. 
  4. Discuss bookselling. Some authors prefer to bring their own books to sell; others prefer you to use your normal supplier. (Note that authors earn very little per book, so this does not make much difference to income, but we like to foster bookselling, for many reasons.) Don't forget to build time into the day for this.
  5. Ask the author in advance what support they need on the day: Being collected from station? Or directions. Lift/taxi back to station? //  Coffee etc on arrival? Other food during the day? Time-out?  //  Technical equipment. (Powerpoint presentations are always best sent in advance and set up ready.) Any other equipment?
  6. Well before the event, brief all relevant staff and generate excitement. Relevant subject-teachers should know about the author and have read some of their works, and class or subject-teachers should brief pupils, get them excited and have them prepare interesting questions.
  7. If you're having bookselling, make sure every child who wants to buy a book can. In practice this means sending a letter home and somehow making sure it gets there. There is little more upsetting for an author than carting dozens of books around, or expecting a bookseller to, and then no one buying one because a) time was not set aside b) book-selling was not advertised and c) money did not appear.
  8. Always introduce the author to each audience in a positive and upbeat way. "Today we have a famous author..." is a great way to boost the spirits of an author facing a class of kids who really don't know who he/she is. It boosts the audience's spirits, too.
  9. Make sure the author's books are in the libraray. It's fantastic to arrive in a school and see a display about us: could you get selected pupils to make one?
  10. Follow up: for the event to have the most effect on the pupils, the following equation is the only one to go for: preparation + good event + follow-up = great event + long effect. So, get pupils to write about or respond to the event in some way. What did thy like about it? What did they learn?
In short: positivity, clarity, professionalism, preparation, detail and excitement.

Top tips for authors
  1. Make sure your website is very clear about what you do and don't do.
  2. When the invitation arrives, wave your crystal ball and listen to the twitchings of your finger-tips. The forewarnings of a good/bad experience are usually there. The following are good signs: the organiser has obviously read your website; the organiser knows fairly clearly what she/he wants; your fee will be adequate; they really do want you. These may be bad signs: the invitation is to "Dear Sandra," when that's not your name; they try to beat your fee down to an amount you don't feel happy with or tell you what a good promotional opportunity it will be. I don't blame a school for trying, but it suggests a lack of understanding of what we do and how we (don't) earn a living. Some great events can be run on a shoestring but enthusiasm, efficiency and respect have to be 100%.
  3. Be very clear at the start exactly what you are agreeing to do and for what fee+expenses. Create a T&C document, which organisers must agree to. (Mine is on this page here - scroll down to "What to do next".) 
  4. Learn from each event what you need and what makes you work most effectively. If you need a break between each event, say so. If you need to have lunch-time on your own or go for a walk, say so. If you need a ball of candy floss, don't say so - that's just annoying. 
  5. Prepare perfectly and be über-organised. But always have a Plan B.
  6. If you're having book-selling, check that the organiser has done the requisite sending home of letters about bringing in money. And check again. 
  7. I find that the "geography" of the room makes a huge difference to how comfortable I feel and therefore how well I perform: the distance from the audience, the lectern or table, the acoustics, the position of my laptop if I'm using Powerpoint, whether teachers are pacing up and down the edges like security guards. Some of these you can't control but two things help: seeing the room beforehand, so you can adjust your table as required and stand there absorbing the vibe and imagining the event; and recognising what things make you tense and learning to breathe through them when they happen.
  8. Take easy snack foods with you - my preferred ones are nuts and dried fruit. They keep for ages and are easy to snack on when blood sugar drops, either just before or just after your talk. Ideally not in the middle, as pistachio nut in teeth is not a professional look.
  9. Remember that the organiser will very likely be stressed and nervous. Usually, they want everything to go well and a lot rides on it for them. A warm smile and a kind remark go a long way. 
  10. If something goes wrong, whoever's fault it is, keep smiling and always be professional. Learn from it, if necessary. If it goes right, be proud - and say thank you. When an event goes well, everyone gains.
In short: positivity, clarity, professionalism, preparation, detail and excitement.

I think a lot of it comes from trying to put ourselves in each other's shoes. We need to understand what schools want and they need to understand what we can give and how to help us give it.

I love the mutual buzziness of a good school event, one where they wanted me and they knew what they wanted from me, and I worked my posterior off to give it to them. 

