Travelling with child—and trying to find inspiration along the way

One of the key ways I find inspiration as an author is by travelling—nothing quite stimulates my creative juices wandering through a dungeon or getting lost in a maze in a foreign country. Travels have been few and far between for my family the last few years, but we recently were gifted flights to Europe (and some free accommodation with friends and family), so we wanted to make the most of it—in other words, we wanted to do all the usual things we’ve always done on our past trips to Europe, Korea, China, and Southeast Asia. That means wall-to-wall exploring, every single day.

However . . .

One significant thing has changed since our last major trip, though: we now have a child. Before the pandemic, we actually did a major international trip to Korea and Japan with our son, but he wasn’t even walking back then, so that was enough to curtail our ambitions.

But he’s five now, so we thought we could revert to our old ways: see everything, go everywhere, and adventure it up.

Yes, we were that naïve!

The first part of our trip was in Spain and reality sank in for me when we visited the Picasso Museum in Barcelona. Hiro and I look at artwork all the time at home (I highly recommend the Daily Art app!), and we’ve visited art installations and galleries in Vancouver . . . which is all to say that I thought I had sufficiently and cleverly laid out the groundwork for a visit to the Picasso Museum.

Wrong.

Is this another room of boring?

As soon as we entered, our grumpy five-year-old, at the end of his late-afternoon rope, announced for all to hear: “BOR-ING.” Turning crimson red, I quickly shuffled him along, trying to find a different room to spark him. All I got was, “Is this another room of BOR-ING?” (Of course, as soon as he knew that was getting a reaction from me, he kept it up.)

Sigh. 

The other thing that my wife and I realized? We had to do WAY more carrying than we expected. We had been building up Hiro’s stamina, but there were many times when we were on a time crunch to meet an entrance time—or to catch a train—and the easiest thing was to just plonk him on my shoulders.

My back sure paid for that halfway through the trip!

So, I didn’t get the ponder and pontification time that I’m used to. BUT . . . of course, there are so many other positives to travelling with a toddler.

The world through a five-year-old’s lens

I’m the one in the family normally accused of getting sidetracked by a detail (usually a doorknocker), but Hiro often became interested in something I wouldn’t have paid remote attention to—like the designs on the sidewalk.

Or the scale of everything—he had never seen anything quite like the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. In some cases, I wanted him to appreciate the magic of a moment in a more profound way, but eventually realized he WAS seeing things in a profound way. His own, personal profound way. 

Mapping, mapping, mapping

Hiro has been obsessed with maps since he was old enough to understand what they were. I remember when he was barely two and I had to map out our neighbourhood for him, because he wanted to see our house in context of his world (which, for him at the time, was the neighbourhood).

So, there was a lot of looking at maps at every city and site. Marcie ended up buying him maps of the major cities we went to (even as I write this, he’s sitting near me, studying one of them). 

No photos, please!

You can never predict a kid’s mood when it comes to photos. Sometimes, he loves to pose and ham it up, especially next to my wife. Other times? Well . . . 

On the run

We tried doing a few things that we thought would appeal to Hiro’s interests—the aquarium, the zoo . . . but, really, what he wanted most was to just run around (except when we wanted him to—like, you know, to catch a train).

Barcelona is famous for Guell Park, but we decided to forgo it (Marcie and I had both been there on previous trips) and instead went to Parc del Laberint d’Horta, which featured a beautiful maze. That was something we could all get behind—and lost in. We must have spent two hours there (and not only because we got lost in the maze, but because we wanted to do it more than once).

There’s no bull here

Another favourite experience that we shared was exploring the bull ring in Mijas, the town where our friends live. I have zero desire to witness an actual bull fight, but for a couple of Euros, we could take a self-guided tour through the ring during off-hours. Hiro loved running around the arena. In particular, I loved going down the alleys behind the arena. I have been working on a middle-grade time travel book, and now I’m thinking I might have to write an extra scene to feature my characters ending up in a bull ring back in the day.

Visiting the Mijas bull ring, made me realize how similar gladiator pits and bull rings are. The father of my friend who lives in Mijas did say that bull fighting came from the Romans—I haven’t corroborated that information, but it does make sense to me.

The run of the place

Another successful experience for us was in Seville. We only had one night there, on our way to Lisbon, and because of that, we missed out entry on two of the main sites there, Royal Alcàzar and the Cathedral, because they were sold out. (The reality is that we didn’t want to prebook a lot of things because we quickly learned that we couldn’t predict Hiro’s day). 

However, we did go check out Setas de Seville on the morning of our departure. This is a site built over the old marketplace, part of a revitalization of the area, and it’s a futuristic looking walking platform that provides a 360-degree view of the city. Because we got there so early, we had the run of the place—literally. Hiro did laps around those walkways, and it was all completely safe, so we felt completely at ease. And the views were absolutely stunning.

