Welcome to our penultimate bookshelf blog!

Today’s shelf boasts six stories about modern children and includes tales of videogames and aeroplanes, boxing and Bollywood dancing, and of course animal friendship.

^{Left to right: SF Bailey, Harriet Devonald, Kel Duckhouse, Helen Harvey, Cathryn Norris, Chitra Soundar}

SF Bailey’s Snow Foal is the story of Addie, who is taken to live with foster carers on a farm far away from her city home, where no one understands her but a tiny wild foal, found all alone in the icy moorland drifts.

Harriet Devonald’s Winston the Winner! follows Lucy, who doesn’t like dogs. That is until she has her first epileptic seizure, when her mum thinks she has the answer - a Seizure Alert Dog!

Kel Duckhouse’s Tyrannosaur is the story of a Molly who wants to be a boxer like her brother Denny. But girls aren't allowed to be boxers.

Helen Harvey’s How to Beat the Queen of Mean is about gamer Emmy, who beats her bullies with the skills she learns from her favourite videogame.

Cathryn Norris’s Tiger Moth is the story of Beatrice, whose life changes when her nanna buys shares in a 1930s Tiger Moth plane. Beatrice and best friend Gabe embark on an adventure, but things spiral out of control when a trip to France doesn’t go as planned.

Chitra Soundar’s Tara’s Theorem of Friendship follows Aswini Tara Iyengar, barely ten and brilliant at maths. All she wants is to find the One Mutual Friend as per the Theorem of Friendship, and an opportunity to dance on stage without her grandmother Janu, professor of mathematics, finding out.

By writing about children in the modern world, you’ve set yourselves a real challenge to get things right! How do you get into the head of a modern child?

Kel Duckhouse: I have taken a lot of my ideas from the young people who I have worked with as a teacher and a youth worker. You’ll find little sparks of the kids I’ve taught in all my work. The real answer though is this, kids don’t change that much and I used to be one. So, I derive most of my inspiration from remembering what it was like to be one. You can get so caught up in adding modern slang and new gadgets to your work, but the fact is, life moves on, trends change, but the child experience remains the same, the feelings, the emotions, the problems they face, so, it’s really about creating timeless writing that children will relate to now and in the future.

Chitra Soundar: My writing age is usually between 7 and 9 years old and I’m always looking at the world from those eyes. I tried to imagine what I would have thought of the UK if I had moved here when I was 9. I visit a lot of schools and work with children of that age and their questions and perspectives of how they see a new space or a new story helps me understand what my character would be thinking.

Harriet Devonald: I currently work in a primary school with a variety of children aged five to eight years. This really allows me to slip into the head of the modern child. Being around them I get a feel for their humour and personalities. I work with them one to one in a variety of subjects and even help them out with their creative writing (which really gives me an idea of their vivid imaginations!).

SF Bailey: I’m very involved with today’s children through my work in Fostering and Adoption. It’s important that I listen to them, and understand their world: their relationships, their worries, likes, dislikes and influences. I love spending time with young children because of the opportunity to see the world through their eyes again. I find that magical.

Cathryn Norris: I work in a primary school, so I’m familiar with how middle grade children talk and behave. Having two teenage daughters is useful; I often ask them how a young person would say something, or if a phrase is outdated. I also sent some of my work to my 12-year-old niece and she was a great help.

Helen Harvey: When I was a kid, I often told myself never to forget what it felt like to be a kid. I told myself this when a grown-up made a joke I didn’t get, or made me eat something I hated, or told me off for trying to do the right thing. Being a teacher is a great opportunity to observe the quirks of children’s behaviour, but I’m always careful to think beyond what I see when I’m teaching. Children, like all of us, only present certain things to adults. Many of the things that they think, do or value are only shared with friends or kept in the privacy of their own heads.

Did you draw on your own childhood experiences in writing your book?

Helen Harvey: Like Emmy in How to Beat the Queen of Mean, I grew up online. I had a website, a gaming guild, a popular fanfic and a poetry critique group. That’s what I did instead of hanging around the town centre learning to skateboard. And you know what? It was great! I didn’t realise, but I was learning marketing, programming, leadership... As far as I knew, I was just having fun. People can get very judge-y about kids spending too much time on their devices – and yes, they need to see the outdoors too – but I almost never see books celebrate how independent kids get to be on the internet.