Thinking of asking me to come and do an event on the brain/stress for your pupils? I have a better and much cheaper idea: buy a Brain Stick™ :)

Tuesday 21 October 2014

So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, goodbye-eee.... Megan Rix / Ruth Symes

How time has flown. I've just looked back at my blog posts and see I started way back in November 2011 and here we are 3 years later and my last post for now.

I've just finished my latest book tour as Megan Rix. This time it was for my book 'The Hero Pup' and we got to have guide dogs and hearing dogs and medical alert dogs, as well as my own two, Traffy and Bella, coming along to different sessions. It was fantastic! My favourite tour so far :) Back in 2011 I hadn't done any week long book tours and now I have 5 under my belt. I'd also never done a ppt presentation but now when we turn up at a school and they're having problems setting it up I'm (don't want to jinx it) so will just say usually able to sort it out. And requests to speak to 700 children plus staff at once - a breeze - done it twice now.

This year has been amazing. Two children's book
of the year award wins - one for 'Victory Dogs' at
lovely Stockton-on-Tees and one for 'The Bomber Dog' at beautiful Shrewsbury. Shrewsbury even provided a dog to come out on stage with me - not a german shepherd like Grey in Bomber Dog but a lively ball loving spaniel who works as a bomb sniffing dog.

Dogs are so wonderful and I never tire of telling children all the brilliant things they can do as well as showing pictures of the things my two get up to. Fortunately I have lots of pictures and the one where Bella as a tiny pup is trying to bury a sock always goes down well. As does the fox poo one :)

I've been so proud of Traffy coming into our local school with me to listen to children read. She's been such a hit and is always ready with a wag of her tail as a new child coos over her. Her special reading mat with letters on it was a true find and the children who've read to her have shown improvements even more than the school had hoped for.

The school was also the first one to hear a very early first chapter of 'Cornflake the Dragon' my new Secret Animal Society series that I'm writing as Ruth Symes. The Ruth Symes books tend to be for slightly younger children than the Megan Rix ones and I love getting letters from readers and pictures of the toys that have been made of the characters. I especially treasured an email I got recently about 'Dancing Harriet' and how the book was being used at a school in India to help teach tolerance and inclusion.

I'm going to miss not writing for ABBA for a while (other than hopefully an occasional guest post) but I've just got a bit too overworked what with running two careers as Ruth Symes and Megan Rix and so it's best to step out rather than find blogging a chore rather than a pleasure. But I'll still be reading it and looking forward to catching up with what's happening  :)



PS Just found out 'A Soldier's Friend' is one of the nominated books for 2015's Carnegie medal - yahoo! Good luck to everyone with books in it xx

PPS Thanks so much to Carol Christie for saying her son got switched back on to reading by The Bomber Dog I hadn't seen the comment at the end of my Dog Days posts until I looked back at the old posts I'd done yesterday. That's what it's all about :)


www.ruthsymes.com and www.secretanimalsociety.com and www.meganrix.com

Monday 20 October 2014

Out of Season - Joan Lennon

Many of us have done author events at the Wigtown Book Festival but if you're like me, you rarely leave the centre of town, where the action is fabulously, alluringly booky.  But the festival is over for another year and I'm here instead to house- and dog-sit.  And I'm seeing a whole different Wigtown, which I'd like to share with you.  From sunrises to sunsets, with some cows in-between - 









Joan Lennon's website.
Joan Lennon's blog.

Sunday 19 October 2014

Shakespeare and Company - Lucy Coats


There have been many bookshops marking all the pages of my life from childhood onwards. There was Mr Oxley's in Alresford, there was the first ever Hammicks, there were all the bookshops of Hay, there was James Thin in Edinburgh, the Libreria Aqua in Venice - each has a special place in my heart. But the one I love most is in Paris.

Shakespeare and Company sits across from the Seine, on a street slightly aslant from the Quai St Michel, and I loved it the moment I first walked into it in 1981. In those days (and probably still), you could work there for a bed in one of the book-lined upstairs rooms. 

I did for a while, and it was a place of companionship, laughter, and above all, a shared love of books. It is, quite literally, a treasure trove, a mish-mash of the new, the secondhand and the simply arcane and archaic. I went back there today with my children, and they were immediately lured in and entranced by the smell of dusty paper, the feeling that the perfect book must be just around the next corner, or just out of reach up that wooden ladder. 

