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Feana Tu 'akoi
Author of the Ready to Read Milly and Sunil series. Illustrated by Matt Haworth & Donovan Bixley 
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About the Author
Feana has always loved words. She loves to think them, sing them, say them, listen to them, read them and write them. She writes fiction and non-fiction, for both adults and children, and has had over 200 scripts published – including stories, poems, books, plays, radio scripts, activities and articles. Her work has been translated into several languages and most of her commercial books are also available in te reo Māori. From the time she could write, she did. Diaries, letters, rhyming verse, stories… She LOVED to be creative. She wrote her first ‘book’ (an action-packed teenage detective novel, heavily influenced by Nancy Drew) on a Mighty Pad when she was 10! Feana began writing for publication when her four children were pre-schoolers. She wanted them to be able to read about kids like themselves, but couldn’t find any stories or books relating to the Tongan culture, or even involving Tongan characters. So, she started writing them. She gets her ideas from watching and listening to the world around her, from reading, thinking and dreaming - and sometimes she even borrows them from people. But she always make the ideas her own, by playing around with words. Selected Bibliography Commercial titles: What Is a Fish?/He aha te Ika? (Scholastic 2007). AWARDS: New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards 2008 What Is a Reptile?/He aha te Ngārara? (Scholastic 2007). What Is a Mammal?/He aha te Ngoteū? (Scholastic 2007). What Is a Bird?/He aha te Manu? (Scholastic 2007). What Is an Amphibian?/He aha te Kirihātua (Scholastic 2007). AWARDS: Storylines Notable Book Awards 2008 Non-fiction List for What is a ...? series. LIANZA Elsie Locke Award 2008 Finalist for What Is a...? series. Freaky Fish illustrated by Eleanor Meecham (Puffin 2008). AWARDS: Storylines Notable Book Award 2009 The Water Fight illustrated by Christopher White (Mallinson Rendel 2008). Jonah's First Day/Te Rā Tuatahi Mō Jonah illustrated by Samantha Asri. (Scholastic 2010). Lest We Forget/Kei Wareware Tatou illustrated by Elspeth Alix Batt. (Scholastic 2011). AWARDS: Storylines Notable Book Awards 2012 Educational titles: Dragons! Dragons! Dragons! illustrated by Donovan Bixley (Ready to Read 2011) Simi Helps illustrated by Samuel Sakaraia (Ready to Read 2014) A Bird In The Classroom illustrated by Donovan Bixley (Ready to Read 2014) Down the Slide illustrated by Donovan Bixley (Ready to Read, 2015) The Lost Hat illustrated by Donovan Bixley (Ready to Read 2015) The Sons of Ma‘afu illustrated by Fraser Williamson (School Journal 2015) Will They Float? photographs by Mark Coote (Ready to Read 2016) Staying Afloat illustrated by Fraser Williamson (Junior Journal 2017) The Garden Surprise illustrated by Matt Haworth (Ready to Read 2018) |
About the Milly and Sunil Series
Milly is an expert problem-solver. She helps Sunil to find his lost hat, figure out how their pants got wet, tempt a bird out of their classroom and identify a mysterious plant.
Where the stories come from
I’m always looking for ways to put Tongan children into stories. (I often put in Tongan adults, too – Mr Langi, the teacher in the Milly and Sunil series, is Tongan.) Tongan culture is a normal part of our family life, so I want to see it represented in books. Maybe it’s normal for your family, too?
Most of these ideas came from things that have happened to us at the school where I teach. We always lose our hats, we often accidentally go down wet slides and once, we really did have a bird trapped in our classroom. It took us ages to trick him into going out!
I shared the ideas for the first Milly and Sunil book (A Bird in the Classroom) with my editor, when I went to an authors' think-tank that the publisher had organised in Wellington. She liked the ideas, got them approved, and then commissioned me to write them. This means that the publisher had agreed to pay me and publish the books, before I even started writing them. (My favourite kind of writing job!)
The Milly and Sunil characters proved to be so popular that the publisher decided to commission more books. The new ideas came either from discussions with my editor, or in the author guidelines, from the publisher.
What happened next
I always procrastinate before I start writing (I tell myself that I’m writing subconsciously …), and this time was no exception. Once I finally got started, I read the author guidelines carefully. They told me how many pages the books would be, what they would be about, the age of the children I was writing for, the level of reading difficulty, how many words I could use and sometimes even which words I could use. School-readers are very difficult to write, as I have to tell a complete story, using only a few basic words. (Chapter books are much easier – I can use whichever words I like!)
Then I free-wrote as fast as I could, without judging or editing. (I always do that for my first draft.) I wrote on a computer, as my handwriting is appalling and I can type as fast as I can think. This means that I don’t have old any drafts to show anyone, but it also means that it was always legible!
I’ve been teaching for a long time, so I had a fairly good feel for the difficulty of each reading level, but the editor always helps with that. School-readers use very simple language, with only a few words on each page, but I tried to inject my particular ‘voice’ and humour, wherever possible. I made sure that something new and illustratable happened on each page (illustrations are a huge part of early reading) and I tried to end on a high point, so that children would want to read the book again. I also tried to come up with snappy, but easy-to-read titles that would give the children clues about the stories.
