The Books That Change Our Lives

A version of this piece was originally written for the CBC Diversity Blog.

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I write children's books because I believe they're the books that change our lives.  

My favourite book as a child was Watership Down by Richard Adams.  I've re-read it more than once as an adult, trying to understand why I loved it so much.  As a child, I saw a thrilling adventure story about rabbits trying to survive in the wild.  But now I can see that it's a story about the big questions of human life.  Who are we?  Where do we come from?  Where do we belong?  How should we live? 

I think that's why it meant so much to me.  My family's roots are in the Middle East.  My ancestors were Iraqi, Egyptian, Kurdish and Circassian Muslims.  I grew up in Britain in the 1970s, where such origins were unusual.  Negotiations around identity, difference and belonging were daily facts of my life.  

Even my name was an issue.  It's an ordinary Arabic name, but totally unpronounceable in English!  Whenever it came up, people would question it to such an extent that I ended up using initials, to make life easier for everyone.  

So when I read Watership Down and saw that the hero of the rabbits' myths was called El-Ahrairah, it struck a very deep chord.  The greatest rabbit who ever lived had an Arabic-sounding name?  That gave me what Junot Diaz has described as a feeling of seeing myself reflected; realising my background could be something more than a burden.

A children's book had given me a way to think about myself and my place in the world.  That's why I decided to put everything I have into writing children's books.  I put years and years of work into making each book the best it can possibly be; making them as thrilling as I can, but also filling them with those big questions.  Who are we?  Where do we come from?  Where do we belong?  How should we live?

In my first book, Varjak Paw, these questions are explored through cats and dogs.  Varjak is a cat who's been told that dogs are monsters, and that cats and dogs can never even communicate, let alone be friends!  Yet he transcends these prejudices to make friends with a dog, and learns that a dog can actually be the best and most loyal friend a cat could ever have. 

My most recent book, Phoenix, is set in a galaxy where humans and aliens are at war with each other.  The humans have even built a spacewall to keep the aliens out.  The main characters are a human boy and an alien girl whose lives have both been damaged by the war.  They discover that they have much more in common than they thought possible – and together, perhaps they can even save the galaxy.

I didn't write Phoenix about any specific situation in the real world.  But I did want to explore those ideas of identity, difference and belonging that I've been living with all my life, and that I think lie at the roots of so many situations all over the world.  

Things have changed a lot since my childhood.  People are on the move as never before; hundreds of millions of us now live outside our countries of origin.  One response to that is to build walls.  But another is to build bridges of understanding, as my characters must do to survive.  

Young people everywhere are hungry for stories to help them navigate this world.  My highest hope is that a book like Varjak Paw or Phoenix might help them think about the world, their experiences of it, and other people's experiences, just as Watership Down helped me.  I love the idea that children's books can be bridges connecting people, showing them that however different someone else might seem, the things that unite us are greater than those that divide us.  And that difference can be a source of richness: something to be celebrated, not mocked or feared.

Collaborating With Dave McKean

Dave McKean is one of my all-time favourite artists.  I love the work he's done on books and comics by writers like Neil Gaiman, David Almond and Ray Bradbury, as well as the books and comics he's created himself.  It was a cat he drew in one of these, Cages, that made me feel he would be the perfect illustrator for Varjak Paw.

I can't honestly describe Varjak Paw as a collaboration, as such.  I was just stunned to be working with one of my favourite artists!  The first time we met, I was too in awe to suggest anything to Dave; I just gave him the words, and a fully illustrated text came back.  But his illustrations were so perfect, they seemed like they must have been part of the story all along.  And I was stunned to see how he used not just illustration but elements like layout, typography and white space to create the atmosphere of the book.

By the time I was writing Phoenix, Dave and I were collaborating closely in the course of our adventures in Hollywood and beyond, where we were trying to make a Varjak Paw movie.  All that time, I was telling him things like: "I'm writing a great big space epic about a human boy and an alien girl who have to save the galaxy!  It's full of stars, black holes, dark matter – and also all the gods of all the ancient mythologies, as imagined by aliens in the future.  Do you think you could draw that?"  

To my amazement and delight, he did.

