Guest Post #4: Fleur Hitchcock - My Favourite Reads - Middle Grade - Past and Present

                                        

Twitter: @FleurHitchcock  - One of the judges of the 9-12 section of the Hot Key Young Writer’s prize, people might like to take note of my middle grade choices!!!

Website: http://fleurhitchcock.wordpress.com/

Favourite books for young people?  I couldn’t possibly, I thought, how can you pick one?

Well I couldn’t, but I’m a middle grade author, and we’re often overlooked in favour of young adult, so I thought I’d try and hold up the flag for a few of my middle grade faves, some of which I read to my children and some I enjoyed as a child, but all of which I have read recently, 

Night Birds on Nantucket.  I was devastated when I finished reading this aged 8, and even though I read Joan Aiken’s other stories and enjoyed them, they couldn’t deliver quite the terror and excitement of Nightbirds. Maybe it was the first Dido Twite book that I read, and so the novelty of the inventive slang and the rich descriptions had greater resonance or maybe I was exactly the right age.  It wasn’t the first in the series, and the series is very loosely linked, but I still think it’s the best of her very good books, all of which I’d recommend.

Holes.  I read this one hot summer and felt every scrap of Stanley Yelnats’ discomfort.  Probably the most beautifully constructed book I’ve ever read, it tells the story of wrongly convicted Stanley, and his incredibly roundabout release from the awful Camp Green Lake.  Apart from being funny, and scary, and so, so neat, it also has one of the best first lines ever: ‘there is no lake at camp green lake’, and one of the most unpleasant villains in children’s literature.  This is a middle grade book, but I can’t think any adult wouldn’t enjoy it.

                                

The Secret Henhouse Theatre.  It’s a common tale, children get together to raise the money to save the farm, although it doesn’t quite come out that way and Helen Peters steers away from the Enid Blyton path, by making the book harder, and more bruising than the books of my childhood.  It’s well written and emotionally close up, so that the central character is sitting on the reader’s shoulder all the way through, and the words play out like you’ve slipped into a movie so that although you should probably linger, it’s a really quick read.

National Velvet – worth reading just for the prose.  Exquisite writing.

The Mouse and His Child – again, beautifully written, a strange poetic journey, about the tiny mechanical mouse attached to the tin mouseling.  The creatures they meet that both help and hinder them are vividly painted and their adventures full of peril. I loved it when I was a child, and when I read it again recently, I was amazed by Russell Hoban’s use of language.

                          

Framed.  This book makes me laugh but underneath the humour and misunderstanding lies great warmth and heart.  I don’t think anyone else gets near Frank Cottrell Boyce’s love for his characters, and the way he fuses hope with the misery of things beyond a child’s control still really impresses me.

The Graveyard Book: Of course it’s a favourite, but I do like the cemetery so much more than the fantasy scenes. 

Artichoke Hearts.  This is on the edge of YA – but strays into that place between childhood and teenage with huge sensitivity.  Absolutely the best children’s book I’d read in ages.

 Sky Hawk:  Written by my contemporary from Bath Spa on the Writing for Young People MA – I saw the very beginnings of this book, and Gill’s passion for her subject infuses the writing, but not at the expense of characterisation or atmosphere. It’s a cracking read and yet full of carefully considered description.  And it makes me cry, which is always a plus. 

And, And And..... But I’ve run out of words. 

About the Author

Born in Chobham and raised outside Winchester, Fleur Hitchcock grew up as the youngest child of three. She spent her smallest years reading Tintin and Batman, and searching for King Alfred's treasure. She grew up a little, went away to school near Farnham, studied English in Wales, and, for the next twenty years, sold Applied Art in the city of Bath. When her younger child was seven, she embarked on the Writing for Young People MA at Bath Spa and graduated with a distinction. Now living outside Bath, between parenting and writing, Fleur works with her husband, a toymaker, looks after other people's gardens and tries to grow vegetables.

Author Guest Post #3: Dan Smith - Favourite Reads Past or Present

                                               

Twitter: @DanSmithAuthor   Website: http://www.dansmithsbooks.com/

Favourite Reads – Past or Present by Dan Smith

I don’t really remember reading a lot of children’s books when I was growing up – as a 10/11 year old I had already started on the likes of Jack Higgins and Alistair Maclean (‘The Eagle Has Landed’ and ‘Where Eagles Dare’ were firm favourites), but there is one book from my childhood that sticks in my mind. I loved ‘The Runaways’ by Victor Canning. There was something about the main character, Smiler, being accused of a crime he didn’t commit, that stirred something in me. Oh, and I loved ‘Danny, Champion of The World’ by Roald Dahl – all those ingenious ways of catching pheasants! 

