Children’s poet ATTIE LIME joins Ian Eagleton in The Reading Realm today to talk about her children’s poetry collections…

Before we settle down in The Reading Realm for a chat, what’s your drink and snack of choice?

A cuppa with a biccie to dunk, please (milk, no sugar).

Tell us about your book in three sentences and then three words!

Poems on Toast is aimed roughly at age 7+ (and anyone who likes poems!).

It includes some of my most popular poems shared in schools.

It has riddles, a tongue twister, poems to be read from the end first, and a good dollop of nonsense!

Imaginative. Quirky. Wistful.

Do you have a favourite poem in the collection you can share with us?

I find choosing favourites of anything SO difficult! A poem I particularly like is Ideas, because it expresses how I feel about writing. It’s also a lovely, lyrical one to read aloud.

Ideas

I keep them in a box under my bed

which fastens with a silver hook

I keep them in a jam jar

and pressed like wildflowers in a heavy book

I keep them in an empty pocket, ready

for the shine of them to catch my eye

I keep them in the garden

in a very special secret slice of sky

I keep them in a mouthful of Sunday fruitcake

bursting with zest

I keep them in my pillowcase, but

in my pen is where I like them best.

How is this collection similar to your other poetry collections? How is it different?

Blue Jelly and Strawberries is aimed at younger children, generally speaking. A Welly Full of Christmas is festively themed, so Poems on Toast is my first unthemed collection for Key Stage2. It’s very exciting but quite nerve-racking! There are still lots of fun poems in it, and plenty to chuckle at but more gentle and thought-provoking ones, too.

Tell us something surprising about your books.

There is a name that I have included in all three of my books. It didn’t start off as something intentional; I realised I’d used it in A Welly Full of Christmas as well as Blue Jelly and Strawberries, so I decided to include it in Poems on Toast too! I don’t actually know anyone with that name, so it’s a bit of a poetic mystery why it kept popping into my head. I wonder if you can spot it…

If one of your characters could come to dinner, who would you invite and what would you cook them? What do you think you’d talk about?

I would be interested to hear what John Applebaum had to say over dinner, because he loves to tell tall tales! Or I’d invite the Booncalloo and feed it lots and lots of cheese!

Do your characters ever surprise you?

Sometimes a character appears out of nowhere (John Applebaum and the Booncalloo again!) to surprise me, but poem ideas surprise me too by popping into my head at unexpected times (driving, in the shower, at the checkout in Lidl!).

If your writing desk could speak, what would it say about you?

Oh gosh! My writing desk would tell everyone that I am untidy, I often get distracted, and that I could not survive without many, many post-it notes! What it perhaps doesn’t know is that my admin is mostly done there, but my poems tend to be written anywhere but at the desk!

Did you like reading when you were a child? If so, what?

Yes, but in quite an on/off way over the years; I wasn’t someone who devoured books. I enjoyed the usual Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton stories, as well as Milly Molly Mandy, Olga da Polga, Mrs Pepperpot etc. I remember loving a book about a chef who made pizza, which had scratch-‘n’-sniff pages all the way through!

What’s your favourite book that isn’t yours?

I love Skellig by David Almond, and more recently October, October by Katya Balen. And all the poetry collections by my brilliant poet-friends, of course!!

What’s the funniest thing a child has said to you?

I enjoy it when they call me names other than Attie, like ‘Mrs Poetry’, ‘Auntie Lime’, and ‘Alan’!

If you weren’t an author, what would you be?

Well, my main job is Mum (I have three boys), so that’s happening anyway! I’d probably be in education in some way – I was a primary school teacher for a while.

What BAD advice would you give to someone who wants to be a writer?

Every time you write ANYTHING, you must use your best handwriting and check all of your spellings.

SPEED ROUND:

Cake or biscuits? Biscuits.

Dinosaurs or unicorns? Dinosaurs.

Pirates or astronauts? Astronauts.

Museums or theme parks? Museums.

Cats or dogs? Cats (with the exception of Danni the gorgeous greyhound).

Summer or winter? Winter (for snuggling by the fire – and Christmas!).

Aliens or robots? Aliens.

THANK YOU Attie for joining us in The Reading Realm today!