For all that it is much more of a tourist destination nowadays, the old magic is still there. It has that indefinable Narnia feel which makes you believe that somewhere in there is a door or doors to another world. There are, of course, because that's what books are - but surely somewhere there's a tiny key, or a bookspine to rub which will take you somewhere else entirely. 

Every writer who visits Paris has been there - and it is a great honour to be asked to read in the little upstairs room with the sofas and the book nook with a tiny desk and endless fluttering pieces of paper, covered in scribbled dreams. Some of those writers are even featured on the wallpaper...

There is a wonderful children's and YA section, where I was happy to see many of my lovely author friends featured (though sadly not me), and an invitingly padded alcove just perfect for a child to curl up on and read one of the pile of picture books which leans against the wall. 

If you go to Paris, do try to make time to go there - and may you be as transported with delight as I have always been...(and take note of my favourite quote above)! 

New dates announced for Lucy's Guardian Masterclass on 'How to Write for Children' 
Captain Beastlie's Pirate Party is now out from Nosy Crow!
"If you’re going to select only one revolting, repulsive pirate book, this is arrrr-guably the best." Kirkus
Website and blog
Follow Lucy on Facebook 
Follow Lucy on Twitter
Lucy is represented by Sophie Hicks at The Sophie Hicks Agency


Saturday 18 October 2014

Creative Energy and Space - Linda Strachan

It takes energy to be creative, and a certain amount of space in your head.

To bring ideas out into the light of day and shape them, change them, discard some and let others blossom.  Making hundreds of little decisions, and some big ones. To decide which ideas are worth pursuing and which are only half-baked. To hold onto the reins of a story that is burgeoning and almost out of control, takes strength of will and the time and energy to see it to the end. There is then the sheer physical task of getting those words or images down in print, paper or computer.

It is not easy having an idea, or a whole pot of ideas, that stumble and crash into each other like bubbles, as you try not to burst or lose them. The ache as they disappear into the ether, slipping away before they are fully grasped or remembered, leaving hardly a scent of themselves - lost forever.
Sometimes they stick together and at other times are subsumed into one huge mass often unwieldy mass that needs careful cutting or shaping and at times brutal harsh editing.

Corralling them into a story, or a novel is not a simple process. Moulding the ideas that crop up almost out of nowhere, shaping the characters and plot, worrying about whether what you are creating has any worth at all.

All this requires creative energy.

It is hard work, not like scrubbing a floor or digging a ditch but concentration, sometimes head-in-hands exasperation and, thankfully, moments of sheer joy!
Ideas can be forced by a deadline and that constraint will at times produce an unexpectedly interesting result but there are other times when the chaos of daily grind, surroundings and distractions, however lovely or interesting, can make it so much more difficult.

A room of one's own, a place of quiet seclusion where the writer or artist can have all distractions taken away, to allow the mind to wander at will and the imagination to blossom, can make all the difference.









A walk alone where the waves lap at the shore...









or where the leaves flutter in the breeze...  



It  will let the imagination wander and often release a knot in the mind, letting the answer unravel in the subconscious.

At times like these it may be difficult for those around us who are not writers or artists to understand the need for that particular kind of peace and space.

While inside our heads our thoughts are wrestling with the problem, it may seem to the outside world that we are not actually working.
It may be difficult for others around us to  understand the kind of energy that is required to work the creative process.

That is why the company of other writers and artists is so important; those people who understand perfectly the stresses and strains involved and the drive to keep doing this amazingly wonderful, dreadful and compulsive thing we do.

There may be times when we cannot find that creative energy, for reasons as varied as there are people. But even in those times, which eventually pass, thoughts and ideas are lingering quietly in a corner waiting for the time when the creative energy returns.

It always does.

So give your creative energy time and space, and nurture it.  You know you want to!




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Linda Strachan is the author of over 60 books for all ages from picture books to teenage novels and the writing handbook Writing For Children.

She has written 10 Hamish McHaggis books illustrated by Sally J. Collins who also illustrated Linda's retelling of Greyfriars Bobby

Linda's latest YA novel is Don't Judge Me  and she is 
  Patron of Reading to Liberton High School, Edinburgh.

website:  www.lindastrachan.com
blog:  Bookwords