I'm always amazed at how resourceful, thoughtful, determined and resilient 12- and 13-year olds are. We adults never give them enough credit!
Each of the stories I have written highlights different aspects of just how amazing kids of that age are. The stories may be fiction, but each character is a blend of the great qualities of the many students I have worked with over the years.
Kids that age are looking for purpose. Some find it in sport, others find it in the arts. They are intelligent and are more than capable, but adults still see them as children. Characters like Jack MacAllistar, Guilhèm de Monbézénac, Bren Schofield, Dom Morales, and Dylan Hughes all find their purpose in adventure. They're not out looking for it—excitement and adventure just fall, unexpectedly, into their laps, and you know what? Like any other 12- or 13-year-old, they are at first confounded by it, but they also find ways of dealing with it, fielding the left curves thrown at them in their young lives, just like the youth of today.
Never underestimate the ability of youth to get the job done!
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Seriously! Contact me! I have manuscripts for exciting adventure stories for 10- to 14-year-olds, beta-tested and approved by avid readers.
My colleagues consider the Adventures of Jack MacAllistar series "a whole new genre of geographical fiction" combining the excitement of travel, internationalism, and activism for young people trying to navigate their way in the world.
I've always needed a creative outlet – a way for my right brain to balance out the analytical and methodical needs of day-to-day life. For decades, that outlet has been photography, but lately, with more and more stories taking shape, my creative outlet has become writing. It began as a means for processing all the great adventures I've had while living overseas and when travelling with students. Now scenes and chapters practically write themselves and become whole manuscripts, ready to go!
30 November 2024: My second NaNoWriMo 'win', and a new story to share with you: Dylan Hughes: Dino Hunter. Read on . . .
— Never underestimate the perseverance of youth —
Thirteen-year-old Dylan Hughes is a self-confessed dino-geek and is convinced that one day, he will be a palaeontologist. After all, he lives in the Alberta Badlands, right amongst the world’s richest bed of dinosaur fossils. True to his word, Dylan finds not one, but two fossilized dinosaurs and earns the name Dylan Hughes: Dino Hunter from the officials at his shrine of all things dinosaur, the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology.
One mysterious night things begin to fall apart as professional fossil thieves make off with his discovery. The police ignore him and even the media are disinterested.
After leaving behind his life in hockey and realizing how classmates now make fun of his passion for all things dinosaur, Dylan finds support in an unlikely new friend Addi who carries the torch for all D2BDs—those who Dare to Be Different. But that doesn’t stop Dylan being kidnapped by the very fossil thieves he is trying to protect his finds from or local boys tormenting him with a ritual he must perform before his 14th birthday. Will Dylan even survive to see 14?
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24 November 2023: I've just achieved my 50,000 words for NaNoWriMo! Woo-hoo!
What an adventure! The first draft of Marooned! is complete.
— Never underestimate the resourcefulness of youth —
Here's a summary:
"If you are reading this, I am either very lucky or very dead."
With this, Bren Schofield begins his journal—a remarkable chronicle of how a suburban 12-year-old kid survives utterly alone and destitute on a South Pacific island. Left for dead after a typhoon destroys their sailboat and his family, Bren quickly learns the ‘Rule of Threes’—three days without water; three weeks without food, and three seconds to make a bad decision—and its brutal consequences.
Day after excruciating day, Bren recounts the thrill of creating a safe haven, befriending unique and amazing wildlife, and experiencing a real tropical rainforest teeming with life. But each success is weighed against the near-impossible physical and emotional hurdles he must overcome to carve out a life, an existence, alone on the island—grisly discoveries made deep in the dark, damp chaos of the rainforest, the visceral fear of what might kill him next, and the sheer panic of never being found.
Having survived weeks of sunburn, insect bites, crab bites, bashed knees, mashed knuckles, and a rogue crocodile he’s named Buddy, Bren now worries that something as simple as loneliness may be his undoing.
But there are holes in Bren’s story. Some things just don’t add up. Is Bren confused about events or is he purposely hiding what really happened?
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Jack is a normal-ish young teenager, with nature-nut parents, yearning for something a little more adventurous than car camping. He wants to be his own person, forging his way into and through a world very different from what his parents experienced. He finally gets his chance with an unexpected family trip to the Galápagos Islands. Adventure awaits, maybe a little too much adventure for Jack and his best friend Erik to survive!
Galápagos! chronicles the exploits of Jack and his best friend Erik, as they experience all The Enchanted Isles have to offer.
"Jack MacAllistar is always on the sidelines. He yearns for something more exciting than his suburban life with his slightly nerdy, nature-nut parents. So, when twelve-year-old Jack and his best friend Erik find themselves in the Galápagos Islands, his wish for excitement propels them into unexpected adventures that push them to the max. Cornered by humongous sea lions, snorkelling with sharks and penguins, surviving a volcanic eruption, then being marooned on a deserted beach, the boys stumble upon a discovery that will set the archaeological world alight. Can Jack possible handle all that is being thrown at him at once?"
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In the second book in the series, tentatively entitled Home Fires, Jack and his friends become activists against what they see as adults ruining their future through inaction.
