2016 Debut Authors Bash – Kiran Millwood Hargrave – Author Interview
Synopsis
Forbidden to leave her island, Isabella Riosse dreams of the faraway lands her father once mapped.
When her closest friend disappears into the island’s Forgotten Territories, she volunteers to guide the search. As a cartographer’s daughter, she’s equipped with elaborate ink maps and knowledge of the stars, and is eager to navigate the island’s forgotten heart.
But the world beyond the walls is a monster-filled wasteland – and beneath the dry rivers and smoking mountains, a legendary fire demon is stirring from its sleep. Soon, following her map, her heart and an ancient myth, Isabella discovers the true end of her journey: to save the island itself.
From this young debut author comes a beautifully written and lyrical story of friendship, discovery, myths and magic – perfect for fans of Philip Pullman, Frances Hardinge or Katherine Rundell.
Image and Synopsis from Goodreads
Released in Hardback in the US on Nov 1st 2016.
Author
Kiran Millwood Hargrave is a poet, playwright and novelist. Last year she graduated from Oxford University’s Creative Writing MA with Distinction.
Kiran was born in London in 1990, and now lives in Oxford with her mad artist boyfriend and mad writer friends.
Author Interview
A huge thanks to Kiran for such a wonderful and open interview.
I’m very lucky to have already have read The Cartographer’s Daughter, however, in the UK it’s called The Girl of Ink and Stars. Can you tell us about the process of titling the book initially and in different countries?
The original name was The Cartographer’s Daughter – I chose it as a homage to Philip Pullman’s The Firework-Maker’s Daughter which was one of my favourite books growing up. Chicken House (my UK publisher) decided the title should reflect the fact that Isabella is very much defined by her own terms, and so we settled on a title that places focus on that. When I sent a UK copy to Pullman he wrote back saying how he loved the title and hoped the US had left it alone (unlike his) – I didn’t mention that it was actually the UK who had changed it! I love both titles though, and it’s been fun seeing how the book is marketed and packaged so differently. I wish I’d chosen shorter titles – it makes tweeting nigh-on impossible.
How do you feel the title of a book can influence readers?
Hugely. It’s a bit like a first line in that it sets the tone for the book. I started out writing poetry, and titles have to work hard for you – I don’t think novels should be any different. My favourite titles are either really short, like Skellig or long, like The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.
In real life female friends fight and Isabella and Lupe are no different. Have you ever had a fight with a friend that has affected your life in such a major way?
Yes. In Year Nine at secondary school my best friend decided she didn’t want to be friends anymore. She’d heard a chinese whisper rumour about something I’d confided in someone, and on a Tuesday before gym class (can you tell it traumatised me?!) she took me aside and said she didn’t want to be friends with a liar. It set a whole chain of events in motion, from the rest of that friendship group taking her side, to my whole class effectively stopping talking to me. It was the most alone I’d ever felt. I self harmed and acted out and generally lost my way a little. It still makes me feel a bit sick to think of.
Then I got fed up of crying in the toilets at lunch time and started hanging out with another class in my year. In that class was Izzy, who is still my best friend and who my main character Isabella is named after. She’s also going to be my maid of honour when I get married next year! I did make up with the first girl and friendship group eventually. Things got easier, but in the case of that particular person we’ve not talked for ages. People move on.
Also, which gift given to you by a friend do you particularly treasure?
Recently, my friend Jessie made me a black-out poem from the first page of an old copy of The Water Babies for my birthday. It’s a beautiful object and I love that she took the time to do that. I always treasure books, and my friend Sarvat got me a copy of The Girl Who Circumnavigated… by Catherynne M. Valente which was a game-changer for me.
Maps are obviously an important part of the story. What inspired that?
Growing up, we had this huge, heavy, hardback atlas that my brother and I would heave out and open on a random page. Then we’d make up stories set in the places we landed. So maps have always been a way into stories for me. I also find it fascinating how the first cartographers managed to envisage the world like that – as one of my characters says, ‘to leave space for where [they’re] about to be’.
My parents, especially my dad, have an almost childlike wonder and enthusiasm for how things work. My dad is a geologist and he still stops the car by the side of the road to pick up a rock and tell us what it is and how old. I’m not that enthusiastic, but I am interested in how and why things are the way they are, and maps are an important part of how humans have visualised our place in the world.
Also, how are your map reading skills and tell us about a time you got lost.
In a recent interview I said my map reading was terrible, but since realised that is an unfair reflection on myself. Whenever I go away with friends they put me in charge because I’m pretty good. That said, one of the scariest moments of my life was getting lost in a forest in La Gomera with my family. It’s this beautiful, wild national park and there aren’t many signs. We’d been walking for hours, had run out of water and not seen a soul. We eventually got rescued by German tourists who had a satellite phone. It was one of the seeds for the story, imagining a girl on an island before Google Maps!
I read that you ‘Never meant to write a book’. Now that you have please tell us there are more to come.