Kel Duckhouse: So much. I think when my friends and family read Tyrannosaur they will see snippets of my life, personality and experiences everywhere, including some of their names. They say ‘write what you know’ and I think this is true. The biggest part of me in Tyrannosaur has to be the setting though. It is basically set where I grew up and writing it really helped me remember the good parts of a bit of a troubled childhood. Like, there was so much magic in my slummy council estate, so many good people and I’ve enjoyed bringing that back to life in my book.

Chitra Soundar: A lot of Tara in Tara's Theorem of Friendship is me – I acted in a movie when I was 10 or 11, like Tara, who wants to go on stage. I acted and danced on stage a lot from when I was 7 until I was 15. That was useful. Tara is different from me in one way is that she’s very good at Maths and I’m not. But Tara’s mum and dad and even her grandma have a little bit of me inside.

Harriet Devonald: In Winston the Winne! my protagonist, Lucy, is an eight-year-old girl who is diagnosed with epilepsy and has a seizure alert dog as a result. But I didn't draw on my childhood experiences, instead, the experiences were more recent than that. I have epilepsy but wasn't diagnosed until the later age of sixteen and it is only very recently that I got a seizure alert dog (my inspiration for the story!). So, oddly enough, it's my more recent experiences than my childhood ones that I'm taking inspiration from.

SF Bailey: I was never in foster-care as a child, nor did I live with a parent with alcohol addiction like Addie’s mother. For these aspects of Snow Foal, I drew on my years as a social worker, and on wider family events. However, I did often feel helpless and scared as a child, just as Addie and Jude do, albeit for different reasons. Like Addie, I some found comfort, and a way forward, through being with animals. My mum was a wonderful artist, with a love of flowers. Her creativity got her through challenges in her own life. She was gentle, loving and immensely strong. There is much of her in this book.

Cathryn Norris: Yes, I did draw on my own childhood experiences. I thought back to times when I was excited by adventure, such as finding caves on a beach or travelling to strange places. I try to remember how I felt as a child: feeling awkward when put into adult situations or being belittled by other children. I took these memories and put them in Tiger Moth.

A number of these books deal with difficult themes. How do you handle tough subjects for young readers?

Kel Duckhouse: Don’t ever underestimate your reader. Young people are way more switched on than a lot of adults give them credit for. Young readers will know if you are talking down to them or sugar coating things; never patronise them. You can always allude to violent things, suggest certain events without having to go into explicit detail and be creative with language, even if you know your character would probably swear like a trooper in real life. Just make sure you keep your reader safe and it’ll be fine.

Helen Harvey: This was the puzzle that started me writing. I was bullied when I was nine. On the MA, Janine Amos challenged us to write about a childhood memory in a style appropriate for the age we had been. My first thought was, ‘How? No one would publish the things my bullies said to me, they were too rude!’ Then I realised bullying is mostly about making the victim powerless, and you don’t need swear words for that. I didn’t want to write a bleak book, so between each dark moment, Emmy gets a chance to feel excited or joyful or safe. Lastly, Emmy has the agency to solve her own problem – though it’s a tough problem to solve, and it takes her a whole book to do it!

Harriet Devonald: I think young readers can handle tough subjects - such as being diagnosed with a disability - as long as they’re written about in a sensitive way. I think the limitations a disability brings should be mentioned so the reader can be made aware, but a happy ending is necessary when handling a tough subject like this. The protagonist isn’t going to ‘defeat’ their disability but they can learn to accept it as part of themselves and not just a label.

SF Bailey: This is something I’ve needed to think carefully about in writing Snow Foal. I think it is important to balance difficult reality with hope, positivity and escapism of some kind. For me, there must be authenticity, an honesty – out of respect for those children who are living these tough things for real. This is why I have, in my opening chapters, shown something of the real harshness of Addie’s current life with her mam. However, I have tried hard to counterbalance this with the love, nurture and fun on offer from her foster family, and to show how her growing relationship with the foal helps her see a happier, and safer, way forward. I have taken great care, also, to show that Addie’s mother is many things besides being an alcoholic: that without her ‘whisky and wine’, she is loving, highly creative and wants very much to be well again. I’ve tried to underline how much there is in Nature to help us when we are struggling emotionally. This is an important theme in Snow Foal. Above all, I think that in writing about tough subjects, I must offer children a sense that things can get better: that they can get through. That there are people who will help.