Fortunately, Dave shares my love of both the most cutting-edge science of the stars, and the most ancient mythologies, which also tried to find meaning in the night sky.  So science and mythology inform the two strands of illustration that run through Phoenix. 

One of these strands is all about the stars.  All the time I was working on Phoenix, I was collecting images of stars.  I had a giant book of Hubble Space Telescope photography in front of me as I wrote Phoenix, and then I gave it to Dave, who had it in front of him as he illustrated it.  His images erupt into the text whenever the main character is dreaming of the stars or flying through them as he crosses the galaxy, using alien technology to follow the invisible dark matter connections that unite everything in the universe. 

It was Dave's idea to use fractal patterns to illustrate these connections.  What neither of us knew was that Dave's visualisation of dark matter would look astonishingly similar to the first images of a cosmic web of dark matter made by astronomers, not long after the book was published!

The other strand of illustration in Phoenix draws on mythology.  The aliens in Phoenix believe that all the mythological gods are really stars who come down from the sky to walk among us.  They take different forms in different times, but they're always the same immortal beings, returning again and again through history.  The aliens call them the Twelve Astraeus.

Originally, I wrote lots of material about the Twelve Astraeus, to explain this background.  But it was impossible to find words powerful enough to describe them.  After all, gods and stars should be mysterious and awe-inspiring beyond words! 

Then I came up with the idea of describing them through illustrations and song fragments, rather than prose.  I gave Dave a list of the Twelve Astraeus, with their names and attributes in different mythologies (Greek, Roman, Norse, Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and so on), and asked him to make a series of illustrations depicting each one in turn.

I wrote song fragments to go with the pictures, which give you little hints about them.  So when readers encounter the Astraeus of Love, for example, they can work out for themselves that she's been called Venus, Aphrodite, Ishtar, Astarte, and so on; and even if they don't, they'll feel who she is, without being told.  I find that more powerful than ordinary prose, and having seen what Dave could do on the Varjak Paw books, I designed the structure of Phoenix around this series of illustrations, which became an integral part of the narrative.

As a huge Dave McKean fan myself, it's been such a privilege to share this journey with him.  We once did an event together in London, talking about the process of collaborating to create illustrated books.  Someone in the audience asked him what his favourite work was of all the illustration he'd ever done.  Among the books he named was Phoenix!  Hearing him say that was one of the nicest things that's ever happened to me.

Author Visits: Hamilton Primary

I'd like to say a huge THANK YOU to Sarah Wright, Sian Richardson, Nick Hutchings and all the staff and students of Hamilton Primary for the wonderful welcome they gave me when I visited them last week!

I had the pleasure of talking to Years 6, 5, 4 & 3 about reading and books, and was hugely impressed with the wide range of reading they'd been doing.  It was brilliant to see that the Year 5s & 6s already knew my work, as this is a school where they read Phoenix in Year 5 alongside their Space topic.

I was lucky enough to see some of the fantastic writing and artwork the current Year 5s were doing with Phoenix, and I thought it was so good, I decided to share some of it here!

It was brilliant to be able to sign books for everyone at the end of the day, thanks to Red Lion Books, and to answer a few more questions. There were so many terrific questions during the assembly, we didn't have time to answer them all.  So if anyone at Hamilton has any more questions, or would like to say anything about the visit or my books, just leave me a message below.  But in the meantime, THANK YOU all again for a wonderful visit!

Author Visits: Putnoe Primary

I'd like to say a big THANK YOU to brilliant librarian Catherine Brugnoli and all the students and staff of Putnoe Primary School for the amazing welcome they gave me when I visited them last week!

This is a school where they read both Varjak Paw and Phoenix, so many of the students had already read at least one of my books.  It was a pleasure to talk to them about reading and writing, and to hear about their favourite books.  And it was a pleasure to answer their fantastic questions!  

It was also amazing to see some of the work that they'd been doing with my books.  Here's a superb Phoenix display from Year 5, who have some very talented artists and writers – some of whom I think will soon be writing their own books!

We didn't have quite enough time to answer all the questions, so if anyone at Putnoe has any more questions, or would like to say anything about the visit or my books, just leave me a comment below.  And if anyone missed out on getting a signed book on the day, and would like one now – you can always order one via Mrs Brugnoli and Rogan's Books.  I'm always happy to sign bookplates for readers!

