Just So Stories

Lian, I am so very happy to be able to welcome you to Just So Stories! I know you must be always so busy, so I really appreciate you taking time out for my readers.

I want to start with your new series, The Dragons of Hallow and Spellhound, which I just absolutely loved. Can you talk us through a little of your inspiration for the book, the creation of not only a different world but so many different creatures, including those who are so endearing? (still really want a minchwiggin to come live in my garden!)

Thank you! This book was huge fun to write, and I’m so happy with it. But it started out as a disaster.

A few years ago I wrote a book with the working title Big Dog, about a hellhound pup who was thrown out of Hell for being too kind-hearted. I thought it was a cute idea, and I spent nearly a year writing it, but I couldn’t get it to work. So in the end I threw up my hands in defeat, put it to one side and wrote A Clue for Clara and Rita’s Revenge.

But the failed book wouldn’t leave me alone, mainly because of that enormous, goodhearted pup. I kept fiddling at the edges of it, until one day I realised that it was never going to work in its current form, and that I needed to do something more drastic.

I ended up tossing out 99% of the story, and only keeping the bits I truly loved: the pup, a girl called Rose, a dragon, and some truly nasty witches. And then I went back to the First Principle of Creativity – playing. Mucking around. Having fun.

I nearly always find when I’m building a new world that it starts out fairly ordinary, but if I keep asking myself lots of questions and scribbling down lots of ‘maybes’, and let the whole thing hover in mid-air for a good long time instead of trying to tie it down too quickly, it takes on its own rich character. That’s what happened here. The minch-wiggins started out as mice, but the more I played, the more they became something entirely new. And the more other interesting creatures appeared. Like horned globs and mor-kits.

Now, let’s backtrack. Your body of work is impressive and certainly, so many of your titles have been constantly on high rotation in my libraries. Can you take us back to your early days in writing, and being published?

I’ve written all my life, but didn’t start taking it seriously until I was in my early 40s and working as an actor with a small Tasmanian theatre-in-education company, Salamanca Theatre Company. I wrote a couple of short plays for them, which reminded me how much I loved writing, so when I left STC, I set out to see if I could make a living from it. (Everyone said it couldn’t be done, which made me really want to try!)

I wrote several plays for Terrapin Puppet Theatre, as well as radio plays for the ABC, travel articles, freelance journalism, short stories for literary mags, short stories for the Women’s Weekly, and short stories for kids. I had a certain amount of success across the board, but the short stories for kids were the most fun to write. They were published by School Magazine, and spurred me on to try something longer.

Rats! (Lothian 2004) was what I think of as my ‘practice novel’. I wanted to see if I could get a book published, so I wrote it in what I hoped was an acceptable style. When it was published, I thought the earth would shift on its axis, but of course it didn’t. So then I set out to write the book I really wanted to write.

Museum of Thieves (the Keepers #1)took me three years to write, and 20+ drafts. Most of those drafts were pretty awful, and I nearly gave up several times. But my faith in the book paid off when it sold in Australia, the US and India, and was translated into 12 languages.

You have a real talent for bringing fantasy to life for young readers – your series of The Keepers, The Rogues and The Hidden/Icebreakers – and now, of course, The Dragons of Hallow – fully attest to this. Yet you are also equally adept in other genres, such as the Feathered Crimefighters, and even a picture book. While it would seem MG fantasy is a preference, which is the most challenging to write? and which do you most enjoy writing?

I’ve realised over the last few years that I adore writing for that slightly younger middle-grade reader, round about 7-11 years old.  A Clue for Clara, Rita’s Revenge and Spellhound are all aimed at that age group. And although I suspect fantasy wlll always be my first love, the crime novels were also a delight to write – though there’s obviously a certain amount of fantasy in them, too. (At least, I assume there is. Who knows what chooks and ducks get up to when they’re out of sight?)

I’ve also discovered that I love writing humour, so that’s an unexpected part of it.

Most challenging? Probably picture books. Condensing everything down into that compact, beautiful form isn’t easy, nor is finding an idea that excites me enough to take up the challenge. Jonathan Bentley and I have another pb coming out in 2024, When the Lights Went Out, but exciting picture book ideas are few and far between for me, compared with novel ideas.

I know you were born in Tassie and have always lived there (and when I took The Kid there a couple of years ago, I was strongly tempted to track you down and stalk you!!). I love Tasmania so much – after, now, four visits there. What is about this tiny state that is so marvellous in your eyes?

I have five generations of family history in Tasmania, as well as having lived here for most of my own life, so this place is layered with stories for me, and full of significant places. But I think it’s also got something to do with Tassie’s island nature. Islands work on a relatively human scale; they wrap around us in a way that enormous land masses like the Australian mainland can’t.

