It’s an actual book. And it’s actually out. Just like the jasmine.
From today THE WHAT ON EARTH INSTITUTE OF WONDER is available in all good bookstores. It’s about a gang of friends who kidnap a rare African forest elephant. If I tell you any more than that, I might ruin the story but let’s just say kidnapping an elephant is not an easy thing to do even when it is the right thing to do. Which I’m not saying it is. There’s also a talking kakapo, an eight-and-a-half-year-old doomsday prepper, a villain with a fondness for wearing Peter Rabbit pyjamas and a lot of underage driving.
It’s a strange environment to be releasing a book but an even stranger time to live. As my mother always says ‘Just keep going!’
The What On Earth Institute of Wonder comes out 31 August. I’m excited and nervous all at once…..
One elephant, one kakapo, one unlicensed teenage driver, one boy waiting for the world to end and a twelve-year-old girl with a very special gift.
Sal has always had an affinity with animals – especially the lost kind. But when two rare and endangered creatures appear out of nowhere, life takes a detour into strange and uncharted territory.
Join Sal, Bartholomew and Roy on a mind-boggling expedition into the secrets of the Animal Kingdom with only an invisible map of the human heart to guide them. (Unless, of course, you count the talking parrot.) What on Earth could possibly go wrong…?
Ah….I’ll let you in on a secret. A lot!
I’m so excited and nervous that The What on Earth Institute of Wonder is coming out on the 31st of August. If you adore animals and don’t mind a laugh, I reckon you’re going to love it. Well I hope you are. And there’s plenty of that in there too. Hope.
Stay tuned over the coming months for some sneak peaks and stories behind the story…
Recently, I was sitting at my desk in a bit of a funk. I was having problems with a story.
Big problems.
I couldn’t seem to get it to work no matter what I tried. I hated everything I was writing. Maybe I don’t have any more stories, I worried. Fear curled up in the pit of my stomach like a sleeping snake. So I just kept on writing – anything! – trying not to disturb it.
Then one morning, early, while I was writing, writing, there was a scratchy kind of tapping noise at my office door.
I got up and opened it. And watched in disbelief as a strange bird walked in, climbed up onto my desk and plonked itself next to my keyboard.
I had never seen a bird like it.
It was as big as a duck with owlish eyes and mossy green feathers. And I don’t mean to be rude, but it was quite fat.
‘Well, since you seem to be all out of stories,’ said the strange bird, ‘how about you write one of mine?’
It can talk?
‘You better believe it,’ replied the bird. ‘And have I got a story for you.’
‘You do?’
‘I do.’
Well, I had to admit, I was intrigued. For a writer, that’s a good sign. So I inched towards my chair, trying not to go too close to the fat feathered creature, and sat down.
‘Ahem,’ I sorted of coughed, my hands hovering over the keyboard. ‘So..um.. what’s your name?’
‘Hector,’ said the bird, ‘And I am a kakapo. That’s K – A – K – A – P – O.’
Glorious photo of a Kakapo by Mike Bodie