BOOKS


Author Interview J P Rose


As a child, J P Rose never felt that she belonged—now, she has penned her first middle-grade novel about a girl finding her place in 1950s Yorkshire


Fiona Noble @fionanoblebooks G


rity gangland crime writing is not the most obvious route into children’s books agrees author Jacqui Rose, laughing as we talk over video call. The author of more than 14 urban thrillers, she has just dashed back to London from Kent for our interview, where she has been tending to her horse who is ill with a cough. This is somewhat more on-brand for her new direction: her first middle-grade novel Birdie will be published by Andersen Press this October (under the name J P Rose) and tells the story of the life-changing bond between a young girl and a pit pony in 1950s Yorkshire. The book draws on both her own experiences of growing up a mixed-heritage child in a mining village and her lifelong love of horses. “I’ve long wanted to write this story,” she tells me. The opening pages of Birdie see the eponymous heroine move from a Leeds children’s home for the “brown babies” of Black American servicemen and white British women, to her great aunt’s home in a small mining village. Leaving the sanctuary of the home behind, Birdie cannot under- stand why she is treated as an outsider. When bullying drives her to take refuge in an old coal mine, she discovers Mr Duke—the last remaining pit pony in the village—and an unbreakable bond is formed.


18 26th July 2024


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36