Yes, of course – now I can’t imagine doing anything else. I’m editing my second story, and writing a third and fourth. I have no intention of stopping. Writing’s a compulsion now, I feel irritable and useless if I haven’t written for a while.
I also read that you wrote ten drafts – what tips can you give about the editing process? What have you learnt working with editors that you will take into your future independent editing practice?
You have to be open to the idea that other people sometimes see your manuscript more clearly than you, without compromising on what you think it should be. As long as edits are in line with your final picture, try them and see. I made major changes to GOI&S and they are often the things people are most complimentary about.
This was the first story I ever tried to tell. I have no manuscript languishing in a drawer, and I’d only written poetry before it – all my mistakes were made (and hopefully corrected!) within the landscape of this book’s world. I threw everything I had at it. It was an exercise in self-indulgence. It used to be double the length. My major influences for the first draft were The Firework-Maker’s Daughter, The Border Trilogy by Cormac McCarthy, and One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez and boy – that confusion showed. I made error after error and I’m so grateful to my agent and editors for seeing through all that. My next books know what they want to be.
Giveaway
One copy of The Girl of Ink and Stars and Five Bookmarks
Click here for rafflecopter giveaway
Good Luck everyone.
Checkout the rest of the Bash schedule here and follow all the fun using #16DABash.
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The Whispers of Wilderwood Hall by Karen McCombie – Blog Tour
Book Synopsis
Ellis is losing track of time…
After leaving her friends to move to a crumbling Scottish mansion, Ellis is overcome by anxiety and loneliness. Then she hears whispers in the walls…and finds herself whisked back in time to 1912.
At first, she feels like she’s finally home. But the past may not be as perfect as it seems – and is there more to hope for in the present than she first thought?
Author
Karen McCombie is from Aberdeen but now lives in North London with her husband, daughter and one big ginger cat.
Before Karen became a full-time writer she worked for several teen magazines such as Just Seventeen, Bliss and Sugar in a variety roles – everything from Fashion Editor to Features Editor – all very exciting and glam!
Karen has sold over one million books in the UK alone and has been translated into 15 languages.
Find out more at http://www.karenmccombie.co.uk and take the opportunity to join Karen’s Club!
What I Thought
This was a quick and easy read and at its heart a touching story – it reminds me of something I wrote when younger which I think was probably inspired by watching Moondial. I wonder if all children being dragged round old houses imagine flitting back to the past and meeting the inhabitants of a past time?
Well for Ellis this really happens.
I like the extended metaphor that the jumps back in time are for Ellis in terms of her feeling out of place and unwanted. Her mother has just remarried and she has a new stepdad and stepsister – and all this has happened in the last few months. In 1912 she befriends Flora, a housemaid who is bullied by those around her, the two of them become each other’s shoulder and Ellis starts to explore how she had been treated by ‘so-called friends’ in the past.
Ellis transforms as the book progresses and begins to assert herself and challenge the secrets that are being kept from her. Her experience of anxiety and other people’s reactions to it were handled well – the whirlwind romance experienced by the adults is for Ellis a ‘Whirl, tilt, shift’. I would add this book to a list of those that deals with mental health in a sensitive way – but as part of a wider story and not the sole focus.
Now, I put the 1912 date together with another little clue before Ellis did but that was part of the fun – when was she going to twig? There was a twist though that I wasn’t expecting. Very clever McCombie!!
I received my review copy from Scholastic via Faye Rogers – opinions as ever are my own.
Please find details of the rest of the stops on the blog tour here:
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‘Alfie Bloom and the Talisman Thief’ Blog Tour – Interview with author Gabrielle Kent
The second book in the Alfie Bloom series – Alfie Bloom and Talisman Thief was released on the 2nd June. For my spot on the blog tour I have an interview with the author Gabrielle Kent and a review of both books in the series.
Summary
When Alfie Bloom inherited a castle and a centuries-old magic, his dull and lonely life was changed forever. But Alfie’s new life has come with dangers he never could have expected. When Ashford the butler is kidnapped in the middle of the night, the castle comes under threat from a terrifying enemy. Trapped inside with only his twin cousins and best friend Amy, it’s up to Alfie to defend his inheritance and prevent a terrible fate from befalling the whole of England!
Author
Website: http://gabriellekent.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GabrielleKent
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Hexbridge
Gabrielle has worked in and around the videogames industry since the mid 90’s. She currently teaches games development at Teesside University where she directs and presents Animex, a week long festival of games and animation talks and events bringing young people together from all over Europe to hear from world leading studios.
Gabrielle has written and contributed to a number of articles and broadcasts on gaming and is a regular judge on the Games BAFTA awards. She has been named one of the Top 100 most Influential Women in the games industry several times, and recieved a Woman of the Year award from MCV magazine.
In her spare time, Gabrielle writes books for children aged 8+. Her Alfie Bloom series has been published across several continents.
Interview
Is there an interesting story behind the origin of Alfie Bloom?
