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I’m still coming down from the high of last week’s Brisbane launch of Henry Hoey Hobson.
Marj Kirkland, National President of the Children’s Book Council of Australia, did the honours at Coaldrake’s Books, in front of a home-town crowd of writers, friends, family and book-lovers.
She told the crowd that she had fallen in love with a twelve-year-old boy, and I know how she feels.
Books are like children. We all love our own and we want others to love them too.
They’re all beautiful in their own way, but oh my giddy aunt, so so different, sometimes it’s hard to believe that they all share the same blood.
My first-born, Dust, was all sweat and tears. Delivered after an elephantine labour dogged by every conceivable complication. When I finally held it in my hands I marvelled that such a small package could have caused such anguish and such joy.
Twelve months later, I’m welcoming Henry Hoey Hobson into the world. The unplanned second-born. My little surprise.
Perhaps because he arrived unannounced to an uncertain reception, he was different from the word go. His story came out with so little prompting, it was as though he had been here before, an old soul who had come into the world fully formed.
Me and Marj Kirkland, Coaldrake's Books, Brisbane launch
After the grief that his predecessor caused, I think of Henry Hoey Hobson as my gift from a good-hearted muse.
He slipped out so naturally, so sweet and true, that I wondered if he would forever spoil me for the next (I’m currently tussling with my third in three years, so I hope not!)
When I rub his glossy cover against my cheek, I tell him the same thing that I plan to tell every last one of them: ‘Of course you’re my favourite …but don’t tell the others!’
People love to know where we writers get our ideas. They seem to think that ideas are elusive, and that we find them in secret places where others never think to look.
The truth is that ideas spring at us from all directions. Like hungry cats, they clamour for a writer’s attention, rubbing up against our legs, jumping onto our laps, and whingeing till they get what they want.
Some inevitably drift off, bored with our lack of response, and are easily forgotten.
Others are more persistent, digging in their claws and refusing to let go till we give in to their demands.
Henry Hoey Hobson was a clawer. He arrived unannounced, when I was busy working on a crime novel, and waiting for my novel Dust to come out.
A likeable kid that nobody liked. How was that even possible?
I felt for him, even pulled out a pen and jotted down his details, then shooed him away so that I could concentrate on my work-in-progress.
He was a persistent little begger and kept pestering me, sneaking into my thoughts, and eventually, into my dreams.
I found myself hunkering down under the doona in the mornings, dreaming up a whole cast of characters who might be able to help him out. When I caught myself laughing out loud at their antics, I knew I was in trouble. But when the missing piece of his story brought tears to my eyes, I knew that HHH had won.
I got out of bed and started writing his story.
I wrote Henry Hoey Hobson for the same reason I hope others will read it. I cared about Henry, and I wanted to know what happens next….
http://christinebongers.wordpress.com
Confession time …While Henry Hoey Hobson was hitting the bookstore shelves in Australia, I was off sunning myself in Maui.
I know. Bad author. Very bad author. I should have been there to pluck HHH’s straight little spine from the bookstore shelves and rearrange them so that his cover faced outwards (like all good authors do).
Instead I deserted him…The moment that fragrant, frangipani-strewn Maui swayed its hips in my direction, I was off.
I figured that Henry would cope, because that’s what he does. It’s one of the things I love best about him.
Twelve-and-a-bit years old, friendless, fatherless and forlorn, Triple H is used to a bit of benign neglect … I figured he’d be able to make it through his first nine days on the bookshelves without me.
I soothed my conscience by sneaking him onto the plane in my carry-on….giving him the window seat …introducing him to new friends … and promising to make it up to him as soon as I got home.
When I flew into Sydney, I headed straight for the airport bookstore, Watermark Books, just to see if he’d made it safely onto their shelves.
And what do you know … there he was, cover facing outwards, half a dozen copies deep on the shelf. Couldn’t have arranged it better myself.
http://christinebongers.wordpress.com
As a kid, I loved reading Zane Grey westerns and Jack London adventures. I’d ride horses bareback and fight boys with sticks, then retire to my room with my uber-Barbie (the one with the swivel waist and the bendable knees).
I devoured Jane Eyre, Ann of Green Gables and Little Women with the same avid obsession as Reach for the Sky, the true story of Douglas Bader, the legless World War II fighter pilot.
In my dreams I was Black Canary from the Justice League of America comics, but it was Green Lantern’s motto that I would chant when alone: In brightest day and blackest night/No evil Shall escape my sight/For those who worship Evil’s might/Beware the power of Green Lantern’s light!
My childhood idols also included Catwoman, the Lone Ranger, Emma Peel (for her lethal elegance) and Jane Russell (for her smart mouth).
I grew up to fight with girlfriends over my right to watch Diehard over Passage to India (which admittedly I still haven’t seen). But it didn’t stop me sobbing convulsively all the way home from Driving Miss Daisy.
I read Robert Ludlum and Wilbur Smith before they became franchises, and would segue seamlessly from John Le Carre to Georgette Heyer and Jane Austen.
My point is that I have never preferred male authors to female authors, or female protagonists to their male counterparts; my lifelong preference is for well-written, strong stories with engaging characters.
So clearly I am the wrong person to ask “Is your latest book for boys or for girls?”
Henry Hoey Hobson is for anyone who ever missed out on the A-team, anyone who ever feared that they might not fit in, anyone who would love to be accepted for simply being him or herself.
And in my book, that would be just about all of us, wouldn’t it?
Read more about Christine Bongers at www.christinebongers.com
When I first heard the name ‘Henry Hoey Hobson’, it hooked me like lawyer vine. With no copyright on names, I knew that somehow, somewhere, I had to use it in a novel.
For me, the combination of those three ordinary little words lifted them out of the commonplace. They resonated instantly, but I had to wait years before I found the right fictional character to fit the moniker.
That character, like his name, was greater than the sum of his parts…a likeable kid that nobody liked, someone who would never be chosen for the A-team, a kid who’d be lucky to make the F and Gs at his sixth school in as many years…
I wanted Henry Hoey Hobson to be the loser you cheered for til your tonsils hung out on strings.
As his story unfolded, I started calling him by his initials, HHH, and his motley crew became part of Team Triple H, pitting them in sharp contrast to the too-cool A-team.
His nickname seemed to be catching on. My blog site started showing searches for ‘Triple H’ and ‘HHH’, not just for Henry Hoey Hobson.
I loved it – my new baby was developing a fan base! I couldn’t help myself, I did what all authors do – I googled Triple H and HHH and found this …
American professional wrestler Hunter Hearst Helmsley. Also known as HHH and yes, Triple H.
Dang.
Now I wonder what his fans make of my Triple H?
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