This week's guest is the wonderful Debbie Thomas! Susan and Sinéad had so much fun chatting to Debbie, who was full of wisdom and wit as we discussed the stories that shaped her - not only the stories in the books she loved, but also the stories of her family. This episode is filled with laughter and suffused with joy, the same joy that Debbie (and we at Storyshaped!) see as being vital in every child's - and every person's - life. Come with us as we meet Debbie, who not only crafts the most wonderful books, but who also uses her storytelling skills to show every single child the true value of story: that their story is important, and that they're worth being listened to.
Find Debbie online via her website and find out more about her books, and her work with children in direct provision, in underprivileged areas, and in hospitals
Books mentioned in this week's episode include Debbie's own:
Dead Hairy (Mercier Press)
Jungle Tangle (Mercier Press)
Monkie Business (Mercier Press)
Class Act (Mercier Press)
My Secret Dragon (Little Island)
Chameleon Dad (Little Island)
And the stories and books which shaped her include:
The Storytelling Animal, by Jonathan Gottschall
The Seven Basic Plots, by Christopher Booker
The Science of Storytelling, by Will Storr
Andrew Stanton: The Clues to a Great Story (TED Talk)
Steering the Craft, by Ursula K. Le Guin
Harry the Dog (series), by Gene Zion
Flat Stanley (series), by Jeff Brown
The King of the Copper Mountains, by Paul Biegel
My Naughty Little Sister (series), by Dorothy Edwards and Shirley Hughes
The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis
The work of Roald Dahl
The Phantom Tollbooth, by Norton Juster
The Tin Drum, by Gunter Grass
Midnight's Children, by Salman Rushdie
The Dragonfly Pool, by Eva Ibbotson
The Abominables, by Eva Ibbotson
East of Eden, by John Steinbeck
The International Yeti Collective, by Paul Mason and Katy Riddell
The Annotated Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster, ill. Jules Feiffer, Notes by Leonard S. Marcus
Collected Fairy Tales
"This life was hired out to me/To decorate the earth with glee."
Our podcast bookshop in Ireland is Halfway Up the Stairs: www.halfwayupthestairs.ie
In the UK, check out our storefront on: https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/Storyshaped. Disclaimer: If you buy books linked to our site, we may earn a commission from bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookshops.
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