Frequently asked questions

Interview for Seven Stories, The Centre for Children's Books

What you usually write about and who you write for?
I love to write about adventures and dangerous escapades (because adventures and dangerous escapades are super-exciting). I almost always write for children (because children are so good at adventures and dangerous escapades).

Why do you write?
I write because I love reading and I hope to infect children with this love. (I can’t imagine my life without all the intrigues and mysteries of reading).

Where and when you write?
I write wherever I can, usually on the dining room table (with my keys, two empty glasses, the radio, a letter from my bank, 80 pence, some chocolate and about twelve pens). Sometimes, when I’m feeling rich, I write in a coffee shop. I take care to sip my coffee slowly, so I can stay and write for hours.

I write in mad, busy patches. Sometimes I write nothing for weeks, and instead, I grow the feeling of a story deep inside my brain. Then, when the story is ready to hatch, I go “into the zone” and write for eight or twelve hours at a time. If I’m ever stuck, I fetch a glass of water or make a honey-and-peanut-butter sandwich; by the time that’s done, I’ve come unstuck and I’m ready to write again.

What inspired you to enter the Frances Lincoln Diverse Voices Award?
I think the media that we consume—the things we read and watch and listen to—helps to shape the people we become and the way our society functions. As a writer, I can contribute to that media, and perhaps influence the society we are creating. As a very-soon-parent-to-be, I want my children to be exposed to different ideas, and to enjoy different ways of thinking and doing. Reading provides a magical door into understanding and celebrating that diversity.

What was your favourite book as a child?
How could I ever choose just one favourite book? As a kid I read and read and read, sometimes reading six or seven books at the same time. I read hundreds of mystery adventure stories: The Secret Seven and Famous Five, The Hardy Boys, The Three Investigators, Trixie Beldon, Nancy Drew (though I was a bit annoyed that Nancy was always being rescued by her boyfriend Ned; why couldn’t she just rescue herself?).

Two books that stand out from my childhood in New Zealand are Under the Mountain by Maurice Gee and The Haunting by Margaret Mahy. Beware: both are really exciting and a little bit scary.

Who is your favourite children’s author either writing today or from the past?
Roald Dahl is my favourite author: I remember my teacher at primary school reading The Witches during our last week of term, and the entire noisy, wriggly, five-minutes-till-home-time class sat in utter silence the whole time she was reading. She could do the voice of the Grand High Witch in a way that sends me straight back to sitting cross-legged and gaping on the carpet tile floor. (I still keep my eyes peeled for wigged women with long gloves, flared nostrils and blue spit.)

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Q&A with children's book specialist Geraldine Brennan about winning the Frances Lincoln Children's Book Award with Takeshita Demons.

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Your father is a New Zealander, your mother is Australian and you experienced both cultures growing up. What was that like?
When I was a child we lived on a farm in the Bay of Plenty in New Zealand’s North Island. My father worked in real estate so it was a kind of hobby farm, but my mother grew kiwi fruit and we kept goats and cows. My sisters and I spent most of our time outside climbing trees, catching eels and having adventures. We had two Jersey calves as pets.

I was 13 when we moved to a suburb in Perth. Just living in a suburb was a shock to me, and my new school was much bigger and the kids much more badly behaved. I remember the feeling of being different in a school and trying not to be. The New Zealand and Australian accents are quite different and I remember not always understanding when people said my name, so I wouldn’t answer them, and that would be embarrassing.

In Takeshita Demons, Miku is struggling between being proud of her Japanese culture and not wanting to be singled out for it in Britain. By the end she feels at home in both places and that is certainly how l believe it can and should be. I like to feel part of wherever I am. I feel proud of all the different parts of myself: the Kiwi, the Aussie, my experiences in Japan, in Switzerland, and now in the UK…I often say I am from London but if the All Blacks are winning I’ll happily say I am from New Zealand.

How did your connection with Japan develop?
I had studied Japanese since I was 11 and had always wanted to go there. After university I spent two years in a suburb near Osaka, teaching English communication in a high school through the Japan Exchange and Teaching programme. I soon realised that you can never be Japanese, you are always a gaijan (foreigner), a novelty and a bit exotic. It could be isolating. My students were the exception, they accepted me completely as myself, which I think young people naturally do.

I returned to Japan some years later to work as an editor of translations for a biotechnology company at Tsukuba Science City near Tokyo. My Japanese was better by then but I still can’t handle all the levels of politeness: I can talk to friends or children, but not to a boss or someone’s grandmother. I used to long for people to speak to me in Japanese but I was also a great opportunity for people to practice English.
I made good Japanese friends, including a colleague who was Japanese but had lived in America, so he understood the sorts of things that would seem strange to me. At lunchtime we would chat and he’d tell me things about Japan. It was through him that I began to understand about Japanese people’s relationships with spirits, ghosts and demons. There was no contradiction for him between working for a science company and knowing that there was a ghost in the room.

Tell us more about the demons!
There are dozens of supernatural yokai that most Japanese people will be familiar with. They appear over and over again in all kinds of stories. Some are benign, some are nasty and some you’re just not quite sure. The demons that Miku has to deal with include the nukekubi, a kind of child-eating flying-head demon, and the noppera-bo, a faceless demon that can take on other personae.

Most Western children don’t know about these yokai in the way that they know about vampires and werewolves, but just as vampires fear garlic, the demons often have an Achilles heel or fatal flaw. The nukekubi, for example must leave its body somewhere while its hungry head flies around, and you can destroy the head by destroying the body. I chose the demons I thought would have the most potential for an adventure story, but there are plenty more for future stories. I like to write about children, especially strong girls, having great adventures.

Why do you write for children?
Children who read have a great time and are exposed to lots of different ways of living and being. As a child I loved mystery and adventure stories and often read six or seven books at once. I loved Roald Dahl because of his energy and humour and I loved the Nancy Drew books, although it was annoying that she was always being rescued by her boyfriend.

I have done a lot of work in outreach science education and love to connect with children through new ideas. I also know how short their attention spans can be. I really want to use writing to continue to connect with children and challenge them to think in new ways.

How do you fit writing into your life?
I usually write on evenings and weekends, but when I start I don’t stop. I take over the dining table and leave it to Doug to make sure I get fed. My first manuscript, a 30,000-word adventure for the same age group, won a Young and Emerging Writer’s fellowship (from Varuna House) and the Voices on the Coast writing competition. At the moment I’m editing a third novel for slightly older readers: I’ve decided a certain character needs to go. I love the power you have as a writer in that way.

What do you do when you’re not writing?
In my current day job, I promote the use of grid computing to help the world’s scientists solve global problems, such as air pollution and climate change. These scientists work together, across time zones, cultures and language barriers, in collaborations involving hundreds of countries. This is the world that the children I am writing for will have to work in. It’s all about finding ways to collaborate and that starts with understanding each other.

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