As mentioned above, we did head to Portugal after Seville, but I leave those adventures for a future post. 

By the way, I normally blog DURING a trip . . . but I simply didn’t have time for that during this one. Once again—travelling with a toddler! I thought I would get more work done on some of the train trips—in one case in particular, I sat down to write and edit some students’ stories, but Hiro wanted me to plug my headphones in and listen in as he watched a movie (Sing).

Inspirational doors

I leave you with some of my favorite doors from Spain. (Yep. I got sidetracked a lot!)

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Writer-in-residency, magic & monsters style

I recently wrapped up a writer-in-residency with a group of gifted learners through the Vancouver School Board and Artstarts. Over the course of several weeks, myself and fourteen students came together in a central location to talk writing and reading—and to create.

My teaching partner and I led students (and their characters!) in an epic journey, exploring various facets of storytelling. I had students take each week as a scene, doing my best to slow them down and take each part of their plot as an important “moment.” I wanted them to concentrate on idea-building and the process of story development, as opposed to simply the product.

As part of this approach, I had them work on many hands-on activities over the course of the program. There was plenty of visual brainstorming, but also some prop-building. Students crafted magical creature eggs, created potions from kits I prepared for them (you should have seen our house that day!), and wrote riddles in invisible ink.

I was in a gifted learning programming myself as a kid, so am always extremely grateful to work with classes like these, where we can pursue our passions and explore our imaginations. It’s hard to capture the magic of these situations, but I’ve done my best with a few photographs that I could snap along the way . . .

Let’s map our way through story time!

My four-year-old I sat down the other day to do some writing, but instead of doing it the usual way (in which he narrates something for me to transcribe), I decided I’d roll out an activity I often do during an author visits at a school or library: Interactive mapping.

Mapping is a fantastic strategy for brainstorming ideas or to simply getting the creative juices flowing. I have many students (especially older ones) who find it hard to sit down and begin the process of writing—they find it hard to turn off all the other things that are pestering them. This sort of activity can serve as a “warm-up” exercise or a transition for the brain. Plus, it’s fun (and shouldn’t creativity be fun?).

For Hiro and I, we started out in one corner of our respective pages, and mapped our characters’ journeys toward treasures in the opposite corner. We created specific problems and obstacles along the way. We both did separate maps, building off our own ideas, though Hiro asked me to swoop in at certain points to do some drawing and labelling for him. (Hiro had an “ice” theme in his adventure—I especially like his “ice monster.”)

As mentioned above, I do this kind of thing with elementary and middle school students all the time, but it was the first time with a preschooler, and it ended up being far more entertaining for him than I would have guessed. 

Magic & Monsters with gifted learners

Today, I finished my first morning as writer-in-residence with the Vancouver School Board’s program for gifted learners. We’re going to be crafting scenes with the theme of “Magic and Monsters,” sending characters off on quests. Along the way, we’ll be designing secret doorways, building potion kits, writing in invisible ink, and mapping our way across imagined landscapes.

I’ve taught this program with VSB twice before, but this is the first time in person, which means I’m getting more hands-on editing, brainstorming, and other writing-related activities. A big thank you to my teaching partner, Ahmed Rahim, for making this amazing program happen. Also, thank you to Artstarts for their “artists in schools” program—we wouldn’t be able to roll out programs like this without their support.

The first part of today’s workshop focused on a general introduction to our philosophy and plan. I brought in my collection of handmade artifacts, hoping to inspire the students and get them to embrace the idea that writing is more than the act of sitting at a screen, but that it can involve doodling, mapping, and building. 

I also brought in a stack of fantasy books. Yes, there was my own Spell Sweeper, but I also brought in a selection of other books from authors of diverse backgrounds and experiences to help them consider a broader approach in their own writing. The books included:

The Jumbies by Tracey Baptiste

Eva Evergreen: Semi-Magical Witch by Julie Abe

The Last Mapmaker by Christina Soontornvat

Lia Park and the Missing Jewel by Jenna Yoon

Rise of the Dragon Moon by Gabrielle K. Byrne

The Twelve by Cindy Lin

The Serpent’s Secret by Sayantani Dasgupta

Girl Giant and the Monkey King by Van Hoang

Frances and the Monster by Refe Tuma

The Barren Grounds by David A. Robertson

The Dragon Egg Princess by Ellen Oh

The Last Shadow Warrior by Sam Subity

Wing and Claw: Forest of Wonders by Linda Sue Park

Dragon Slippers by Jessica Day George

Witch Hat Atelier by Kamome Shirahama

The Third Eye by Mahtab Narsimhan

The Fabulous Zed Watson by Kevin Sylvester and Basil Sylvester

Of course, I could have brought in many more books from my personal library, but you have to start somewhere!