‘Lord of The Flies’ by William Golding is a book that grabbed me when I read it at school. The isolation, the darkness, the savagery and, of course, The Beast. I’ve now read this book more times than I can remember and it never gets boring. It’s the ultimate survival story . . . or is it? You see, when I was twelve years old, I was introduced to the film of The Old Man and The Sea, and decided I had to read the book. I was mesmerised by it and still am. I once recommended the book to someone who returned it saying, ‘it’s about a bloke who catches a fish’. Well, yes, but it’s the best book ever written about a bloke who catches a fish. It’s also about so many other things, like friendship, tenacity, pride, loss, courage, struggle, human nature . . . you get the idea.

‘The Go-Between’ by LP Hartley is another favourite. It might seem an unlikely choice with its genteel Edwardian setting, but when I read it as a teenager, it was the dark underbelly of the society that intrigued me. The lies and deception. I also love that the narrator only really knows what happened when he is much older and able to understand it all. 

Oh, and don’t get me started on ‘The Road’ by Cormac McCarthy! What a beautifully grim book that is. In fact, I love McCarthy’s writing and could re-read many of his books – as long as there’s time to read Elmore Leonard and James Lee Burke. What else, what else . . ? ‘The Wasp Factory’ by Iain Banks was a huge inspiration for me to start writing, as was pretty much anything Stephen King wrote in the eighties. I love ‘True Grit’ by Charles Portis, ‘Clockwork Orange’ by Anthony Burgess, ‘Fight Club’ by Chuck Palahniuk, ‘Game of Thrones’ has had me gripped and ‘Holes’ by Louis Sachar is brilliant – read it now if you haven’t already – and . . . phew, I should probably stop now. 

Well, I don’t read anywhere near as much as I would like to. When I’m writing a first draft of a new novel, reading someone else’s work is fine, but when I’m editing, it sometimes feels a bit too much like work. In those circumstances, I often turn to another overlooked form of storytelling – the graphic novel. So here’s a list of my favourite gra . . . oh? You’ve heard enough? Well why are you still here, then? Go and read a book or something. 

About the Author

Growing up, Dan Smith lived three lives: the day-to-day humdrum of boarding school, finding adventure in the padi fields of Asia and the jungles of Brazil, and in a world of his own, making up stories. He lives in Newcastle with his wife and two children. My Friend the Enemy is his debut children's novel.

Dan Smith reads from his novel My Friend The Enemy (Chicken House Publishing) Published on 4 July 2013

Author Guest Post #2: C. J. Busby - My Favourite Read - Eight Days of Luke’, by Diana Wynne Jones

                                             

Twitter: @ceciliabusby             Website: http://www.frogspell.co.uk/

‘Eight Days of Luke’, by Diana Wynne Jones

I first read Eight Days of Luke when I was about nine, not long after it had come out. It was just about the best book I had ever read, and from that point on and on the basis of that book only, Diana Wynne Jones was my favourite author. I checked every library or bookshop I entered for other books by Diana Wynne Jones. Never being quite sure whether I would find her under ‘W’ for Wynne, or ‘J’ for Jones meant that the disappointment of finding no trace of her was always delayed till I had thoroughly checked both places, as well as the letters either side in case a book had got misplaced. But although I did find Charmed Life (quickly another favourite), there was generally no sign of her. So I read Eight days of Luke again. And again. I probably got it out of our library at least ten times (why on earth didn’t my parents buy it for me? But somehow books seemed too expensive in those days to actually own!) It’s not hard, even now, to recapture that sense I had as I read it that here was something completely out of the ordinary – utterly compelling and magical. It’s the particular combination of the ordinary everyday world with the world of myth that marks out a Diana Wynne Jones book – rarely are her books completely set in a fantasy realm, and even when they are, there is a kind of matter-of-factness at the heart of what happens. 

David, the protagonist of Eight Days of Luke, is an ordinary schoolboy, in the horrible situation of being dumped with a whole bunch of rather selfish and unpleasant relatives in the school holidays because his parents are dead. One particular holiday, thoroughly miserable and angry, David decides to curse them. His curse, all made-up words and emotional release, suddenly takes on a life of its own, a combination of ‘fierce terrible words’ that ‘asked to be said’. As he finishes declaiming them, the garden wall comes crashing down around him, and a strange, red-haired boy appears in the ruins – Luke. From then on, David’s life changes, immensely for the better, although Luke gets him into all sorts of scrapes, and draws the attention of some very mysterious and powerful people: Mr Chew, Mr Wedding, Mr Fry. It soon becomes clear that David isn’t the only one with difficult relatives – these people are after Luke for something terrible he’s done, and only David can save him, by somehow finding the ‘object’ that Luke stole, without knowing what it is. 

