The Delights of "Keepsake" by Paula Leyden

I am a massive fan of Paula Leyden’s wonderful books for kids. I absolutely loved The Butterfly Heart and The Sleeping Baobab Tree, both award-winning middle grade books set in Zambia, so I was really keen to read Keepsake when I received a copy in the post from Little Island. (I've tried to avoid any spoilers.)

The cover art for Keepsake by Olivia Golden is smashing and I can’t stop looking at it! 

Keepsake is a younger middle grade story set in a small town in Ireland. The story focuses on two kids, Johnny and Ella, and their love of a horse named Storm. Ella has been visiting the horse when she first encounters Johnny.  Storm, though well cared for and kept in a fenced-in field, is wrongly taken one night by “the pound man”. The children only have a few days to save Storm before he will be killed. Johnny and Ella are aided by Ella’s grandmother, Orla. This high-stakes plot drives the story, touching on the racism experienced by Travellers in Ireland, but it never gets too heavy. I love a good horse story, and this one does not disappoint.

Sometimes an adult voice creeps into the third-person narrative just a little, but overall, the story is told from the children’s alternating points of view. We come to understand why Johnny is initially wary around Ella and his family is sure nothing can be done to save Storm. I love the way Paula describes Ella’s special sensitivity to the people closest to her. It’s an interesting and fresh way to describe Ella’s gift. We also have to wait patiently, along with Ella, to find out what Orla’s secret is.

I felt a bit impatient with the early part of the book, but then I realized that I was feeling what Johnny and Ella are feeling. They are anxious to DO something to help Storm, and it’s not until further along in the story that they, along with Orla, are finally able to take action. Paula has written this very cleverly so that we really feel their helplessness and frustration. The last third of the book moves at a brisk but not rushed pace, with secrets revealed, events resolved, and lives sorted. I closed the book feeling thoroughly satisfied and pleased with the way everything worked out. Paula threw in a few small surprises, though I had correctly guessed at one of them.

What really made the story shine for me was the personal details woven into the book. I love that Ella is recording Orla’s stories, and we get to “hear” some of those stories. (I wish I had done more of that with my own family.) Johnny’s grandmother has died recently, and he’s really missing her, which adds extra meaning to his love of Storm and his desperation to get the horse back. Ella longs to ride a horse and have her dad come home. These kids have known loss and longing, and it helps to cement their friendship.

I’m also still drooling a bit for some of Orla’s pancakes. They do sound rather tasty.

You can find out more about Paula Leyden and her books at http://thebutterflyheart.net.

Next Big Thing - Blog Hop

How the Next Big Thing - Blog Hop works

An author answers ten questions and then tags other authors to do the same thing the following week on the same day, which in this case is a Wednesday.

Paula Leyden tagged me.

Paula Leyden

I met Paula a couple of years ago at a Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) event, and we’ve kept in touch ever since. I loved that she was from Zambia as I’ve had a secret crush on Africa for as long as I can remember, though I haven’t yet traveled to any countries on that continent. Paula’s first book, The Butterfly Heart, is a beautiful, lyrical, funny, touching, and exciting book that deals with the issue of child marriage in a very sensitive and accessible way. In 2012, Paula’s book was shortlisted for the Children’s Books Ireland (CBI) Book of the Year award and won the CBI Eilis Dillon award, a well-deserved honor.

I am eagerly awaiting her follow-up book, The Sleeping Baobab Tree, which is due out in May 2013.

You can find out more about Paula Leyden on her website.

My book

I’m really flattered that Paula included me in her list, since I am prepublished and very sloooowwwllly writing my stories.

Here are my answers to the questions. This is fun!

What is the working title of your next book?
A Dragon Named Thelma

Where did the idea come from for the book?
I really like dragons, and I also like oddball names, so I came up with the title “A Dragon Named Thelma” first. I had a pretty good visual of her in my head, bright yellow with orange wing tips, kinda girly. I was a long-time volunteer at the Vancouver Folk Music Festival, and I had performed at a couple of other festivals when I was younger, but got stage fright and kind of stopped singing in public. So, I had the idea of this little dragon who likes to sing, and she wants to sing in the folk music festival. Then I thought - what if she can’t really sing but this is her dream? How is she going to achieve her goal to perform at the festival?

What genre does your book fall under?
Urban fantasy since it’s set in the real city of Vancouver. I’ve taken some liberties with the layout of the city to include Dragontown and a dragon entrance at the public library.

