Author Interview: Penny Reeve CALEB Award Winner

Penny Reeve CALEB Award Winner is our guest today.

Penny is talking about her CALEB award winning book “Camp Max” and the inspiration behind the book. You can find a review of Camp Max at here. Welcome Penny and thank you for your time.

1. Firstly, can you tell us a little about yourself?

I live in western Sydney with my husband and three children. I’m a wanna-be gardener, an ‘I’ve never got enough time to read!’ reader and a fan of family movie nights. I’ve written more than 20 books for children and released my first YA last year – writing as Penny Jaye – called Out of the Cages.
I occasionally write for adults, but it’s children’s and YA stories that capture most of my imagination.

2. Can you tell us how you came to write Children’s fiction?

I think I’ve always been a writer, but I really began trying to write books for children – with the aim of publication – when my first child was a baby. I couldn’t find the type of stories I wanted to read to her, stories that taught about God and about the world with integrity and wonder, so I thought ‘maybe I could give it a try’. My first published books, the Find the Animal series (CFP, UK) were the result of this experiment and they’re still being sold today!

3. When I read Camp Max and really enjoyed the story can you tell us where you got the inspiration to write this book?

Oh, I’m glad you enjoyed it! I love hearing how adults enjoy my stories even when they aren’t the originally intended audience. [bctt tweet=”I love hearing how adults enjoy my stories even when they aren’t the originally intended audience. #AuthorInterview” username=”ausjenny”]

The inspiration for Camp Max was probably my own questioning around the theme of the Tania Abbey series, that is: How can the average Aussie kid respond to the world’s poor? I wanted to really push the idea of generosity to the point where kindness had potentially unwanted consequences. What happens when generosity costs? Can we weigh up that cost and still give? How are our friendships affected by the decisions of faith we choose to make? Etc. The story grew fairly naturally as my characters came to grapple, and grow, with these ideas. It was a fun book to write and challenged my own values along the way too.

4. What do you hope readers get out of this book?

As with all my books, I hope they get a good, fun read! But I also hope they journey with me wrestling with the values behind generosity and lasting friendship. I hope it widens their worlds, just a little bit, to consider how their own decisions can make enormous impact for good in the lives of others. I hope this story inspires and empowers my young readers to love big.

5. I love how Tania wants to help her friends win a ticket to Camp Max and love the ideas for the talent quest. Did you have fun coming up with the ideas?

Yes! It was such fun to really celebrate the different characters’ personalities through the talent quest. Often the quirks of a character remain hidden in a story as the plot action takes the main stage. But this story gave me the opportunity to really bring out their strengths and play on their personalities and how they bounced off each other.

6. I also loved how Tania’s friends wanted to help friends in India and Tania struggles to know if she could do the same. Also, how she grows throughout the book. Did you have an experience that inspired this part of the story?

This story, and the other stories I’ve written with the same cast of characters (The Back Leg of a Goat, Water or Goo and More than a Mouse), often draw on some of my own experiences as a child. My parents were MAF missionaries when I was growing up so I lived in a variety of different locations and was exposed to many different communities and ways of life. I remember frequently seeing not just the effects of poverty, but the very real difference generosity could have on the lives of others. I also remember trying to balance my desire to help, with the limits of what I could do, and the impact that might have on my own life.

7. And finally do you have any other comments for our readers?

Teacher’s Notes to support the use of Camp Max in Primary Classrooms or Home School learning can be downloaded FREE of charge from the publisher’s website. (Just scroll down to the bottom of the page to find the link to Download Teaching Notes). http://wombatbooks.com.au/index.php/camp-max

Do you have any questions for Penny?

Penny Reeve is the Australian author of more than 20 books for children, including the popular Madison and Tania Abbey series. She is passionate about writing stories that both entertain and empower readers to engage with – and respond to – the around them.
Penny now lives with her husband and three children in western Sydney, where she is currently juggling the fun of busy family life with study for her Masters in Creative Writing and Literature (Deakin University) and several writing projects on the go! She also writes as Penny Jaye.
Visit her website and Facebook page for more information.