Lilly’s Library is a junior fiction story about a little girl who loves books and doesn’t want to wait until she grows up to have her own library.
The idea for this book came to me one day and I started to write, then it sat for ages until I saw it when I was going through some old files and thought it’d be fun to finish it off.
Initially, I wanted it to be short, around 10 chapters, but, after the first draft, it extended to 12 chapters as I wanted more information there about how Lilly stocked her library.
There are a few hints in the story that Lilly is neurodivergent, though it’s not explicitly mentioned. I like writing characters that are neurodivergent coded, but not necessarily diagnosed, especially as many girls aren’t diagnosed until later in life.
Once I had finished my early rewrites, I gave this to my 8-year-old nephew to read (if he’s reading this, he was 8 at the time, now he’s nearly 10!). He loved the story and had a few suggestions to improve it.
I did another rewrite and then edits based on his feedback and from some other beta readers. While doing this, I started playing with the cover design in Canva.
When I was happy, I pressed publish, and this story is now out there. If you ask my nephew, he will proudly tell you about his involvement in the book and show you his name on the acknowledgements page!
You can get your copy from my website, on Amazon in print and ebook, and other ebook platforms.