As always, the next part was my favourite – I love to edit! I rewrote, over and over again, until I was happy with the text. I read it out loud and made sure it flowed smoothly. If it sounded wrong, I changed it, no matter how much I liked it. I would have preferred to then leave it for a while, so I could read it later with ‘new eyes,’ but this wasn’t possible. Educational scripts often have a fast turn-around.
Before sending the stories off to the publisher, I checked the author guidelines again and made sure I’d followed them to the letter. I paginated the stories (divided them into pages) and added suggestions for illustrations in italics. (I do this mainly for Tongan-specific stories, to help the illustrator, or if there’s a plot feature that won’t be spelled out in the text. But they’re only suggestions – the illustrator is the expert on illustrations, not me!)
Sometimes I then go have to go back and forth with the editor, to come up with an agreed version of the text, but as I wasn’t retaining copyright for these books, the final text wasn’t up to me. (I’m lucky, though. My editor always takes my feedback into consideration.) This process is usually fairly quick with school-readers. Books for the commercial market have a lot more back-and-forth. It can take weeks, or even months!
Once I’ve delivered the final draft, my part is pretty much done. I’ll sometimes have to answer questions from the illustrator, especially for Tongan stories, and sometimes I’ll be consulted about a change once the books have been trialled in schools. (Eg: The title of the most recent Milly and Sunil book was changed to The Garden Surprise after trialling.) But otherwise, I just sit back and wait for the books to arrive!
Milly is an expert problem-solver. She helps Sunil to find his lost hat, figure out how their pants got wet, tempt a bird out of their classroom and identify a mysterious plant.
Where the stories come from
I’m always looking for ways to put Tongan children into stories. (I often put in Tongan adults, too – Mr Langi, the teacher in the Milly and Sunil series, is Tongan.) Tongan culture is a normal part of our family life, so I want to see it represented in books. Maybe it’s normal for your family, too?
Most of these ideas came from things that have happened to us at the school where I teach. We always lose our hats, we often accidentally go down wet slides and once, we really did have a bird trapped in our classroom. It took us ages to trick him into going out!
I shared the ideas for the first Milly and Sunil book (A Bird in the Classroom) with my editor, when I went to an authors' think-tank that the publisher had organised in Wellington. She liked the ideas, got them approved, and then commissioned me to write them. This means that the publisher had agreed to pay me and publish the books, before I even started writing them. (My favourite kind of writing job!)
The Milly and Sunil characters proved to be so popular that the publisher decided to commission more books. The new ideas came either from discussions with my editor, or in the author guidelines, from the publisher.
What happened next
I always procrastinate before I start writing (I tell myself that I’m writing subconsciously …), and this time was no exception. Once I finally got started, I read the author guidelines carefully. They told me how many pages the books would be, what they would be about, the age of the children I was writing for, the level of reading difficulty, how many words I could use and sometimes even which words I could use. School-readers are very difficult to write, as I have to tell a complete story, using only a few basic words. (Chapter books are much easier – I can use whichever words I like!)
Then I free-wrote as fast as I could, without judging or editing. (I always do that for my first draft.) I wrote on a computer, as my handwriting is appalling and I can type as fast as I can think. This means that I don’t have old any drafts to show anyone, but it also means that it was always legible!
I’ve been teaching for a long time, so I had a fairly good feel for the difficulty of each reading level, but the editor always helps with that. School-readers use very simple language, with only a few words on each page, but I tried to inject my particular ‘voice’ and humour, wherever possible. I made sure that something new and illustratable happened on each page (illustrations are a huge part of early reading) and I tried to end on a high point, so that children would want to read the book again. I also tried to come up with snappy, but easy-to-read titles that would give the children clues about the stories.
As always, the next part was my favourite – I love to edit! I rewrote, over and over again, until I was happy with the text. I read it out loud and made sure it flowed smoothly. If it sounded wrong, I changed it, no matter how much I liked it. I would have preferred to then leave it for a while, so I could read it later with ‘new eyes,’ but this wasn’t possible. Educational scripts often have a fast turn-around.
Before sending the stories off to the publisher, I checked the author guidelines again and made sure I’d followed them to the letter. I paginated the stories (divided them into pages) and added suggestions for illustrations in italics. (I do this mainly for Tongan-specific stories, to help the illustrator, or if there’s a plot feature that won’t be spelled out in the text. But they’re only suggestions – the illustrator is the expert on illustrations, not me!)
Sometimes I then go have to go back and forth with the editor, to come up with an agreed version of the text, but as I wasn’t retaining copyright for these books, the final text wasn’t up to me. (I’m lucky, though. My editor always takes my feedback into consideration.) This process is usually fairly quick with school-readers. Books for the commercial market have a lot more back-and-forth. It can take weeks, or even months!
Once I’ve delivered the final draft, my part is pretty much done. I’ll sometimes have to answer questions from the illustrator, especially for Tongan stories, and sometimes I’ll be consulted about a change once the books have been trialled in schools. (Eg: The title of the most recent Milly and Sunil book was changed to The Garden Surprise after trialling.) But otherwise, I just sit back and wait for the books to arrive!
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