Author Visits: Radcliffe Primary

I'd like to say a very big THANK YOU to Sophie Jacques and everyone I met at Radcliffe Primary School when I visited them last week!

I'd like to say an especially big thank you for their amazing PHOENIX STEP (above)! I've never had a step before, and was totally blown away to see Phoenix there, along with Harry Potter, The Cat In The Hat, and many more of my own favourite books.  What a brilliant way to celebrate reading – I wish we'd had steps like this when I was at school!

Radcliffe is a school where they've been reading both Phoenix and Varjak Paw, so it was a real pleasure to talk to Years 6, 5, 4 and 3 about writing and books.  There were many terrific questions – more than we had time to answer. So if anyone from Radcliffe would like to ask me another question, or to say anything about the visit or my books, just leave me a comment below!

It was then inspiring to do a creative writing workshop with some Year 6 & 5 students.  They were full of brilliant ideas, and in just an hour, they produced such original, entertaining and well-written stories – this is clearly a school with great writers as well as readers!

Finally, it was a pleasure at the end of the day to sign books for everyone who wanted them.  But if anyone missed out on getting a signed book, and would like one now, you can order them from the brilliant Pea Green Boat Books, who did a fantastic job on the day.  Thanks again to them, and to everyone who made this such a memorable visit!

Author Visits: Fortismere School

I'd like to say a very big thank you to brilliant librarian Gillian Ward and to everyone at Fortismere School for the fantastic welcome they gave me when I returned to visit them again last week!

I was Patron Of Reading at Fortismere for two years, from 2015-2017 – you can read all my blogs about everything we did here!  So it was a total pleasure to come back and meet the new Year 7s, and to talk to them about writing and books.  And then in the evening, I had the honour of meeting this year's Reading Champions.

Reading Champions involves young readers recommending their favourite books to each other in presentations.  This year, the finalists were championing a wonderful range of books: Pig Heart Boy by Malorie Blackman, Railhead by Philip Reeve, Wonder by RJ Palacio, The Enemy by Charlie Higson, Itch by Simon Mayo, Swallows And Amazons by Arthur Ransome, The Last Wild by Piers Torday, Percy Jackson And The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan, The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak – and, amazingly, Phoenix by me!

I was knocked out by these presentations, and by their passion for books and reading.  And I was especially delighted when Zaki's fantastic presentation on Phoenix was voted the winner!  So congratulations to Zaki – and thanks to everyone who made this such a memorable evening!

Author Visits: Park Hill Junior School & Kenilworth Books

Nearly four years ago, I visited Park Hill Junior School at the invitation of Sally Greenaway, who was the first teacher I ever heard from who was reading Phoenix with a class.  Last month, I had the absolute pleasure of returning to Park Hill and visiting them again, and I'd like to say a very big THANK YOU for the wonderful welcome they gave me!

I love visiting this school, because there are so many brilliant young readers and writers there.  And because they read Varjak Paw in Year 3 and Phoenix in Year 6, they know my books very well, and do fantastic work with them.  Before this visit, I received some amazing letters, like this one:

So it was a total pleasure for me to talk to Years 6, 5, 4 and 3 about writing and books, and I was thrilled to see so much enthusiasm for stories, and to hear so many inspiring dreams.  There were lots of excellent questions – more than we had time to answer, so if anyone at Park Hill would like to ask another question, or to say anything about the visit or my books, just leave me a comment below!

The brilliant Tamsin Rosewell of Kenilworth Books did the bookselling at the school, and then invited me to do a signing in the bookshop, which is one of my very favourite bookshops.  She had made the extraordinary window display that you can see above, with some of the most beautiful artwork I have ever seen!

There were also star-shaped biscuits in honour of Phoenix, and they were delicious!  It was a pleasure to meet and chat with some more of Kenilworth's young readers, and to sign books for all who wanted them!

If there's anyone out there who would like a signed copy of one of my books, but didn't get to the signing – they still have lots in stock at Kenilworth Books, and you can order them directly from the shop!  And I'd just like to say another big THANK YOU again to everyone who made this such a memorable and magical day!

