It all
began in Cornwall. This is where the landscape for the Septimus Heap series was
born and where Angie Sage at last got the chance to switch from illustrating
books to writing them.
Although
you will find the Septimus Heap novels in the nine to twelve years old section
of the bookshop, they were written for, and are read and appreciated by, all
ages. The books are fast paced, exciting tales of adventure full of interesting
people and many layered relationships. They take place in a fictional world,
which has enough similarities to our own to resonate, and enough differences to
intrigue and entertain.
MAGYK,
Angie’s first book in the series, went to number one on the bestseller lists in
New York and London. “It was such a buzz, getting that phone call from my
publisher.” Her other long running series, Araminta Spook, which is for younger
children, reached the top ten of the children’s bestsellers.
Angie
grew up in the south of England.
Straight out of school, she trained as a radiographer with a view to
getting into medical school, but when that actually happened life had other
plans. A few years later she went
to art school, knowing that she wanted to be part of making beautiful
books.
“After
art school I got an agent and became a jobbing illustrator,” Angie says. “I did
Ladybird books and toddler books, but I was pretty sure I could write too. So eventually
I wrote my first book—a very simple story for under fives in rhyming couplets—and
sent it in as a dummy book. After six months they said they were still looking
at it. Six months later they told me, yes, it’s still here. I imagined it in a
dusty corner, lonely and ignored. I waited yet another six months and with a
heavy heart I phoned them up and asked them to send it back to me. The next day
I got a call from the editor, who told me, ‘I was just walking down the
corridor to put your book in the post when I realized that I don’t want to send
it back to you.’ And that was that. They took it, and on the strength of that I
got a literary agent.”
Angie
balanced life raising her two daughters with illustrating, and writing a few
early reader books. But, as with the pictures, she always felt that the early
reader books weren’t quite what she wanted to write. Then the illustration work
began to tail off. “I was actually without work for six weeks, and I thought,
well, I can’t go on any longer than three months but I’m going to use this time
to get into the atmosphere of something. I really thought that at the end of it
I would have to go back to being a radiographer. I was actually making
enquiries about refresher course,” she says with a shudder. “But I had this
scene that was haunting me, where someone finds a baby in the snow, so that’s
where it started. At the end of three months I had the first eight chapters,
and on the basis of those my agent got me a publisher.”
And so
began the Septimus Heap series, a three book deal that went to five books and
then, as the Septimus world expanded, to seven. “The characters just kept
arriving, and their lives just kept growing. When people ask me about them, I
talk about them as though they’re real because they feel real. I think it’s the
characters that sustain the series.” The series continued with the TodHunter
Moon trilogy but the publication of book three, StarChaser, in October, will be
the last of Septimus Heap—apart from a few follow-up novellas for diehard fans.
Angie
left Cornwall in 2007 to move to a very old house in Somerset where she and
husband Rhodri discovered a huge wall-painting of Henry VIII, which at times
rather took over their life. It’s a house that would not be out of place in
Septimus Heap, but it is also a demanding creature that can make it hard to
concentrate on writing.
Angie
is disciplined in her approach, and works a full working day. “I tend to work
until the Archers comes on. If I’m into a book I will have a schedule with a
word count, usually a thousand words a day, and if I’ve not done five thousand
words in the week, I’ll need to catch up on the weekend. And then there is all
the other stuff too: emails, letters, keeping up with Septimus fans and even at
times, just finding time to think about new things, which sometimes gets lost
but is, of course, the most important thing of all.”
Angie is now lead author on a project that is a departure from her normal way of working in that it involves planning five books in a series story arc but writing only the first one and handing the rest over to other writers. “It’s an interesting and different way of working,” she says, “and I’m learning a lot.” She also has a new series in mind and a standalone YA (Young Adult) novel waiting for the go-ahead.
A writer’s life is about so much more than just
the writing. Angie is planning to move to a less demanding house and hoping to
get out on the water a lot more, but she has a sneaking feeling that writing is
going to be a huge part of her life for some time to come. In March 2016 she
will attend The Writing Retreat
in Cornwall as a visiting author, talking to the guests and sharing writing
tips with them. She’s looking forward to being back in Cornwall, and in such a
magical location.