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
Well, perhaps Andy Serkis would like to don the ping-pong ball outfit for the CGI for Thelma! Not sure who would play Sashi. I’m not familiar with the current crop of young Indo-Canadian actors.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
Thelma is a bit like an X-Factor contestant - she is determined to perform at the Vancouver folk music festival but she can’t actually sing.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
No idea. Of course, it’s preferable to get the vetting and support of an agency or publisher, but it is also possible to do well with self-publishing if you’re prepared to do everything yourself.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
I’ve only done 2,000 words, so I’m really just getting started. I was working on another story, but this one is going easier, so I thought I’d focus on it for now.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Someone in my critique group recently described my story as a cross between Little Miss Sunshine and How to Train Your Dragon!

Who or what inspired you to write this book?
My love of folk music, the Vancouver Folk Music Festival, my own dreams of solo singing in public (that didn’t quite happen), and just the fun of writing about a singing dragon and her human best friend.

What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
It’s about pursuing your dream but being flexible enough to roll with the challenges and disappoints that might arise without giving up. It’s about the friendship between two disparate beings, who accept their differences and embrace their similarities.

Tag, you’re next!

I’ll just tag four authors, because I could wax poetic about everyone I like to read! However, if my tagees (!) wish to limit themselves to only one other author, that is allowed. If they don’t want to play, that’s okay too - it’s all about having fun!

Jane Mitchell

Jane Mitchell's most recently published book, Chalkline, is one of the most moving, harrowing, and beautiful books I have read in a long time. This is a book that deals with the kidnapping of a young boy and many of his friends from their village home. They are forced to train as terrorists or be killed. The book shows his world and how it changes him as he tries to survive. It also shows what his family and the rest of the village is coping with the loss of most of their boys and no idea if they’re dead or alive.

The reading is not as heavy as you might expect for such a difficult topic. You really get into the heads and hearts of the main characters and want a positive outcome for them all. Jane has won numerous awards for Chalkline and for some of her other books.

You can find out more about Jane Mitchell on her website.

Oisín McGann

If author/illustrator Oisín McGann is not already the Next Big Thing, then he should be. I’ve become a big fan of Oisín’s books over the past few years. I read a couple of his Mad Granddad series - they are great fun and have Oisín’s illustrations to accompany the text. Many of his books for younger kids are a little crazy and outlandish and funny, but things always work out in the end.

I also really like Oisín’s young adult books, like Small-Minded Giants. These are much darker and more serious, usually with a male protagonist who is struggling to survive in a violent world and protect the people around him.

Oisín is also a great presenter and regularly teaches online and face-to-face writing courses. I did a weekend writing workshop with him and a group of participants in Dingle a few years. He is very practical and down-to-earth with his advice but was also very encouraging and supportive of my fledgling work.

You can find out more about Oisín McGann on his website.

Helen Grant

Oh my god! How much can I rave about the amazing work of Helen Grant? I absolutely adore every one of her books so far. The first book I read was The Vanishing of Katharina Linden. I’ve since read The Glass Demon and Wish Me Dead. They are all set near and in a small village in Germany where Helen actually lived for a number of years. Her attention to detail is awesome, and you really get a strong sense of place. It think the location is always an important element in her books.

Even though the protagonist in Vanishing is a young girl, I feel they are all young adult novels. The main characters are usually female, sometimes a local, sometimes a blow in. They are struggling with the usual teenage issues but there is always a mystery, always some kind of spooky terror. You don’t know if it’s supernatural or not. I love to try to unravel the plot, but I don’t always get it right, and that is very enjoyable too.

Helen’s first two books were nominated or shortlisted for awards. I believe that Helen’s next book that is set in a Flemish-speaking area of The Netherlands. Can’t wait!

You can find out more about Helen Grant on her website.

Candy Gourlay

I first heard about Candy Gourlay from Steve Hartley at a writing retreat in Swords, County Dublin, Ireland in November 2011. Steve raved about how Candy had helped him to get his website up and running. I didn’t find out until later that she was also a published author of a really amazing book, Tall Story.

Tall Story is about a very tall boy, a giant, who lives in the Philippines. His mother is remarried and living in England. They are both waiting to be reunited when he is allowed to immigrate and join her. The book really captures the two different worlds and the two sides of the family. There’s basketball, a natural disaster, a local legend, a medical emergency, and a half sister who is both anxious and thrilled at the prospect of meeting her brother. It’s a funny story but also heartfelt. You can feel the love Candy has for the Philippines, and her sense of humour is always present.

I got to meet Candy last fall at the SCBWI British Isles Winchester conference. You can really feel that Candy is just like her writing style. The warmth and humour and curiousity comes through in every way. She signed my copy of her book for my three nephews - who just happen to be from the Philippines and were reunited with their mother, and their new step-father and step-sister a couple of years ago!

I am really looking forward to Candy’s next book, Shine, which is going to be something different, and wonderful.

You can find out more about Candy Gourlay on her website.

