#deborahabela

Before presenters shared their ‘Wish List’, Australian Children’s Laureate, 2016 to 2017, Leigh Hobbs read a letter from Glenda Millard. She wished all, ‘a wonderful time drenched… in the solace… and joy’ of inspirational creatives.

3 Photos courtesy Google Images

Glenda Millard

*photos of Glenda Millard images courtesy of Google.

Leigh Hobbs wished for every school to have a library with a librarian because ‘every school kid deserves one’. For children to be given ‘time’ to create, write, draw and read, free from the ‘pressure of tests and ranking’. His bolshie characters, Old Tom, Mr Chicken and Horrible Harriet continue to befriend kids in libraries, bookstores and throughout the stratosphere.

Meg McKinlay wished for ‘spaces of nothingness’ to allow children ‘dreaming time and creative time’. For children to know that away from the digital world ‘being bored’ was a chance to use their imagination — to think what else could they do. Meg’s fondest childhood memories were jumping on their bikes, exploring the bush and discovering the unexpected.

Gus Gordan wished for ‘all’ kids to have access to books. Books allowed children the chance to see ‘what’s outside themselves, outside their community, outside in the world’ with all its possibilities.

Mark Wilson wished for kids to grow-up into a world he had as a kid. A world with nature’s greatest places, ‘with things called forests and… beaches’. A place where turtles could nest safe from hotel lights. He wanted that sort of world for kids.

Jeannie Baker wished for every ‘single’ child ‘to love and be loved’. For children to have a supportive home, a peaceful environment and ‘to be creative and not be criticised’. To go to school with time to ‘exercise their curiosity… use their imagination’ and find and make things. Jeannie wanted children to think for themselves, play outside and engage with nature with feelings of awe and wonder. Some children experience a fear of nature – ‘Nature deficit syndrome’. ‘What one fears, one destroys. What one loves, one defends.’

Anna Fienberg wished every child to ‘find a friend in a book – in a character’. To have a friend early-on allowed them ‘to feel validated and not so alone’. Access to books allowed children to enjoy the pleasure of reading and to discover where a book could take them.

Kyle Hughes-Odgers wished children ‘time’ to experience creative freedom and a sense of place. To have time in their day with ‘no judgement’ to make whatever they wanted to make using their hands. This ‘promotes creative thinking which promotes critical thinking’ and helps push individual thought. Having ‘time’ to express opinions and views was important as it allowed a sense of validation and that you mattered. All this is away from digital distractions.

Deborah Abela wished for ‘every single child to feel equal, included and accepted’. Regardless of where they came from, gender, size or shape, intelligence, sexuality, disability or ‘a million other things that make us different’. As a kid she was called ‘a wog and a daygo’ and had rocks thrown at her on the way home from school. In her student workshops, kids know they count, are noticed, fit in and that ‘being different really counted’ especially ones who had ‘really good sword fights’.

Literature Centre Education Officer and Conference MC, Sasha Burbridge made a wish for teachers — ‘Time’ in their day to allow kids to ‘enjoy the beauty of Australian books… and appreciate reading for reading sake’. Away from constrictions of the curriculum or whether children have eaten before coming to school.

Congratulations Lesley Reece AM, Director of The Literature Centre, Fremantle. The sold out 2017 Celebrate Reading National Conference was a credit to you and your amazingly formidable team.

Thank you from Jenny Stubbs, Story Arts Festival Ipswich (SAFI) co-ordinator and Vice President Book Links (Qld) Inc. And Maria Parenti-Baldey, primary teacher, writer, blogger at www.bigsisterblogs.com.

Leslee Reece AM and Maria

Jenny, Mark and Shirley

Conference MC, Sasha

Write A Killer First Paragraph

Abela’s first big tip. ‘Your first chapter has to be short, sharp, solid, fast. It’s got to grab your young reader. It’s got to almost have a beginning middle and end, and a cliff hanger at the end. You want to hook them… hold them and keep them reading.’ The first lines were critical to hook the reader. In positioning herself as a ‘reader’, Abela role played asking questions after reading Gleitzman’s opening lines.

Morris Gleitzman’s Once — ‘Once I was living in an orphanage in the mountains and I shouldn’t have been. And I almost caused a riot. It was because of the carrot.’

