Would you please tell us about the inspiration and creative process behind The Great Big Book of Families?
Author: Mary Hoffman
I’ve been thinking of writing a book like this for over 20 years! I suppose it began when a 12-year-old girl who had learned to read from one of my books, wrote and told me that her family was her, her mother and her budgerigar. It stuck in my head because I thought there were some people who might say that was not a family but that the girl was absolutely entitled to her own definition.
It seems to me that children’s picture books lag well behind reality and I wanted to show a range of ways of living that are classifiable as “family” that would mean every child could find something to identify with.
Already, in Grace and Family, I have had phrases like “a family with you in it is your family” and “families are what you make them” so I have been niggling away at this idea for some time.
I’m afraid this is going to be the longest answer because you ask about the process. I knew I didn’t just want to write a text and hand it over to an
Great Big Book of Families by Mary Hoffman
illustrator, which is the way that picture books often work. I wanted to find an illustrator who would work with me and who could be guaranteed to understand the points I was trying to get across.
Ros Asquith was my ideal first choice and if she hadn’t been interested, I might not have done the book at all. Fortunately she wanted to do it and has done a brilliant job.
What are the special skills you need to be a children’s author?
There’s only one that really matters and that’s to have retained the imagination you had as a child.
What do you know now that you wish you’d known when you started writing children’s books?
That actually, in 2010, what you need is a very strong USP (unique selling point) and that if you write a book that can be summed up in one sentence, it won’t matter what the quality of the writing is. And if you don’t have that USP, it doesn’t matter how good the writing is. Depressing but true.
For a parent who has a child only interested in watching TV what advice would you give them to interest their child in reading books?
If they are only interested in watching TV some ideal opportunities have already been missed but it’s never too late. Children love (and need) to have stories read to them and told to them. And they need a good example. If parents prefer TV to reading, why should the children be different?
How would you involve and educate kids about green issues?
I think most children can teach us about green issues better than the other way round. They respond very easily to ideas of fairness of distribution and also to the idea that this is the earth they will inherit as grown-ups. I think I’d level with them and say that my and earlier generations have made an awful mess of things. We have the excuse that we didn’t always know the consequences but we should make sure that they do.
Would you please tell us about your causes or charities you are involved with?
I have edited two anthologies without payment – Stacks of Stories in support of National Libraries Week and Lines in the Sand: New Writing on War and Peace, put together in a tearing hurry in 2003 when Britain and the USA were about to invade Iraq.
I also wrote The Colour of Home about asylum-seekers and spent a year working with them to get the story right.
I support animal charities like Blue Cross and a hardship fund for students at my old college.
What are your dreams?
My absolute personal dream for me would be to own a house in Tuscany. I should also like to win the Carnegie Medal and the Eleanor Farjeon award, to be Children’s Laureate and win the international Hans Christian Andersen Award and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award!
Oh, yes, and to have films made of my Stravaganza novels!
Would you tell us a little about your future plans?
See above! No, seriously, I have two more long novels commissioned and the possibility of more Great Big Books of … I have also written an adult novel that I am planning to revise in the second half of this year.
What were your favourite childhood books and why?
When I was little, I loved the Mary Plain books and Worzel Gummidge. When I was a little older it was Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books. And I always loved myths and legends and fairy stories, and still do.
How do you keep in touch with your audience?
By email. I get a lot through my two websites: www.maryhoffman.co.uk and www.stravaganza.co.uk
On Facebook there’s a Mary Hoffman page and two Stravaganza pages. And on Twitter I’m @MARYMHOFFMAN. So there are lots of ways of keeping in touch. I don’t do many Primary School visits any more but I sometimes visit Secondary schools or colleges and appear at festivals.
Tags: Children's Author, children's writer, Great Big Book of Families, Mary Hoffman