Cathryn Norris: I deliberately didn’t want to include ‘difficult’ themes such as death, divorce, illness and family disharmony. There is rivalry between my main characters and some children at their school, but that is all. My daughter said, ‘Mum, I’m fed up with sad stories, can you write something that’s not gloomy?’ So I did!

On the flipside of dark themes are moments of happiness and hope. Is there a joyful moment in your book that you particularly enjoyed writing?

Chitra Soundar: I loved writing Tara’s scenes with her family. I loved the jokes with her Dad and how as a family they interacted. I also enjoyed Tara’s moments with her Grandmother including her comic commentary about their situation.

Helen Harvey: The lasagne scene! This came out of another Janine Amos workshop about love and feeling loved. The lasagne scene takes place in Emmy’s warm, busy kitchen, with plenty of homemade lasagne. It’s the moment when Emmy realises that her sort-of step-dad is trying his best to look after her like a real dad, by cooking her food that she likes (no peppers!) and buying her clothes so that she won’t be teased at school.

Kel Duckhouse: There are a few, but I want you to read the book to get to them. I think when you get to those moments of joy, after putting your character through hell, it’s always so wonderful. I really love the very last moment in my book. It literally makes my heart bubble, it’s very sentimental and I think it leaves my reader feeling safe at the end of a bit of a rough ride.

SF Bailey: There are many small moments of tenderness or simple joy, like Jude’s pride in growing his primroses under the old oak. Or the banter that springs up between Addie and ‘bonkers’ Gabe. And there are exciting scenes, too, like the one on the night time moor, where the Beast of Exmoor may lurk in the mist. That was fun to write. But I have really revelled in writing the tender scenes between Addie and the foal…

Cathryn Norris: I loved describing the joy Beatrice feels when she flies the Tiger Moth. I spent a long time making sure I got these scenes right. I also had fun writing about the tea-party at the end of my story; what could be more enjoyable? Friends, dancing, tea and cake!

Harriet Devonald: Of course! Disability isn’t all doom and gloom. It brings strength, determination and true happiness due to that. I absolutely loved writing my ending but I can’t give that away!

Several stories on this shelf are about girls who get involved in typically “male” hobbies. Was this choice deliberate?

Cathryn Norris: Absolutely! People tend to associate engineering and planes with boys, but there is no reason whatsoever for girls not to enjoy these pursuits too. Beatrice follows in the footsteps of her great grandma and makes a fine pilot. I would be so delighted if my story encouraged a girl to consider aviation as a hobby or a career.

Helen Harvey: In How to Beat the Queen of Mean, Emmy is a gamer. I didn’t choose this just to buck stereotypes; that was just a bonus. I made Emmy a gamer because, with no friends at school, Emmy needed somewhere to feel valued: the internet.

SF Bailey: I feel strongly that writers must avoid any kind of gender-stereotyping, and hope I have managed this in Snow Foal. Sunni, for example, loves her sequinned clothes and her bangles because these are things that her mother wears, and part of an identity that she holds on to. But she also climbs trees in her glittery dresses, and is determined to be a shepherd. Jude loves to nurture his flowers and to paint. Addie has not had much opportunity to develop hobbies, other than for a love of art, but she is both sensitive and utterly fierce!

Kel Duckhouse: It wasn’t a deliberate choice, no. I just kind of assume that girls can do whatever the hell they want and so it wasn’t until a bit later in that I realised it was an actual thing. The reason I chose to write about a girl who wanted to be a boxer, is simply because I wish I was a boxer, but I’m way too old to do that now. That sort of thing wasn’t around when I was a kid. So, I did the next best thing, I wrote about it and now I feel like I have been one. That’s the magic of writing, you can be who and what you want to be, with a little bit of imagination.

As a children’s writer, how far do you think you have a responsibility to reflect the diversity of the modern world? How do you do this?