Abela as reader, ‘What do you mean you’re living in an orphanage and you shouldn’t have been? So are your parents still around… or not still around? What do you mean you almost caused a riot? And what… does a carrot have to do with anything? Morris has that beautiful balance between the very very serious and a lovely note of comedy.’ After further examples, her audience were keen to write and share their first paragraph for Abela’s feedback.

Kids to Lead the Action

The basics of writing for kids, ‘it must be kid-focused where often kids lead the action with maybe an adult nearby.’ Often Abela gets rid of the adults ASAP or sidelines them. She found the easiest book to do this was in Grimsdon where she flooded an entire city, rescued most of the people, took them somewhere else but left some kids behind. ‘The kids could do whatever they wanted. They didn’t have to be home for bedtime or have to explain the broken bones because they’d been on an adventure hanging from a plane.’

Ask Yourself

Abela regularly questions her motives for writing and encouraged others writers to do the same. ‘Why am I writing? Why am I writing this particular piece? Is it because I’m excited… Is it a period in history I love? This story won’t leave me alone… it’s driving me nuts… I wake up at 3 in the morning… can’t get the characters out of my head.’ Whatever your why, a passionate answer will see you committed to your project.

Also, ‘What is the story I’m trying to tell and are you doing it? With every paragraph, every single chapter, what is the story I’m trying to tell? With Grimsdon, I’m trying to tell about a bunch of kids who are stuck in a flooded city and are desperate to escape.’

Novels have Behaviours

Abela said her novels had their own personality and likened them to being child-like. ‘Some (stories) come roaring out… like in The Spelling Bee. It was a delightful, playful gorgeous thing and it sort of wrote itself.’

However, Grimsdon was her naughty child. ‘No matter how nice I was to it, it would not behave. It felt like I dragged every single word out of some word rock.’ Her editor advised, ‘Just write one paragraph at a time, one page at a time and you will get to the end.’ Like Grimsdon, Abela appears to have a delightfully devilish streak in her as BookLinks co-ordinator Yvonne Mes found out.

Three Story Elements 

Abela explained the elements using the cake baking analogy.  ‘At the very, very beginning, your story needs the three basic ingredients character, setting and problem.’ Put these three elements into the plot pot… take those characters, put them into an interesting setting… then we make as much stuff go wrong for them… .’

Characters

Know your characters like you’ve met and are getting to know them. Make them interesting, especially if ‘you’re asking kids to hang out’ with them for a whole novel or series.

Setting

Your setting is the same. “The single nicest thing a kid has said is, ‘I felt like I was in that book.’ It means you’ve done it. You’ve created a world and you’ve created kids that feel real. And that this (world) could possibly exist. No matter your world, whether soccer fields, haunted castles or World War II it must be authentic.”

Problem 

Know what your characters want, then create problems to achieve it. ‘What is the thing your character wants the most? It’s usually numerous things, but what is the one thing driving that character? For India Wimple in the Stupendously Spectacular Spelling Bee, what she wants is to win the spelling competition.’ But first she wants ‘not to have that feeling of throwing up in front of a group she doesn’t know.’ The things you throw at your character must be hard to get, but not impossible. And it mustn’t be frustrating for the reader.

Voice in Your Head

Abela found a way to silence the ‘voice in your head’ that often reminds you how bad you are. She learned to become so involved in her characters and their story, that it felt like she’d forgotten the ‘voice’ was there. ‘I ignore it. I don’t give it permission… I haven’t got time to listen to you… I’ve got a city to flood or I’ve got some kids to rescue… so get out!’

Drafting Process

The drafts goes through several stages – from a solid foundation to build your story on, to making sense, to rewriting, to fine tuning and then finessing. Grimsdon went through at least 3-4 drafts before sending it to the editor.

** Editor’s Notes Are Gold

In Grimsdon, her editor showed Abela how close she was to her characters and story. When the editor said, ‘I know why you like this character… I don’t know why I should.’ In her rewrite, Abela had to transfer her passion for her character to the reader so they’d have more empathy. ‘No matter what you write, you must be passionate about what you are writing.’

Abela’s books have won numerous Australian and USA awards.

http://www.deborahabela.com