WINNER OF THE WATERSTONE'S CHILDREN'S BOOK PRIZE 2009
While visiting her grandmother's house, an old photograph leads Tanya to an unsolved mystery. Fifty years ago a girl vanished in the woods nearby - a girl Tanya's grandmother will not speak of. Fabian, the caretaker's son, is tormented by the girl's disappearance. His grandfather was the last person to see her alive, and has lived under suspicion ever since. Together, Tanya and Fabian decide to find the truth. But Tanya has her own secret: the ability to see fairies. Can it help them to unravel the mystery? Soon they are facing terrible danger. Could the manor's sinister history be about to repeat itself?
1.) Tanya's character is named after my niece. My niece assures me she can't see fairies though.
2.) Other characters' names borrowed from my family are: Florence and Ivy (my grandmothers) and Elizabeth (my mum).
3.) 'Florence' is an anagram of 'elf crone'.
4.) 'Tanya' comes from the Russian name 'Tatiana' which means 'the fairy queen'.
5.) The Hangman's Catacombs in the story are based on deneholes (cave-like holes in the ground) in an area of woodland near to where I grew up.
6.) My favourite human characters in the story are Red, Warwick, and Fabian.
7.) My favourite fairy characters are the drain-dweller and the Mizhog.
8.) If the book was ever made into a film I'd like Warwick to be played by Dougray Scott and Florence by Vanessa Redgrave!
9.) The methods of protection against fairies detailed in the story, such as wearing the colour red, really were used many years ago.
10.) I was born on Midwinter's Day (21 December), one of the 'in-between' days mentioned in the story. Other in-between days are Halloween
(31st October), and Midsummer's Day (21st June). In-between days are believed to be times when magic is more likely to occur.
11.) The original title of the book was Elvesden - rubbish, I know! It was called this for quite a long time. I also toyed with the idea of
calling it Second Sight, but there were already lots of books with this title, so . . .
12.) . . . the second title was Fairy Blood - and it was under this I secured my agent. Though this was attention-grabbing, it wasn't quite
classic enough, and so The 13 Treasures was chosen. Third time lucky!
13.) Speaking of luck, the number 13 is believed to be unlucky by most people, but has so far proved to be the opposite for me. As well as
being in the book's title, I once won an art competition on the 13th, and it was on the 13th that I met with Simon & Schuster, who then said
they wanted to publish my books.