"Never in a million years did 13-year-old Jack MacAllister expect to become an activist. His new and revealing experiences last summer in the Galápagos Islands with his best friend Erik, awoke their combined desire to make a difference in the world. "We’re too young to vote, but not too young to shame!" becomes the rallying cry of their small group of globally-minded friends who launch a series of school strikes while encouraging Jack and Erik in their Our Global Future online campaign. But, it’s not without significant challenges from school administration, the mayor, parents, reporters and classmates they once counted amongst their friends. As they forge their way between social norms and democratic rights, the value of friendship is tested when they face a backlash against everything they fervently believe. Jack and Erik also encounter life-threatening experiences while winter camping in Killarney, only to have Jack’s life completely turned upside down when his parents announce they’re moving to Africa."
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Jack is forced to leave his life behind and move with his parents to Tanzania, East Africa. While the move brings new friends and many daring adventures at school and on safari, Jack must also learn to navigate the minefield of teenage relationships.
Welcome to Jack’s excitingly adventurous, tumultuously changing world! Having left behind their comfortable, predictable life in suburban, small-city Canada, fourteen-year-old Jack MacAllistar and his family are beginning a whole new life in the uncertain maelstrom of a developing nation, Tanzania. Upon arriving, they quickly learn that nothing is quite as they expected. From the wonderful serendipity of safari adventures to ants swarming their house, they soon discover the contrasting bright and dark sides of living overseas, where ‘everyday is an adventure’. Part of that excitement is meeting new friends like James, a Tanzanian boy on campus; Harry, a British bloke from another school; and the Danish twins, Lea and Mia. Imagine navigating the confusing labyrinth of young teen relationships, a new school and a country with very different standards and expectations. But, along with the beauty of the tropics, the wonderful people and spectacular wildlife and landscapes, Jack learns that poverty is rampant, as is corruption, poaching and smuggling. In fact, from the moment he meets the Deputy Head of his new school, Mr Bourini, Jack knows something is up, and he and his friends must find the courage and cunning to get to the bottom of it, despite the dangers.
Jack and his friends get tangled up in crimes that become deadly for fifteen-year-olds and his encounters with poachers just about finishes him off. Can they persevere through this web of deceit and maintain their friendships?
It’s the moment of truth, yet the justice fifteen-year-old Jack MacAllistar and his friends Harry, Mia, Lea, and Sam were hoping for slips away. Instantly, their lives turn into a cat-and-mouse game of deadly threats and traumatic encounters as they try to expose who is really behind the wildlife poaching and illegal trophy hunting in northern Tanzania. Then Erik arrives from Canada and Jack’s world is again turned upside-down. All of this amidst a backdrop of changing teenage relationships, assumptions and misinterpretations leaves Jack constantly on edge, wondering where the danger will come from next. From Maasai bomas to the Swahili Coast and back to the heights of Mount Meru, difficult life lessons of honesty, integrity, and friendship become harrowing experiences in Jack’s personal quest for fairness and understanding, culminating in utter brutality at the hands of the very people he and his friends have been trying to expose. How can Jack and Harry possibly escape these armed and extremely dangerous criminals?
New Manuscript tentatively entitled Guilhèm's Quest
— Never underestimate the tenacity of youth —
Duchy of Aquitaine, 1350CE. Rivalry between brothers is nothing new, nor is the disparity that separates nobles and peasants. As barons of Périgord, the family of 12-year-old Guilhèm de Monbézénac is caught up in the devastation being wrought by the Hundred Years' War between the battling monarchs of England and France. But conflict also rages within their family.
Guilhèm has a secret known only to him and his two best friends, Arnaut and Ferrand: through learning and battle-training Guilhèm plans to fulfil his quest to become a knight. But, as the second-born son, he must stand by and prepare for a life in the monastery, while his unworthy, good-for-nothing older brother, the heir apparent, rises to the most chivalric of orders. Guilèm's in-built sense of justice is further challenged by the callous and malicious way his brother treats anyone who crosses his path, especially their peasant workers. How will Guilhèm achieve his dream? And how will he protect his friends from the depravity of his evil brother, his father, and the great Baron de Beynac?
New Manuscript tentatively entitled The Vortex of Time
— Never underestimate the determination of youth —
In the creepiest, dustiest corner of the basement in his family's old Toronto home, twelve-year-old Dom Morales discovers a long-forgotten box that holds secrets far too real, far too exciting, and far too dangerous to believe.
Stuffed with old manuscripts and trinkets, Dom is mystified at the discovery of a hidden inscription on the inside of the lid of the box:
Wið ealdum relicum, a hiden searw
Eorðan tocgan, soðfæstnessa oncyþ.
A port seorlað—Forbeodan! Forbeodan!
For tīma mæg fæstian þa unware.
Cyrre þu scealt, oþþe wēn þone cost,
Þæt in þǣm ēacum, þu beon forloren.
— Parum claris lucem dare —
What could all this possibly mean? And what's with all these dusty, old trinkets?
Can't wait to find out? Contact me!