The second part of the day was about rolling up our sleeves and writing our first scene, which was about a character discovering a secret of special doorway. The first order of business was to design the doorways and generate some story building elements. I love how these students embraced this process, as you can see by some of their work below!

Sign-ups for WRAD 2023 now open!

Are you a teacher, librarian or educator? I am thrilled to be participating in World Read Aloud Day 2023, and am currently booking 20-minute slots.

A typical structure for my WRAD visits looks something like this:

• 1-2 minutes: I introduce myself and talk a little about my books (I come with props!)
• 3-5 minutes: I read aloud a short excerpt from a book.
• 5-10 minutes: I answer a few questions from students about reading/writing.
• 1-2 minutes: I book-talk a couple books I love (but didn’t write!) as recommendations for your students.

I’ll be reading from either Spell Sweeper, The Secret of Zoone, or The Guardians of Zoone—or maybe I’ll give you a sneak-peek of a new work! I write middle-grade fantasy books that contain high adventure, plus some meaningful messages about how we can find our place in our communities and the world at large. Ideal for grades 4-7.

To book your slot, visit my sign-up genius page or email me through my website, leefodi.com.

And, of course, I’m booking regular school visits that involve in-depth presentations and my trademark interactive brainstorming sessions. For info on those, please visit leefodi.com!

School visits, author residencies, and writing workshops

Hard to believe the new school year is already here!

I had a very busy—and fun—2021-2022 season as an author, visiting schools, libraries, and learning institutes in Canada, USA, and Korea. Many were done virtually, but I also was thankful to see a return to in-person workshops (especially in Korea!). Many of my workshops were built off the release of my latest middle-grade book, Spell Sweeper—which meant a focus on magic potions, mysterious monsters, enchanted pets, and spell-binding shopping trips!

If I had an official resume, it would read like this for 2021-2022 . . .

• World Read Aloud Day (virtual readings for schools across the US and Canada)
• Canadian Children’s Book Week Tour (virtual workshops for schools in Alberta and Ontario)
• Several in-person workshops for libraries and learning institutes in Korea
• Several virtual author presentations for schools and libraries in Canada, in which I rolled out my trademark interactive brainstorming sessions

Writer/Artist-in-residencies for:

• Vancouver School Board gifted learning program
• Star of the Sea School, Grade 5
• Kamloops School of the Arts (grades 8-12)
• Hume Home Learning school (K-8)

I delivered activities for The Imagine in the Park festival in Hamilton, Ontario, and I even led events for adults, delivering presentations for CANSCAIP, The Writers’ Union of Canada, and WriteOnCon.

What magic will this school year hold? I’m prepping for my scheduled creative writing classes, writer-in-residencies, and school visits now, but you can still book me for an in-person or virtual author visit! Just visit my website.

My Grade-Seven Space Opera

I’ve been annoying the intraweb this past year with posts about Spell Sweeper (but don’t worry, I’ll still talk about it, because promotion is just part of a modern author’s duties). . . but let me take a break from Spell Sweeper matters and talk about a different project that I worked on, a project of EPIC proportions.

My friend Mike recently unearthed a precious artifact from the past…a script we wrote for our own epic Space Opera when were in elementary school. I introduce to you EXTROIS, taking place in the distant future (uh . . . 2000 A.D.). Yes, the future—where “everything is destroyed, and the people are destroyed” (so I’m not sure how a plot is possible with no characters or setting available, but let’s not nitpick). 

It might be the best thing I’ve ever worked on.  Though, as Mike pointed out, to try and release this now may result in various lawsuits from Lucasfilm and the estates of J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. As I recall, one impediment to this project was that we didn’t actually own a camera to film on. This is now easily rectified, but it’s going to be hard to get the old crew together.

Our costume designs might need some reworking to fit our, uh, advanced body shapes.

Other books and stories from my childhood have survived, and I regularly show my creative writing students, to prove to them that I wasn’t born with some magical talent, but this is the first time where there is a direct comparison between my creative output and a peer’s. I mean, honestly! Mike must have been a joy to teach—his printing is neat, considered, and cleanly spaced. My sections looked like I was writing with my hands tied behind my back! (So, apologies, Mrs. Clough…I can’t believe I made you struggle through my scrawl on a daily basis!)

For all of you out there who think your writing is good enough, and you’ll never get there, then please use this as Exhibit A.

I remembered Mike and I working on this, but thought the script had been lost in time, so it was quite the gift for it to suddenly turn up. 

By the way, yes, my last name is spelled differently here. It’s the name I grew up with, but when I was a young adult, I legally changed it back to its original Hungarian form (when my Grandfather immigrated, they anglicized his name, which was often the case back in those days).

Welcome to Enchanted Earth!

At the end of June, I finished up a year-long project at an arts-based high school in Kamloops (about four hours outside of my home city of Vancouver). Over the many months, I delivered a series of world-building activities, all via Zoom, first because of the pandemic and then because the roads were cut off after our extreme flooding (and then because of covid again). 

