An author in our midst…
Being invited to talk about my debut novel Everybody Jam, at the Edinburgh Book Festival – the largest event of its kind in the world, was a really big deal for me.
My book had only been published six months before, and this was my first literary festival. I got a taste of what was in store when the cab to my hotel went past Charlotte Square in Edinburgh. It had been transformed into a tent city, bustling and aglow at dusk.
I’m not usually late for anything, but being ready the next morning at 9.30am for an event which didn’t start until 4.30pm, was a personal best, even for me.
When I arrived at the festival, it was buzzing. I went to the author’s yurt – a cosy, Mongolian-themed green room, where I tried to pretend to know what I was doing.
I met Daniel Hahn, who would be chairing my event. He was lovely - really put me at my ease. When he had to dash off to introduce Charlie Higson, (of Fast Show fame), to his audience, I began spotting other famous faces; Ian Rankin, Melvyn Bragg, Margaret Atwood, Malorie Blackman… And me? I tried my best not to let nerves take over.
Eventually it was time for my event to start. Daniel introduced me to the audience and one of his first questions was about where the inspiration for Everybody Jam came from.
Everybody Jam is 13-year-old Danny Dawson’s story of life on a 1,600 square mile outback cattle station. As I explained to the audience – that’s equivalent to 16 Edinburghs, and is pretty far removed from rural North Yorkshire, which is where I am from. But I had worked on a cattle station during a trip to Australia in 2002 and the vastness, beauty, isolation and heat is something I can’t forget.
Daniel was also interested to know why I’d written the story from the perspective of a boy. I just felt more comfortable writing as a boy. I was too self conscious to write as a female, so I sort of hid behind Danny’s voice.
Using his voice meant I had to use my imagination more, as well, which was useful, because Danny experiences a lot of things I never have, such as the death of his older brother Jonny in a horrid accident. (Thankfully both my brothers are alive and well). In the story Danny is also training a pet camel called Buzz. I’ve had a go at training a Yorkshire Terrier-cross before, and while the pooch was what Danny would call ‘pretty feral,’ it’s not really the same thing as breaking in a camel is it?
We also talked about the relationships between white Australians and Aborigines in the book. Describing Aborigines as Gins and telling jokes about them is as normal as the desert’s dust and heat to Danny. He doesn’t know anything else. But the arrival of an outsider – a Pommie housegirl, means things begin to change. Daniel and I discussed how that new relationship transforms Danny’s world.
Something in Danny’s life which I have experienced is the thrill of the muster – that’s when the herds are rounded up and sorted into cattle to keep and those to sell. As Daniel explained to the audience in Edinburgh, mustering is exciting, dusty, dangerous work, carried out by fearless Aussie blokes and Danny wants to be one of them. He has dreamed of the muster all year, but his sister’s illegitimate pregnancy as well as the worst drought the family has ever seen, threaten to ruin his chance to prove himself.
As a first timer at Edinburgh, I suppose I had something to prove. So when an Australian woman in the audience told me she’d read and enjoyed Everybody Jam so much she was sending a copy to her cousins in Australia, ‘I felt real tall’ as Danny would say. Afterwards, as I dashed through the crowds on Princes Street, back to the station to catch my train home, I thought ‘I hope I never get used to this.