Anyone who is familiar with the Norse legends – and when I first read the book, I had thoroughly absorbed Roger Lancelyn Green’s magnificent Myths of the Norsemen – realises quite quickly that Luke is the Norse trickster god, Loki, master of fire and mischief. It follows that Mr Chew is Tyr, Mr Wedding, Woden, and Mr Fry, Frey. Suddenly, it’s as if you are reading the book with double vision: the ordinary and the mythological, the mundane and the magical, side by side – and it’s this, I think, that makes Diana Wynne Jones’s books get under your skin in such a thorough way. It’s impossible, after that, not to have the sense that only a thin veil separates your everyday life from the world of magic and myth. Any time, any day, you might just enter an amusement arcade and find yourself in Valhalla, or cross a bridge and realise it was an echo, a ghost, of Bifrost. Unlike with Harry Potter, ordinary people are not forever walled off from the magical world as unknowing Muggles – they are always just one step away from diving into or being caught up in the magical or mythological.  The effect of this revelation at the age of nine was a completely exhilarating ‘extra sense’ of magical possibilities in the everyday world that has never left me. For me (as for Neil Gaiman) it makes Diana Wynne Jones simply the best writer of magic for children there is. And although I have now managed to find and read (and re-read, frequently!) almost everything she’s ever written, Eight Days of Luke is probably still my favourite book.

About the Author

C. J. Busby was brought up on boats and in caravans in the southeast of England and north Wales. She lived in south India for a year for her PhD, and then taught Social Anthropology at universities in Edinburgh, London and Kent. She lives in Devon and has three children and currently works on environmental issues with schools, and is a copyeditor for an academic press. Her first picture book text, The Thing, was shortlisted for the Nickelodeon Jr national Write a Bedtime Story competition. 

Author Guest Post #1: Nigel McDowell - Five Favourite Books

                       

Five Favourite Books.........

Twitter: @NMcDowellAuthor  Web site: http://www.nigelmcdowellauthor.com/

The Witches by Roald Dahl

Devouring anything by Dahl was an obsessions for all small boys in my Primary School, but of all his books, The Witches was the one I returned to time and again, and still do.  He begins simply, startlingly, by telling the reader that witches really do exist.  As a child this was a revelation, and a terror...but keep reading: he tells all we need to know about witches, how to recognise them, and how (hopefully) to outwit them.  Dahl is famous for his grisly humour, his resistance to comfort or patronise.  But what he does wonderfully is to acknowledge a child’s worst fears (a psychopathic Headmistress, creatures trying to turn children into mice by feeding them potion-laced chocolate) and at the same time indulges their wildest dreams (an extraordinary chocolate factory, an escape from a cruel life on a giant peach, learning the power to overthrow that deranged Headmistress).  He tells children that the world can be a dark place, yes, but says too that if you search hard enough, you can discover some magic to light the way.  

                    

Z for Zachariah Robert C. O’Brien

When I wonder about how to begin a novel, these words often return to me: ‘I am afraid.  Someone is coming.’  This is how Z for Zachariah begins, and once started it is impossible to put down.  I read this novel, like many others, as a teenager.   It was part of High School English; we studied it for an entire term, but even that couldn’t weary it.  It pre-dates Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and the tide of recent books about apocalypse and disaster, and in clear, lucid prose tells an intimate story about a girl, Ann Burden, fighting for her survival.  Her battle to succeed against loneliness, isolation, but also against someone who would attempt to destroy her.  It is claustrophobic, desolate, frightening, and a book I hope teenagers still read (and, if they must, study).

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Simply put - the novel that made me want to write.  At sixteen, this book (intended, I was told, for girls) was something moving, poetic, witty, sharp, beautiful.  It is still all those things to me, and more.  I read it when I want to be reminded of what I’m aiming for. 

Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan

Margo Lanagan is an Australian YA author, and one of the best.  She has written many wonderful short stories; reminiscent of Angela Carter, with her lyrical prose and macabre imagination.  But if you haven’t yet read her work then her dark gem of a novel, Tender Morsels, is the place to begin.  Set in a dark fantasy world so vivid and vile that you can almost smell its reek in your nostrils as you read, feel the filth gathering under your fingernails, it is a fable about how brutality and love can (and must) live alongside one another in the world.

NW by Zadie Smith

I wanted to include something recent; something not just contemporary but that (in the current climate of historical fiction) is also determinedly modern, and attempts to deal with and make sense of the “now”.  Zadie Smith’s newest novel is, I think, her best.  As in her previous work, her dialogue is keen and seductive; her portrait of London detailed and vivid, and her observations on class and guilt, marriage and motherhood, and melancholy - faultless.  But this is also a bold exercise in style.  A modern (or post-modern?) masterpiece.

About the Author

Nigel grew up in County Fermanagh, rural Northern Ireland, and as a child spent most of his time battling boredom, looking for adventure - crawling through ditches, climbing trees, devising games to play with his brother and sister, and reading. His favourite book as a child was The Witches by Roald Dahl. After graduating with a degree in English (and having no clue what to do with it!), he decided to go off on another adventure, spending almost two years living and working in Australia and New Zealand. With him he took a small notebook containing notes about a boy called "Bruno Atlas", and a seaside town called "Pitch End". When he returned to Ireland after his travels, one notebook had multiplied into many, and eventually his notes for Tall Tales from Pitch End filled a large cardboard box... Nigel now lives in London. He has written articles on film and literature for a number of websites.He is always on the hunt for books about folklore and fairytale. He wishes he had more time to climb trees. Tall Tales from Pitch End is Nigel's debut novel.