I have always adored castles and still remember visiting Alnwick Castle on a school trip thirty years ago. There was a medieval festival taking place in the market square at the time, little did I realise it would make its way into my books decades later! I came up with the idea for Alfie Bloom in 2006 when I visited Castle Coch in Wales. In one of the rooms is a carving of The Fates above a fireplace. I imagined talking to them and hearing my destiny. I suppose, in a way, they really did talk to me – they told me I’d write a book. As I made the long drive back from Cardiff, an idea for a story flew round and round my head, growing bigger and bigger. By the time I got home I was ready to start writing about the boy who inherited a castle.
When you were a child, what were your favourite stories to read?
Magical realism! When I was little I was sure that fantastical creatures and magic were all around us if we just knew where to look and I loved books that backed up my beliefs by setting magic and fantasy in our own world. I still do.
Do you write better in a specific place (i.e. office, bed, café…)?
I fidget a lot! I start writing at my desk, but move around the house a lot, then I start visiting the fridge for snacks. I find that the best place to actually get a lot of writing done is at a library. I like Liverpool Central library but it can be very loud so I always take noise-cancelling headphones.
Who is your favourite character in the Alfie Bloom series?
I adore Artan, the flying, talking, pun-loving bearskin rug. What better flying carpet than one that can talk to you and tell terrible jokes while you’re flying
If you could live in any fictional world ever, which one would you choose?
I always thought Xanth from the Piers Anthony novels seemed a magical and wonderful place to live with so much to discover. I’d like to live in Castle Roogna and travel into the magical tapestry that hangs there.
Do you have any odd writing rituals (i.e. writing in the dark, only at 3am, only after four cups of coffee…)?
I always light a candle while I’m writing. Fig, blackcurrant and woody scents are my favourite. I brew a pot of popcorn green tea and choose one of my favourite spotify playlists. Usually: Through the Woods, Deep Dark Indie, or The Far-North Folk.
There is a lot of mystery and magic in the Alfie Bloom books, do you know how everything works?
I do, and it takes me a long time to write because I like to have everything clear in my head. When I wrote the first book I was a bit unclear on what Alfie’s magic was and how it worked. and it caused me many problems later on as it became rather confusing for my proof readers. As a result I went back and clarified it, but it did involve quite a bit of rewriting!
What is your favourite aspect of the magic in Alfie Bloom?
Very little comes easily in life, so I like to show that magic also comes with consequences. As Spiderman’s Uncle Ben once said, “With great power comes great responsibility”. The powerful magic that inhabits Alfie is always hungry to feed. Alfie must learn to control it and to exercise restraint in using it.
What I Thought?
Thanks to Faye Rogers and Scholastic I was introduced to this series and provided with copies of both books to review. Opinions are my own – as ever.
I really loved this series and its characters and raced through both books, and will definitely head back for a re-read when the next book comes out. I find that I do sometimes struggle with middle grade books feeling too young (as a 37 year old that’s not really surprising), but, for these books that wasn’t a problem at all. I was definitely hooked when the carriage from Muninn and Bone came calling. Although they work well for the intended age group 8-12 there is much for readers of any age to enjoy. This series has been compared to Harry Potter and there are some similarities – the fabulous cast of characters, joy and ease of reading and magic but it is also very different.
In ‘The Secrets of Hexbridge Castle’ poverty stricken Alfie finds out he has inherited a castle… and a ‘bit’ of magic. The only thing he will miss by moving is his best friend Amy, but his castle is in the village occupied by his dead mother’s family so he gains his twin cousins Robin and Madeline as friends, and Amy comes to visit. Together they explore the castle and its many rooms, secret passages and dangers. Alfie’s new school Wyrmwald House seems to be led by two Miss Trunchballs!! Something sinister is happening in the village and Alfie is driven to use his magic.
One of the things I liked is the idea that magic isn’t necessarily fun and simple to use and that it does come with responsibilities. Alfie isn’t necessarily that happy with the power he has been given and it will be interesting to see how he handles this as his experience grows. Alfie reminds me a little of Roald Dahl’s Charlie Bucket – he is very generous and kind-spirited.
Like Gabrielle, Artan the flying bearskin is my favourite character and his puns did make me giggle.
In ‘The Talisman Thief’ we find out more about Ashford the butler that was assigned to look out for Alfie and his father – thankfully because William – Alfie’s dad, a rather eccentic inventor – really can not cook. I can’t say much without spoilers but Ashford isn’t maybe what you might have expected. Hexbridge is invaded by fae and it’s up to the children to save the day.
Alfie’s school isn’t a magical one and his magical training comes via letters, deduction and trips between times. The rural village setting of Hexbridge is perfect to contain the magic and mysticism and I loved that the villagers follow old pagan festivals.
To summarise – read these books – to your kids if you have them – or to yourself if not. There is much more I could say and many more characters to meet but I’d much prefer you to find that out for yourselves.
Do also check out the rest of the blog tour.
kirstyes 