Author Visits: St Joseph's Catholic Primary

I'd like to say a big thank you to Angelina Brett, Tracey Churchill and everyone I met at St Joseph's Catholic Primary School for the fantastic welcome they gave me when I visited them this month!

It was an absolute pleasure to talk to Years 6, 5, 4 and 3 about reading and writing, and I was delighted to see what great young readers and writers there are at St Joseph's.  This is a school that places the very highest priority on reading.  They've even built a brand new library for the children, and asked me to open it while I was there!

Of course, I was thrilled to do this, because I believe that libraries are magical, life-changing places.  The books we discover in them can shape us and stay with us forever.  I've always hoped that my own books might have that kind of effect on readers – so I was absolutely knocked out when one of the students at St Joseph's read Phoenix after my visit, and made this amazing video about it:

So here's another big THANK YOU to her – and to everyone at St Joseph's for such an inspiring day.  And if anyone has any more questions they'd like to ask me, or would like to say anything about the visit or my books, just leave me a comment below!

Bookbuzz 2017!

I am absolutely thrilled to announce that Phoenix has been chosen to be part of Bookbuzz 2017!

Bookbuzz is an amazing scheme run by the reading charity BookTrust.  Every year, schools that sign up to Bookbuzz are sent a package of books chosen by a panel of experts.  Teachers and librarians then share the books with their students, who can choose one book to take home and keep – for free!

The books cover a wide range of genres and are designed to appeal to all students aged 11 to 13, regardless of their level of reading.  I think this is a brilliant idea, because that's an age when people often stop reading for pleasure.  There are so many demands on your time in secondary school, but the pleasure of reading a book you love is something that should never be lost.  So I love the idea of a scheme specifically designed to create a buzz around books at that age.

This year's list includes books by some of my own favourite authors, like Wonder by RJ Palacio, The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel, Murder In Midwinter by Fleur Hitchcock, Where Monsters Lie by Polly Ho-Yen...  there really is something for everyone!  You can find the full list and more information on the BookTrust website.  And for anyone who's already trying to choose a book – here's Dave McKean's amazing Phoenix book trailer:

Three Steps To Writing

Last year, I was asked to give some writing tips by the fantastic Little Star Writing.  You can read my original blog on their website, but I thought my readers might enjoy it too, so here it is!

I like to break writing down into three steps. The first step is HAVING AN IDEA. People often ask me how to get ideas. The truth is that we all have ideas, all the time. Just think of yourself as a reader rather than a writer – and then write the story you would most love to read yourself!

That's how I had the idea of writing Phoenix. I’ve always loved space stories. The stars have always filled me with a sense of wonder. I love the thought of other life; other worlds, out there in the universe… Yet there aren’t many books set in space for younger readers. So I had to sit down and write my own!

The second step is WRITING A DRAFT, in which you tell yourself the story you want to read. Do a bit of it every day, until you reach the end. But remember that no-one can write a great book in just one draft. I've never met a single writer who could do that; a book is too big and complicated. You need to build it over a number of drafts.

The way you do this is the third step: EDITING. Once you've written a draft, try to read it as if someone else had written it. Stop being the writer, and become the reader again. And then, as the reader, ask yourself all the questions you ask of every other story you read. What works? What doesn't? What should there be more of? And less of? Then go back to being the writer, and do everything you can to make it more like the story you want to read. Keep doing this, again and again, until it's the best version of the story you can possibly write.

To illustrate how much things can change in this process, I'm going to show you an early draft of Phoenix. First of all, for comparison, have a good look at the extract above. It's the opening of the final, published draft. Once you know it well, have a look at the opening of my early draft:

Can you see how much has changed? It's gone from first person to third person. From present tense to past. It's become a dream. The setting has completely changed. The only thing that's the same is a character gazing up at the stars. That's the heart of it; but everything around it is different!

That process took me 13 drafts. It was long and hard – but it was worth it, because Phoenix is the book I wanted to read; a book that didn't exist before I wrote it. And you will feel the same about the stories that you write. So I'd like to wish you all happy writing, and happy reading – because in the end, the key to being a writer is really just being a reader!