The Butterfly Heart by Paula Leyden

Paula Leyden writes on her website: "I decided to write The Butterfly Heart for many reasons – but the initial idea came to me through a memory that has haunted me. While I was at primary school in Zambia, a school friend of mine was taken out of school and married off to an old man. At the time, this upset me deeply, and I felt helpless to do anything about it. So, in some ways, I wrote the story for her, and for young girls in many parts of the world that this has happened to and continues to happen to. These children, and they are children, are robbed of their childhoods, condemned to a world of pain, premature childbirth, HIV/AIDS, and death. This is not something that should happen to anyone, anywhere, ever."

Paula’s book reminded me of something I had forgotten. Growing up in Canada, I knew a girl who was taken out of school and sent away to marry someone when she was only 14. I had no concept of what it meant for her. All I knew was that she had disappeared out of my life completely.

You might wonder how in the world someone can take such a difficult and serious subject as child marriage and write a palatable story suitable for kids to read. The Butterfly Heart is a warm and engaging story, and I was drawn in from the first page. The book opens with: “My friend Winifred didn’t put her hand up today. Not once.” From those two sentences, I knew that Bul-Boo was thoughtful and observant, and that Winifred was not acting like her normal self.

I was worried I might find the world in the story too exotic and different for me to relate to, but Paula has done a fine job of creating an accessible, fond portrait of Zambia, its culture, and its people. I very quickly grew to care about Bul-Boo and her outgoing twin sister Madillo, their friends and family, and mysterious Ifwafwa, the snake man.

There is a gentle humour throughout the story, especially in the school scenes featuring Sister Leonisa’s rather unique teaching methods. Paula weaves traditional Zambian folklore into her tale, and there’s a whiff of magic in the air.

I was a little concerned that Paula might be breaking one of the golden rules of writing for children: get the grownups out of the way and let the kids solve the problem on their own. But what I found was that because I learned something of Ifwafwa’s childhood, his joys, sorrows, and fears, he seemed more vulnerable and childlike and not the all-powerful adult. And while Bul-Boo has asked for help, the children are actively trying to fix things themselves. The resolution is not what I expected, and it works wonderfully. So the golden rule may have bent a little, but it is still intact.

Paula has a second book being published by Walker and is writing a follow-up to The Butterfly Heart, and I am looking forward to both!

http://thebutterflyheart.net/

My Africa

This was supposed to be a review of Paula Leyden’s book, The Butterfly Heart, but in doing the research for it, I realized I needed to write about my own tentative connection to Africa first.

I read a ton of books as a kid, but I could not tell you a single title of an African-set story now, other than the Tarzan of the Apes’ adventures. I was rather fond of Cheetah, but I don’t think I fell in love with the idea of Africa until later.

When I was a bit older, I read The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood by Elspeth Huxley. My brother would argue that my “obsession with Hayley Mills”, as he calls it, is what got me interested in the TV series, which led me to the book.

By the time I was a teen and then a young adult, I loved the romance of colonial Europeans living in mysterious, wild Africa – young Elspeth made friends with local Kikuyus, Karen Blixen ran a farm, Beryl Markham flew her bi-plane into the bush to rescue stranded men, and life seemed one great adventure.

My impression of Africa was woefully out of date and unrealistic, to say the least.

So then I listened to the radio, read the news online, and had discussions with people about all the bad stuff going on. I read The Constant Gardener and watched the film. I read countless other books and watched movies and TV shows set in various contemporary African countries, some dark and doomed, some lighter.

To tell you the truth, I’m a bit scared of the “real” Africa, the one with poisonous snakes, dangerous men, genital mutilation of women, warlords and despots, pirates, drought, starvation, and HIV/AIDS. There is no adventure to be found here, no romance, no joy.

You’ll probably kill me for admitting that I like Alexander McCall Smith’s series, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency. I was at a writing event a number of years ago, which featured African authors writing about life in each of their countries, and the very serious author of something very heavy and depressing BUT LITERARY (apparently) sneered at my chirpy admission.

I am well aware that McCall Smith’s books are not a realistic portrayal of Botswana, and they are being written by a white guy from Scotland. But, while they are lightweight and ultimately upbeat mysteries, they  also feature African women with heart, character, and humour.

McCall Smith on his website says: “I thought…that it was a great pity that there are so many negative books and articles about Africa. I wanted to show readers in the rest of the world that there are many great and remarkable people living in southern Africa – people who lead good lives, with honour and integrity…This is not to say that there are not many problems in that part of the world – there are. But the problems are only one side of the story – there is another, more positive side.”

I think that’s what I’m looking for, that other positive Africa, that shows real people living real lives and dealing with real issues, but written as a celebration, that embraces the joy of life. That’s why I read Paula Leyden’s book, The Butterfly Heart, which is set in Zambia. I’ll review it in a follow-up blog.

Eventually, I will travel to Africa and experience it for myself. For now, I rely on the authors of good books to gently enlighten me.