Hazel Edwards's Blog - Posts Tagged "hijabi-girl"

I like a book title I can remember , so I can recommend it to friends. The vague phrases just don't stick in my mind.
My ideal would be a one-word ambiguous title , which is a genuine clue to the story inside and to the style in which it is written. If it's a funny book, I want the clue from a funny title.

Sub titles are OK, if they give more clues. But the ultra-long titles, are so difficult to remember.

As an author I have been guilt of using long titles like 'There's a Hippopotamus on our Roof Eating Cake'. But these days I tend to use short titles like 'Hijabi Girl' or 'Outback Ferals.'

And don't have one that's too close to another famous title unless you are parodying it. Which is your favourite title and why?

My favourite LONG title this week is Anna Ciddor's 'The Family With Two Front Doors'. Intriguing.

Sometimes fiction becomes fact. Authors say 'What if?' and readers say 'Why not?'

As part of the 'Hijabi Girl' launch, illustrator Serena Geddes did 'scribbles' of our character of the therapy reading rat. Students in the audience were fascinated with her process.

A book launch is a bit like a first birthday party for a book project. I've launched the books of other people. I've attended launches as a reader because I was curious about the background behind a particular story or I was keen on the writing of that author.( Or they were a friend!)

But attending a book launch with your co-writer and illustrator such as our recent 'Hijabi Girl' launch at Craigieburn Library was a different kind of shared experience. It's almost as if we had several parents of this book baby of ideas. Co-author Ozge Alkan who is a qualified children's librarian, and who wears a hijab, checked that our cultural references were accurate and respectful, but fun.

And the fictional story we had created was becoming fact. Now there are Aussie Rules footy fan club coloured hijabs. And girls' teams with some players wearing hijabs. Libraries do have therapy pets who encourage children to read aloud. But usually reading dogs, not rats like our character.

Hume Council is a very multi cultural area with 160 languages spoken, according to the Mayor who launched our 'Hijabi Girl'. And I'd had to learn new cultures in order to write a fun book which combined Aussie Rules football for girls, Islamic food and dress culture , friendship, being the new kid, and even soccer.

Plus Rattus Rattus the Reading Rat character who is permitted in the classroom , sitting in the Reading Chair ,as long as any student is reading to the therapy pet, in any languages. There are real pet reading ambassadors like Lachlan, the Reading Dog from Hurstbridge Library. And creations of fiction, like our Rattus Rattus the Reading Rat, who may become fact as schools and libraries adopt reading therapy pets.

So a book launch can launch diverse ideas which become fact. And maybe a few more libraries and schools will adopt therapy pets as 'listeners' for children's reading aloud in any language?

As an author I'm often asked how I choose my titles. As a reader, I prefer short titles which give me a genuine clue about the content and the genre. Not keen on abstract phrases.
As an author, I'm aware that despite a descriptive sub title, most people use only the first part of a title e.g. 'Difficult Personalities: A practical guide to managing the hurtful behaviour of others ( and maybe your own) gets shortened. 'Hijabi Girl' was a better title than the original 'The Unforgettable Book Character Parade' or even 'Hijabi Girls' Aussie Rules Team' which we considered.

'Big Little Lies' is a clever title because it contains contradictions. And there needs to be a hint of underlying conflict.
'Almost a Crime' is deliberately ambiguous and provides a clue, as each short story contains a sleuth-narrator who could also be the perpetrator of the crime.

Choosing titles is almost as difficult as naming babies. But they can always change their names by deed poll, later in life. More difficult with a book title.

Authors are often asked, which is the book they remember from their childhood.

I admit my secret. I was an Enid Blyton fan.

My grandfather had a private lending library and the children’s section was a wall of Enid Blyton. So I devoured the Famous Five and the Secret Seven, and then moved onto flying with Biggles. Sunday School prize books were the only other option. They were very moral tales of missionaries and far off places like Fiji and China.

But the book which impacted on my early life was Enid Blyton’s ‘The Land of Far Beyond.’ This was my first experience with an allegorical story, which was a quest, and where the characters had the names of their attributes. E.g. Mr Doubt, and the giant’s page boy called Fright. Even the places they travelled matched their names.As an adult, when we orienteered on a real map with Mt Disappointment labelled, it reminded me of ‘The Land of Far Beyond.’

Because I no longer have my own copy, I Googled the title and had a feeling of familiarity as I looked at the cover on the Enid Blyton Society webpage.

Today’s children would consider this cover bland, but I loved the sense of a journey conveyed in the artwork. I liked the economy of a story with several meanings and layers. But the story ALSO needed adventure and danger with eccentric characters to interest me.

My family taught me to read before I went to school. I used to read under the bedclothes with a torch. An aqua- readaholic, I still read in the bath or listen to audio books in the car or when walking.

‘Animal Farm’ by George Orwell had the same multi-appeal because at one level it’s a children’s story of animals taking over the farm, and the pigs walking on their hind legs, but really it is a political satire . It’s about the cycle of power.

I don’t think I knew ‘The Land of far Beyond’ was based on Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress until much later .I still like symbolic shape and sub-text within a story.

Flying home from Kuala Lumpur, during Ramadan, I watched a translated reading of the Koran on the in-flight screen and decided the poetry was similar to psalms.

Maybe reading ‘The Land of Far Beyond’ contributed to family orienteering, going on an Antarctic expedition and co-writing ;Hijabi Girl’ which is also a puppet musical. And the now 40 year old 'There's a Hippopotamus on Our Roof Eating Cake'? But mainly it opened the possibility for me that a book could take you into imaginatively structured ‘other’ worlds, beyond suburbia.

Which book do you remember from childhood?