The one that got away

Otherland, my beloved pandemic book

Hi everyone!

The sun’s out finally, and I am thinking about midsummer for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I’m doing my first event tomorrow based on my picture book, A Midsummer Night’s Drama. (My first EYFS event, wish me luck with the extra-small people…)

But also because of Doctor Who. Anyone who knows me in real life or online will know I am thinking mostly about Doctor Who at the moment. In this case it’s a particular episode - 73 Yards. Without giving too much away, the episode invokes fairy lore.

The fairies I love are not the sparkly variety, but the ones who steal babies and lay curses on mortals. I love them so much I wrote a book about them - a book I don’t think I’ve ever talked about here. So here goes. 

Rohan and Myra aren’t friends. They’ve known each other all their lives, but they don’t like each other very much. Which is why it was so much fun to write them being forced to go on a quest together. Myra is anarchic and expansive while Rohan is cautious and sarcastic. I love an odd couple! When Rohan’s little sister is kidnapped by fairies - and it’s all Myra’s fault - the two of them are plunged into a horrible, topsy-turvy world of fairies and gods and ever-shifting monsters. 

It's a book that’s a little bit hard to describe, inspired partly by Jim Henson’s Labyrinth but also Maurice Sendak’s unsettling picture book, Outside Over There. It features a nasty Fairy Queen who has a hint of Queenie from Blackadder.

A true queen

All in all, Otherland is the product of every story I’ve ever loved, minced through my subconscious. 

It’s a book I’ve found hard to describe the “hook” for because it’s lived with me so long. It’s not a book I can pitch, because it’s a book that’s wholly real to me. There’s no market positioning yer innards, is there? 

Otherland was the book of my heart. I started the earliest version of it over 20 years ago. It changed a lot over the years, and had various rejections along the way. But it emerged blinking into the light in 2021. Slap bang in the middle of a pandemic. 

So, although it’s one of my favourite books I’ve written, I imagine a lot of you haven’t even heard of it. I’d love for you to check it out - it has the jokes of Loki but more fantastical wildness and weirdness. 

You can get it here and read people you might have heard of saying nice things about it here. 

One day I’d love to revisit it  - that world, those characters. And perhaps even do an illustrated edition. In the meantime, back to putting the finishing touches to Loki 4! Out Sept 12th! 

More news about that to come….

Louie x