I do a lot of teaching and speaking over digital technologies, but it’s always a bit more challenging when art is involved because I simply don’t get a chance to lean over shoulders and see what everyone’s working on in the moment. Sure, people can send me photos and files, but it’s never quite the same, mostly because I find it harder to connect with the students.

Luckily, I was finally able to make the trip to Kamloops in the last week of June to deliver a keynote speech to the entire school body and to view their amazing gallery of work. The biggest surprise? The students were so engaged, asking me so many questions, and showing some genuine interest—these were things that I just didn’t pick up on during our virtual sessions. So, there was a connection, and that made the experience extremely rewarding.

As for the specifics of the project, the students were divided into teams to create five different realms: Ice, Sky, Underground, Land, and Water. The worldbuilding was applied to every course in the curriculum—not only the obvious ones such as art and writing, but also science and math. 

The result was really amazing. As I wandered the gallery of their Enchanted Earth, I found sculpture, myths, recipes, maps, constellations, language systems, field guide entries for creatures, dioramas . . . pretty much every corner of these worlds was imagined and explored. 

I’m showing pictures of just a fraction of the amazing pieces.

I want to extend my thank you to all the students and staff at Kamloops School of the Arts (secondary pod), in particular my partner Melanie Gilmar, who spearheaded the entire initiative. A big thank you to ArtStarts, the funding body for the project.

A free bonus book for you!

Hey, Spell Sweeper fans—you deserve a gift for all the love you’ve given this book. So, I’m releasing today a free e-book of “EXTRAS,” which you can download HERE.

(If you’re looking to get a copy of Spell Sweeper itself, then check out HarperCollins’ purchase page.)

Lots of goodies here! First, I’ve got some deleted scenes for you (some of those intervening moments where Cara talks about aspects of her life or Dragonsong Academy). It was a hard decision to cut these scenes; even though they are quite short, they slowed down the pacing of the main narrative or, in some cases, I felt the information was covered well enough elsewhere. But if you were dying to know what kids at Dragonsong like to dress up as for Halloween, you won’t have to wonder any longer!

Second, I have included two of the “wizard fairy tales” that are referenced in Spell Sweeper: The Tale of Eurybia the Eradicator and The Tale of Theradune the Betrayer. These tales present the origin stories of two important talismans that impact the plot of Spell Sweeper, but they’ll also give you a glimpse into Cara’s thinking. I never did intend to include these stories in the main book. I just often conceive these kinds of myths as part of my world-building process.

Third, are some Spell Sweeper inspired recipes and, finally, some of my own sketches of the characters (Maike Plenzke’s versions of these characters on the cover are much better than my own, but at least you can see how I was thinking of them).

Well, how many times have I been asked over the last few months: “Will there be a Spell Sweeper sequel?” I’m thankful so many people want one! But I did pitch this book as a stand-alone, so if I ever return to Cara’s story it won’t be quite yet. However, you can enjoy more of Cara’s voice and world RIGHT NOW!

Of course, if you haven’t read Spell Sweeper yet, these extras will provide you with a glimpse of Cara’s voice and, well, let’s just call it her swagger. Either way . . . enjoy!

My magical classroom

Unlike Cara Moone in my latest middle-grade book, I never went to magic school as a kid—but I was in a classroom that was incredibly magical.

It started in Grade 3 when I was sent to the hall to sit at a lonely desk and fill out a piece of paper. I thought I was in trouble at first! There was a sheet of paper with rows of circles, and the instructions said to draw. 

I can’t remember what I drew exactly, but it definitely wasn’t confined to within those circles. In the weeks ahead, there were a few other tests, and at least one interview with some old guy that came across as very scientific. In my imagination, he hooked me up to electrodes and tested my brain patterns (but I actually think he just asked me complicated questions).

Grade 4 . . . everything changed. I was put into a “creative learning” class with Mrs. Clough. We had a giant room with a small number of students. Some of the students came and went, but as for me, I was in that same classroom with the same teacher for three years.

During those three years, my creativity was nurtured and enflamed. I was given permission to be me. (I grew up on a farm in a small rural town and let’s just say that painting pictures or writing stories did not have many practical applications). 

Being in Mrs. Clough classroom was a foundational experience in my life. That room was my haven, a place where I could write, draw, build and explore. Many stories and ideas blossomed within those walls. I became a critical thinker, a dreamer, an enactor.

Mrs. Clough’s classroom helped make me who I am today, both as a writer and arts educator.

How can you ever repay those teachers in your life? It’s impossible, but I’m doing my best today by sending Mrs. Clough signed copies of my books.

Incidentally, that classroom still exists. Eventually our school was turned into a town center and our classroom was converted to become part of the public library . . . so, yep . . . my books are sitting on shelves in the place where I learned how to embrace my creativity.