Meet Steve Draper, Sheffield Author

Sheffield's next best selling author of The Girl and the Goldcrest

Our friend Liz Buchanan met with Steve Draper, to hear about his first book - The Girl and the Goldcrest.

I am a baby boomer. A member of that 'golden' generation. We haven't had to cope with war. We tended to have good pensions, retired at sixty and by the time the possible environmental catastrophe of global warming happens, we will be gone.

But I have grandchildren and I don't want them to be faced with an environmental catastrophe either. I'm not sure that's why I started my book, but it's why I persevered. I felt I ought to help young people explore issues around the environment, global warming, wildlife and also social issues such as racism and bullying.

In the second book of the series, Project Cryption, the kids decide they should have a school allotment.

I was born in South Africa. My parents were born there and so were my mother's parents. There was apartheid of course, but there were also five children. I think the main reason my parents came back to Britain, was for the free university education!

So I met my wife Sarah in Birmingham, on a working-class council estate. Literally, the girl next door. She was the Doctor's daughter and I was the vicar's son. She remembers thinking that I was stuck up. But our backgrounds, although relatively privileged, gave us a huge amount of respect, understanding and admiration for those people who had less. Who were working hard to make life better for themselves.

I studied music at Oxford; St. Catherine's College, which was a new college back then. It's a beautiful building. I play the piano; not brilliantly. I trained classically as a singer but my voice packed up. At the time I didn't even know why. I doubt I'd have made money as a professional musician anyway. As the joke used to go.... those who can, do. Those who can't … teach.

So I did a PGCE at Durham. Sarah and I got engaged and moved to Sheffield in 1975, so I've been here for nearly fifty years. I taught music in comprehensive schools. I enjoyed it. There are obviously challenges, including an expectation that you'd do a lot of extra-curricular activities. The school band, choir, and musical productions took up a lot of time but I think less was expected of classroom teaching back then.

Later I worked for the music service, in David Blunket's Wider Opportunities scheme, which was absolutely brilliant. Again, it was about serving aspirational people. But the funding disappeared and the wonderful music services had to downsize. I was offered severance in 2010 and I had a six-month old grandchild, so I took it. I looked after Daisy three days a week. I'd never really looked after a baby before. It was hard work, but a great privilege.

I started The Girl and the Goldcrest in October 2005 when I was walking in the Rivelin Valley, just listening to the birds. I clearly remember having a story idea about Guardians, creatures who look after the rest of their species. My protagonist, Emma, unexpectedly finds that she has the ability to communicate with these Guardians and embarks on a series of adventures with her friends to help wildlife.

I finished a version of it only a year later and I thought it was wonderful. It wasn't wonderful, though – it was c**p. I gave it to some friends to read and the problem with friends reading your stuff is, they don't really like to say, 'I'm sorry Steven, this is c**p.'

It really was. There wasn't even a baddy. I submitted lots of work to lots of agents and publishers over many years, and no-one was interested. I eventually joined the Sheffield Novelists' group because I felt I needed some help. In this group, experienced writers read your work and are honest about it as critical friends. The most valuable thing I've learned is that you have to understand how other people are going to interpret what you've written. Obviously, I’m still learning.

    During lockdown I spent a lot of time walking in the Peak District, but I also decided to make a whole series out of the initial idea. I wrote three more books and called the series Greenerdawn.

Here, Emma and her friends decide to form a group at school. Here they’re discussing what to call it. One of them suddenly calls out ‘Greenerdawn’.

Sheffield Novelists had me looking at the plot in more detail. There wasn't enough continuity; the chapters were different, disconnected scenes. For instance, at one point there was a flash flood and somewhere else there were bird attacks. Eventually, I invented the baddy, Cain Grindlethwaite, and suddenly he was everywhere, bringing it all together. Cain has the same ability as Emma; he can speak to birds and they can speak to him. He is evil and manipulative, and throughout the series, he is trying to create Guardians that he can control, which would give him overwhelming power. His underlings dammed the river to cause that flood, for example. The incidents became interconnected, weaving themes and structure through the story.

Here’s Cain meeting Emma for the first time. ‘Oh, a spirited young lady. Emma Sparrow, you say?’

Next, was actually getting a submission accepted. Perseverance is a word you hear over and over again. It's easy to get discouraged.

After all the rejections, I decided to publish it myself. Brian Smith did the illustrations; he's an old acquaintance and I'd seen a lot of his work, at events like Art in the Gardens. Mostly he paints very eye-catching  watercolours, but he was happy to work in black and white with pencil. My vision for the illustrations was something like an updated version of the pictures from the Chronicles of Narnia and Charlotte's Web – and he delivered. They're fantastic.

Here’s a scene from the first chapter. ‘Sparrowlegs, sparrowlegs.’ The boys from the back row in Emma’s English class were chanting from the bike sheds.

 This is towards the end of the book. ‘Your name will be Snuffledown.’ (The commissioning of a Guardian Badger.)

I then did a number of school readings. I've read to nine groups of children in schools and libraries, including a group from Newfield in front of the Lord Mayor.

It's not easy to get into these institutions and I struggled at first, but eventually the book was approved by the wonderful lady who runs the school libraries service. She said, 'We do Chatterbook sessions at Meersbrook library.' I said, 'What are Chatterbook sessions?'

It turns out that the group of kids are given a book to read and then a month later they meet to discuss it. When I dropped my books off, I chatted to the librarian in charge. She said, 'It's a very quiet group and there's only about six of them...'

I said 'Well, I'll leave six books and one for you.'

I came back a month later. I'd prepared lots of activities and discussion questions. Things like making bug hotels and binoculars. The lady said, 'there was only one child here last week.'

I thought, 'Oh, no!'

But in the end, all six turned up. Were they quiet? No! They were full of it. Buzzing. The hour just disappeared. We were talking the whole time.

At the end of the session one of the girls said, 'Can I keep the book? And I said, 'I suppose so.'

Then another said 'Can I keep the book? Can I keep the book?' It cost me six books that day, but I was very happy.

Anyway, I was looking through the Chatterbooks material and spotted an associate publisher called Cragthorpe Milner. I'd never come across them before. I'd got tired of submitting my manuscript by then, but I sent three chapters, as you do....

The publishers asked for the whole book. They said, 'we think you might have something here.' Then they offered me a contract. I'm having to become tech-savvy, so I'll be getting a web-site. I'm hoping that the first books – which are no longer available - will become collector's items one day!

I also have to mention two schools - St. Marie’s in Ranmoor and Nether Edge Primary School. St. Marie’s began the journey by allowing me to read a couple of chapters, and Nether Edge read the whole thing. The reception in both reinforced my determination to get kids reading the books.

The Girl and the Goldcrest is set to be published by Cranthorpe Millner and will be available from all major book retailers, a bookshop near you, or my website:

www.Greenerdawn.org.

The launch date will be Tuesday 28th November.

Thanks Liz, for giving us this insight - it’s inspiring to hear how Steve never gave up his dream and from 2005 has worked to become a published author. If you are an aspiring author, or just enjoy writing, please join us in our Love Sheffield Writers group.

If you know an inspiring and creative Sheffielder you’d like to hear in conversation, please introduce us to them, we hope to bring many new stories to you in future editions.