Harriet Devonald: As a children’s writer I have a duty and responsibility to reflect diversity. Children are taught that diversity and equality are both incredibly important to the world we live in so they need to see respect and tolerance reflected in literature too. I wanted to remind children that when diagnosed with a disability a person can feel vulnerable and others may need to help them feel better again. Equality is key.

Cathryn Norris: In my story, I portray heterosexual and homosexual relationships. I have rich children and not so wealthy children. I have young people and old people, some who are physically active and some who are in wheelchairs. I show people from all walks of life. The most important thing is not to have stock characters or press diversity upon the reader, I think this would be patronising.

Chitra Soundar: A writer’s job is to write it as truly as possible. My story is set in the UK and it has an Indian family at its centre. But the school has a mixed demographic and Tara’s friends are from all sorts of backgrounds and interests. As much as it’s important to represent the diversity of the world we live in, we also have the responsibility to portray it as accurately as possible, avoiding clichés and stereotypes.

SF Bailey: I agree with William Nicholson’s words in his play Shadowlands (about C.S. Lewis). ‘We read to know we are not alone.’ I think that fiction has an important role to play in drawing children together, creating empathy, and in forming inclusive minds for the future. I know that there has been some great progress towards inclusivity in the Children’s Book Industry, but that there is a way to go. Some groups are still under-represented and children ‘Looked-After’ (or, in the Care System) are among them. I wanted to write a story with such children at the centre; one which would be exciting and interesting for any child to read. I wanted to show that although children in the ‘Care System’ have their own, difficult stories to tell, they have many of the same hopes, worries, dreams, and struggles that other children do. That they are brave and resilient. That they can have great adventures!

Kel Duckhouse: As a working-class author, I find it incredibly important to be diverse in my writing. When I was younger I didn’t see much of myself in books, even though I devoured every single book in sight. Then as a teacher, I taught children at a pupil referral unit, who were all from similar backgrounds and I really struggled to find fiction to engage them, because the characters in books were never much like them. It flips too, we need middle-class children to read stories about different types of children, to give them a rounded experience.

Comedy writers amongst you, do you have any tips for writing humour?

Chitra Soundar: I’m not sure I’m qualified to give tips – but for me, the humour comes from the situation and the juxtaposition of two unlikely elements in the same setting. I also love wordplay and many of my jokes are word plays or comic phrases. I read a lot of funny stuff, watch comedies, sitcoms and stand-ups. I joke around a lot and play pranks. I try and find the humour even in dire situations. And when I write, I find it hard not to allow characters riff with each other.

Helen Harvey: I find humour in juxtapositions: high fantasy and orange squash, friendships solemnly sealed with cubes of cheese, poisoning evildoers with gummy worms (apparently I’m also preoccupied with food). I’m all about laugh-with humour, not laugh-at.

Harriet Devonald: My best tip would be to draw and build upon your own funny experiences and characters. One of my characters, Matt, is based on my best friend who never ceases to make me or my friends laugh. So why shouldn’t he make my readers giggle, too?

Cathryn Norris: My story is more light-hearted than comic, however, I did make myself laugh when I wrote some scenes (I know, I know, you shouldn’t really laugh at your own jokes!) I think the more serious a situation is, the funnier it can be. In children’s literature, humour can be used to make a scary situation less frightening. For example, in Tiger Moth, my favourite funny dialogue happens when the children discover and come face to face with the criminal.

Intrigued? Find out more….

Snow Foal by SF Bailey

Winston the Winner! by Harriet Devonald

Tyrannosaur by Kel Duckhouse

How to Beat the Queen of Mean by Helen Harvey

Tiger Moth by Cathryn Norris

Tara’s Theorem of Friendship by Chitra Soundar

The Contemporary Realism for Younger Readers Bookshelf

Helen Harvey on behalf of Torchlight

The Contemporary Young Adult Bookshelf (with Dark Notes)

The Speculative Young Adult Bookshelf

The Fantasy and Adventure for Young Readers Bookshelf

The Young Adult with a Distinctive Setting Bookshelf

The (Sort of) Historical Middle Grade Bookshelf

Q&A with Jess Butterworth

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Ask a Torchlight Author