New blogs by SF Said!

I've been writing some blogs to go with the publication of PHOENIX in North America by Candlewick Press.  I thought my readers might be interested in them.

The first blog I wrote was for KidsReads, and it was about collaborating with my brilliant illustrator, Dave McKean.  Dave and I have been working together since he illustrated Varjak Paw, nearly a decade and a half ago, and for me, his artwork is a vital part of my books.  Here's a little bit of the blog:

"By the time I was working on PHOENIX, we'd become friends and collaborators.  We'd spent a lot of time together trying to make a VARJAK PAW movie, with many adventures in Hollywood and beyond.  As I was writing PHOENIX, I was telling him things like: "I'm writing a great big space epic about a human boy and an alien girl who have to save the galaxy!  It's full of stars, black holes, dark matter – and also all the gods and goddesses of all the ancient mythological pantheons!"

The next blog was for the Children's Book Council Diversity Blog, and it was about how I think the books we read when we're young are the most important books of all.  Here's a little bit of that blog:

"I write children’s books because I believe they’re the books that change people’s lives.  My favorite book as a child was Watership Down by Richard Adams.  I re-read it as an adult, trying to understand why I’d loved it so much.  More than a thrilling adventure story about rabbits, I saw it was a story about the big questions of human life: Who are we?  Where do we come from?  Where do we belong?  How should we live?" 

And the most recent blog, which I wrote for KidLitFrenzy, was all about my love of science fiction, and how seeing the first Star Wars film as a wide-eyed 10 year-old eventually led me to write Phoenix.  Here's a little bit of that blog:

"I was 10 years old when the first Star Wars film came out.  It was a life-changing moment for me, as for many of my generation.  As I looked up in awe at that first starship filling the screen, I remember thinking that I wanted to write a story as big as that one day.  I wanted to see a sci-fi space epic for young readers – so I finally sat down and wrote one myself."

I hope you enjoy reading these blogs – and I hope you enjoy the Candlewick edition of Phoenix too!  I'd love to hear from readers in the US and Canada – so if you have already read Phoenix, please leave me a comment below!

You can also WIN A FREE COPY OF PHOENIX – there's a giveaway on YA Books Central this month that anyone in the US can enter!  

PHOENIX USA!

I am absolutely delighted to announce that my new book PHOENIX is now available in North America!

It's published by the wonderful Candlewick Press, who have produced a beautiful edition that uses all of Dave McKean's fantastic original artwork for the book.  You can order it from them, or from any good bookshop or website.  You can find the publishers' page for Phoenix by clicking this link, and you can watch a special US version of Dave McKean's Phoenix book trailer right here:

You can also WIN A FREE COPY OF PHOENIX!  There's a giveaway on YA Books Central this month that anyone in the US can enter.  I've written a piece to go with it all about the book's inspirations.  

I hope you enjoy it, and I would love to hear from readers in North America – so if you've read Phoenix, please leave me a comment below and let me know how you enjoyed flying among the stars with Lucky and Bixa!

Author Visits: Beckford Primary School

I'd like to say a big thank you to everyone at Beckford Primary School in West Hampstead for the fantastic welcome they gave me when I visited them last week!

I first visited Beckford back in 2013, and it was a pleasure to return and be greeted by this inspiring tiger again.  (If you want to know why I'm inspired by tigers, see this blog post!)  Year 4 at Beckford are currently reading Varjak Paw, and Year 5 read it last year.  Many of them had also read The Outlaw Varjak Paw, but only a few had read Phoenix so far, so I showed them Dave McKean's fantastic Phoenix book trailer.

So many people wanted to read Phoenix after watching the trailer, the local bookseller West End Lane Books completely sold out of copies!  They said they would return with more copies the next day, and I signed book plates for everyone who said they wanted one – but if there's anyone at Beckford who wanted a signed book plate for their copy of Phoenix and didn't get one, just let me know and I'll send it over.

It was really inspiring for me to see so much enthusiasm for books and reading, and to be asked so many brilliant questions!  If anyone from Beckford has any more questions, or would like to say anything about the visit or my books, just leave me a comment below.  And if you'd like to see more pictures from the visit, there are lots more on this page on the school's website!