Writing Books for Both Children and Adults: Interview with Author Catherine Jinks
By Valerie Khoo
Very few authors manage to cross the gap between writing for children and writing for adults. However, prolific Australian author Catherine Jinks has done just that. Catherine successfully manages to write both children’s and adult books. Her eighth adult novel The Secret Familiar - Confessions of an Inquisitor’s Spy will be released in November 2006 by Allen & Unwin. It’s a medieval murder mystery.I spoke to Catherine about her creative writing process.
Valerie Khoo: You manage to successfully write for both adults and children. Do you find that you have to put on a different ‘hat’ or go into a different ’space’ and switch between the two when you write?
Catherine Jinks: There are certainly differences, but I wouldn’t say I go into a different ’space’. When I get an idea for a story, I simply decide right from the get-go whether it’s an idea for children or an idea for adults. Then I find that everything stems from the initial choice of category, and I don’t have to spend much time worrying about what ‘hat’ I am wearing. When I am writing for children, there are more restrictions on content and writing style, but absolutely no restraints on ideas - the sky’s the limit. When I am writing for adults, the reverse applies. Adults won’t necessarily ‘go with’ you as far as a child will, but are far more amenable when it comes to big words, sex, violence and slow, meandering plots.
Valerie Khoo: Where does your interest in medieval history come from?
Catherine Jinks: Aesthetic appreciation. As a very young child, I loved the look of the castles, clothes and churches of the Middle Ages. This visual preference eventually led to a deeper appreciation of the era as I researched it more thoroughly. Although I find the medieval mindset incredibly foreign (and endlessly fascinating), at the same time I feel quite comfortable moving around in the Middle Ages. Perhaps it’s because I have lived with the period for so long. Either that, or I am a reincarnated fourteenth-century monk.
Valerie Khoo: What portion of your work for this book has been research and what portion actual writing and creativity?
Catherine Jinks: This is a hard question to answer. I spent about six months writing The Secret Familiar, but I have spent the last twenty years slowly building up a database of medieval research. Both my previous books dealing with the medieval inquisition - The Inquisitor and The Notary - covered different aspects of the same immensely fruitful subject. So, although the research that I did specifically for The Secret Familiar only took me a few weeks, it was built on years and years of preliminary research into subjects like heresy, papal inquisitors, the Albigensian Crusade and so forth.
Valerie Khoo: What would your advice be for aspiring writers who would like to tackle both children’s and adult markets? Any tips?
Catherine Jinks: Here’s a brutally honest tip: if you’re determined to tackle both markets, don’t do it the way I did it. Don’t start out writing children’s books, then proceed to writing adult books. Do it the way Tim Winton, Peter Carey and Nick Earls have done it; start as a writer of adult books, then graduate to children’s literature. Otherwise you’ll find it hard getting people to take you seriously as a writer of books for adults. Not impossible, mind you - but hard.
Valerie Khoo: When did you know you wanted to write full time and how did you make this happen?
Catherine Jinks: I have pretty much always wanted to write full time, but of course that wasn’t an option, initially. It takes years to lay the groundwork for a novel-writing career. Writing full time as a journalist can work. Writing full time as a novelist is a rare achievement. I have been publishing for seventeen years, but I’ve only been a full-time novelist for thirteen of those years, and making a reasonable living for about nine of them. I believe that my main advantages are as follows:
1) I am pretty prolific (thirty-odd books in seventeen years).
2) I have been married for fourteen years to a great little earner.
3) I have spread myself over a fair number of markets - adult, young adult, younger readers, early childhood - so I can publish more than one book a year in Australia and not saturate any particular market.
4) I seem to export quite well, having been sold into the USA, the UK, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Russia, France and Thailand. (This is partly because my agent is so good, and partly because my subject matter isn’t exclusively Australian.) When you have foreign money coming in, it’s much easier to survive as an Australian novelist - especially if you haven’t had any humungous bestsellers.
5) In the early days, I received a grant from the Literature Board of the Australia Council. I am very grateful for that, because it got me started; now I don’t need to apply for grants, and I am grateful for that, too!
About the Author: Valerie Khoo is director of the Sydney Writers’ Centre in Australia. The Sydney Writers’ Centre offers short courses in creative writing, feature writing, business writing and much more. She is author of five books and a regular writer for The Sydney Morning Herald. Valerie is passionate about helping other people achieve their writing goals. http://www.sydneywriterscentre.com.au
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