We chat with debut author Celia Krampien about The Bellwoods Game, which is a spooky, highly illustrated middle grade novel follows a girl who hopes to fix her outcast status through a game in the haunted woods, only to discover that some legends shouldn’t be played with.
Hi, Celia! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Hi there! I’m an author and illustrator of books for young people living in the Niagara Region of Ontario, Canada. I love all things spooky, hiking in the woods, and drinking too much coffee.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
I was the “artist” kid while growing up and never considered myself a writer, but I was a voracious reader. After graduating college, I worked as an illustrator for a few years, making images for newspapers, magazines, and children’s books. I love illustrating but it can be a very reactive sort of job, always waiting for opportunities to come up. I started wanting a little more agency, more control over the sort of stories I was illustrating. The only way I could think to make that happen was to write the stories myself. Books had always been such a big part of my life and I’d written lots of stories over the years, making little books for fun and as presents for loved ones, but it’d never occurred to me to try at it seriously, like, as a job, before then.
Quick lightning round! Tell us the first book you ever remember reading, the one that made you want to become an author, and one that you can’t stop thinking about!
I have fond, early memories of THE MONSTER AT THE END OF THIS BOOK by Jon Stone and BUT NO ELEPHANTS by Jerry Smath. I was collecting books by Adrienne Adams when I started writing and love A WOGGLE OF WITCHES and A HALLOWEEN HAPPENING. One of my favourite books of all time is HELLO UNIVERSE by Erin Entrada Kelly. It’s the first and only book that I finished then went right back to page one to start again. It’s sweet, funny, and totally brilliant.
Your debut novel, The Bellwoods Game, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Spooky and full of heart.
What can readers expect?
The Bellwoods Game is an annual tradition for the kids in the small, rural town of Fall Hollow. Every Halloween, three kids go into the supposedly haunted woods that runs through the town and race to ring a mysterious bell. Legend says that ringing the bell is the only way to keep the town safe from the vengeful ghost that supposedly haunts the woods. But this year, when spooky story enthusiast and Bellwoods game expert, Bailee, and her friends enter the woods, they discover there’s more to the legends than they ever imagined. Only by working together and harnessing the power of stories can the kids put an old wrong right again.
Where did the inspiration for The Bellwoods Game come from?
The book started with Abigail Snook (one of the main characters in the story). I used to live near this scenic area with a high cliff overlooking a creek with a bridge running through. I was daydreaming while going past one day and thought, “what if there was a person standing up on the cliff?” At the same time, part of the rhyme (the same one at the beginning of the book) as well as Abigail’s name popped into my head. I started asking myself questions—who is this person? What is she doing up on that cliff? She felt like a character begging for a story. It took a few years but I’m glad I finally found her one.
Were there any favourite moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
I’m fond of all the main kids in the story. I wanted each of them to have their own unique reason for going into the woods, some personal issue they were struggling with that was tied to the supernatural experiences they encounter. Each one comes away from the experience changed. At the end of the story, their problems aren’t necessarily solved but I they’re better equipped to move forward.
Can you tell us about the journey of getting The Bellwoods Game published?
I’d only ever written stories for picture books but had some ideas floating around in my brain that felt like they could work for an older audience. With encouragement from my wonderful agent, Andrea Morrison, I started putting them to paper. Once I had a first draft of THE BELLWOODS GAME complete, I did some illustrations and created a “mock-up” of one of the chapters to show how the text and illustrations could fit together. I sent what I had to Andrea who sent back some thoughtful feedback. I did a little revising then she sent it off to some editors and we were, thankfully, able to find a home for it with the lovely and talented folks at Atheneum Books for Young Readers.
What’s next for you?
Happily, I have another book out this year, a super sweet and funny picture book I illustrated called FIONA BUILDS A FAIRY HOUSE, written by the talented Kristen Dickson and published by Roaring Brook Press. If you love fairy tale creatures, boogers, and cat chaos, you’re going to love this book! I’m also working on a few new things that I can’t quite talk about yet so stay tuned!
Lastly, do you have any book recommendations for our readers?
I’ve been really loving middle grade graphic novels lately. Some ones I love: THIS ONE SUMMER by Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki, BE PREPARED by Vera Brosgol, LIVING WITH VIOLA by Rosena Fung, TWINS by Varian Johnson and Shannon Wright, SNAPDRAGON by Kat Leyh, and THE TRYOUT by Christina Soontornvat and Joanna Cacao.
