Writers Against Disasters
by Writers are good at writing. They’re not so good at digging through rubble, helping to maintain food supplies or giving medical aid. Hundreds of writers have contributed stories to anthologies and sacrificed their royalties so that funds could be raised for aid efforts. In many cases, the publishers have also given up their profits and / or worked for free on these titles. This is all very appropriate. Writers, after all, are meant to comment on the world.
The first charity book I became involved with was Lines in the Sand, edited by Mary Hoffman and Rhiannon Lassiter and published by Frances Lincoln. It gave a voice to all of those writers, who happened to write for children, who had signed the petition against the war in Iraq. I was really pleased to be included; I hated the fact that we were at war and that the UN was divided by it. My little story anyway suggested an alternative to war. In many ways, my Peace Child trilogy, made up of three normal trade books, is about that too. My story in Lines in the Sand, The Gift Child, tells exactly the same story as three Peace Child books of 103,000 words each. It felt good. It was something positive I could do.
Not that it is always straight forward. I became quite famous in Lines in the Sand. A third of my story was left out in the hurry to get the book out. It didn’t actually do me any harm, though. I think the first print run has produced rather rare editions. Frances Lincoln did not change the ISBN when they corrected that mistake and two other less serious ones.
Then Bridge House, the company for which I am a partner, took over publishing Greg McQueen’s 100 Stories for Haiti. It nearly killed us. Our administrator and our designer were working 24/7 apart from eating and sleeping and the other partners were busting guts to keep our already carefully planned other charity book, Gentle Footprints, for the Born Free Foundation, and our young adult imprint going. We have put it out as an e-book with Smashwords, allowing buyers to give what they choose. Just two bright sparks decided to download it for free and I’ve seen it, with thousands of other books, pirated on a web site. Fortunately, the quality is so bad that all they’re actually doing, is advertising the book. But then there are the problems with the US tax authorities …. A whole other story. Nevertheless, I’m glad we did it.
Since then, there have been 50 Stories for Pakistan, 100 Stories for Queensland, and just today someone has taken on 100 Stories for Japan and now there is the more original Author Auction site. Forgive me if I’ve left anything out.
In many ways, in joining in these initiatives, we are doing what writers are meant to do. We are framing and describing the world for our readers and along with all those people who donate cash, we are giving some of what we might have earned for our efforts to those in need. Yet we can’t do this all the time: we also need to eat and pay the mortgage.
Bodies such as the Red Cross, Save the Children Fund, the Hunger Project and many others fund raise and educate continuously, so can respond to disasters and long-term problems quickly.
I’ll shortly be starting my Davina Patterson imprint, which really has a direct link to my Peace Child trilogy. Davina Patterson will produce something I can’t: picture books for emergent readers. Importantly, the stories will all be Bible stories, stories from other religions, myths and legends, some traditional folk stories and fairy tales – in other words, those stories that carry a universal message simply. There will be a permanent proportion the sale price of each book donated to an organisation that makes a difference. Thus the writers and illustrators will be telling important stories to the younger people in our world and will be touching those less fortunate than themselves.
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