And then there’s the sheer familiarity of landscape. Rocky hillsides with dry schlerophyll forest spell home to me. I can appreciate other landscapes as stunningly beautiful, but they don’t touch my heart in the same way.

Can you tell us more about your childhood, and growing up in the ‘wilds’ of way down south? Family, school, pets, loves/hates, naughty girl at school or the teacher’s pet?

I grew up in Launceston, northern Tasmania, with Mum, Dad, three older brothers and a slightly deranged dachshund/cocker spaniel cross called Jock. Like most kids in the 50s, we had a very free-range childhood that really suited a dreamy child like me.

I loved learning, so on one level I slid fairly easily into the teacher’s pet mould. But I also disliked school because it cut into daydreaming/reading time, and I had a rebellious streak that led me to being asked to leave Brownies. So really I was a mass of contradictions.

When I was in Grade 6 I was given a retired trotter, Chief. I’d been obsessed with horses for several years at that point, so it was a dream come true. As well as riding him, I spent a lot of time lying in a hammock in the stable, reading, with the smell of horse and hay and happiness in the background.

Were you a reader? What were your favourites? and did you write as a child as well?

I was a dedicated and passionate reader. Number one on my reading list was anything about horses. But also adventure and high romance. Violet Needham was one of my favourite authors – lots of stormy midnight rides across unnamed European countries to save longlost princes or escape from overly-ambitious grand viziers.

I also loved anything with animals in it, especially if they could talk. The Jungle Book, My Friend Flicka, the Narnia books. I can trace so many elements of my own books back to the themes I loved reading about as a child.

My writing was mostly stories about horses, and poems heavily influenced by Banjo Paterson. Then I discovered plays, and started writing scripts to take to school – giving myself the best parts, of course. I started my first novel when I was in grade 5 and didn’t get past the first half page. But the idea was there in my mind, that this was a possibility. To write. To be an author.

What is your reading taste now? What’s on your bedside table or TBR pile?

I’m very much a genre reader. Crime, fantasy, romance, science fiction. I’m a long time fan of space opera, particularly Murderbot, Lois Bujold’s Vorkosigan saga, the Linesman novels by SK Dunstall, and the Ancillary series by Ann Leckie. 

Fantasy favourites are The Goblin Emperor and T Kingfisher’s Paladin novels.

My TBR pile is mountainous and keeps getting added to. Plus, like a lot of people during and after covid, I’m rereading more than I used to.

My habitual question is, what is your working day like, and what about your working space? And because ‘we’ (that’s just me really) are inveterate stickybeaks, photos are always appreciated!!

I’m very much a morning person, so I’m up early and try to get a decent amount of work done before distractions start to hit. I try (with varying degrees of success) to stay away from news and social media until lunch time, then I go for a walk, eat, and come back to do the more prosaic parts of the job – organising workshops, writing talks, answering emails, etc. Sometimes, if I’m doing well on the self-discipline, I’ll get back to the WIP round about 5 pm and make notes about tomorrow’s work. I’m always pleased when I do this, because it makes such a difference. But it’s one of those things I find hard to sustain.

My work space is my sofa, with a pot of green tea beside me. (It could be anywhere really. The pot of tea and solitude are the most important bits.)

But my work space is also the beach at the end of the road, for when I get stuck and need to get the gears moving, and my garden, for short walks and conversations with myself.

What is your most important piece of advice for anyone (not just children) who wants to be a writer?

Be patient, be stubborn, and be willing to learn.

No matter how much talent you start out with, you need to learn the craft side of writing, and that takes patience, humility, and the ability to take a deep breath, accept criticism with good humour (only on the outside – you can swear and curse all you like in the privacy of your own head), and try again.

Can we assume that #2 in The Dragons of Hallow is on its way and will that be soonish (not that I’m impatient or anything)? Are you working on any other projects at present?

Yes, the second book, Fledgewitch, is coming in April 2024, which is exciting. I’ve just seen the internal illustrations for it and they are PERFECT. The illustrator this time is Martina Heiduczek, and she has done an amazing job, particularly with Snort, who is the hero of the story. When I wrote him, I had a very vague idea about what he looked like, and Martina took my vague description and made him utterly adorable.

My new project is a spin-off from the Clara/Rita books, but that’s all I’m saying about it at the moment, because I’ve got no idea if my publishers will like it or not. I used to write to contract, which was more secure financially but came with a lot of pressure. These days I write the book first, before even trying for a contract. It’s definitely less secure financially, but it takes a lot of pressure off, and I can enjoy the writing more. There’s still that terrifying moment when I submit it, of course, and chew my fingernails to the quick while I wait for a response!

If I asked you to describe yourself in a six-word sentence, what would it be?

High functioning introvert, good with animals.

Lian, I am so utterly delighted to have you visit, and I know that many of the blog followers, will also be. Thank you again, for generously giving up your time for Just So Stories.