down the situation a lot to make it friendly for kids,” Ade says, adding that: “It was the first scene in the first edition but we rejigged it so it comes in chapter 3 in the second edition. But I felt it was important. I was wondering if kids could handle it, but I think they are able to handle a lot more than we give them credit for.”
critics are going to read it and what are they going to think? And will the kids like it?”
Adrenalin rush
The process of bringing real experience and emotion to life through fictional characters and tense plotlines has proven a fascinating puzzle. “There are so many problems you have to solve to make things make sense, to keep the reader in suspense and build up the tension,” Ade says.“That kind of skill and craft I find really enjoyable and fascinating to do. And the book, the finished product, is a lot of hard work. It takes a whole team of people. They have their different jobs in making it work but I enjoy that collaborative process and the arguments we have. Should it be in first person? Should we keep that bit in? I find that all enjoyable… the whole process.” But this team work comes after a personal process: “To me writing is this very spontaneous creative process, generally I have to sit down and procrastinate, and marinate thoughts and ideas in my head until it gets to bursting point and then I get onto the computer and everything splurges out.”
And the stuff that is marinating in Ade’s head can be fairly edgy because “as a black, disabled, African kid, growing up in east London, I saw things that I shouldn’t have seen” and he puts the tools of fiction to work to give children a useful taste of that reality. But it means and there are some difficult scenes.
Parental guidance
One of these scenes was the first page of the first book. A stand-off between Ade’s parents and a racist gang in a marketplace: “I actually think I watered
16 PEN&INC.
Ade in action on the basketball court.
Autumn-Winter 2020
Despite the disputes he had with his own parents while growing up, he knows they tried and that parents everywhere “have to explain tough circumstances and situations to their children and I wrote these as books kids could read together with their parents, so when they come across those tough bits – and there are those tough questions – they can sit together and work them out with their parents.” Ade says: “Some parents might say “this isn’t what I want to be doing with my child” but at some stage your child is going to realise that not everyone in this world is nice and is going to have to deal with some form of inequality or discrimination or challenge or hurdle. Who would you rather they talk this through with? Would it be you? Or would you like them to try and find out about it on the internet? Or with some random stranger or a friend who doesn’t have the same sort of experience as you?”
Ade as a baby.
Unfair about unfairness Despite overcoming many big challenges, Ade hasn’t forgotten the painful bits of childhood. Particularly that children are often left to evaluate problems about their environments that have already been labelled ‘hopeless’ by a well-meaning but world-weary adult.
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