I am absolutely thrilled to be hosting Sinéad O’Hart on my blog today! I absolutely loved ‘The Eye Of the North,’ an action-packed adventure frosted with magic. 

Emmeline has never left Widget Manor, but one day her scientist parents mysteriously disappear and she’s bundled onto a ship to Paris to stay in a safe house. Aboard the ship, she befriends the scruffy urchin, Thing, and it soon becomes apparent that her life’s in serious danger! Will she be able to evade the clutches of the maniacal Dr. Bauer who’s hellbent in summoning a monstrous kraken from deep below the ice? Will she escape from the Northwitch’s icy dungeon on the back of a magical god-horse? Will she ever manage to uncover the truth about her parents’ whereabouts?

For my full review, click HERE.

I had the privilege of asking Sinéad why she wrote and who for. Below is here response:

Why Do I Write and Who Do I Write For?

This is a question I usually find quite hard to answer, because it’s a bit like ‘why do you breathe?’ or ‘why do you love your family?’, and there’s no simple answer to a question like that. I write because it comes naturally, and because it’s instinctive, and because my brain works and processes the world through words. Even when I’m far from my computer or my notebook and pen, I’m curiously taking in everything around me, and I’m people-watching, and I’m wondering about who lives in that house I’ve just passed or what sort of person is sitting beside me on the bus, and I’m making up tales to go with everyone and everything I encounter. I’ve always had a lively imagination, and I have always loved nothing more than getting lost in my own world. I talk to myself. I dream up whole conversations. I don’t know the meaning of the word ‘bored’, because I never have nothing to do; my inner narrator is always running. I’m introverted, I like to observe, and I absolutely love words – the taste, shape, feel and smell of them.

I would write even if I had no chance of ever being published. I wrote for years with no expectation or hope of anyone seeing, or wanting to see, anything I created. I write because I love it, and because it’s a challenge and a craft, and it’s something I want to learn more about, and because stories are how I understand the world around me. I write because I can’t not write. I write because I am. I hope I will be writing as long as I live.

Now. If you were to ask me why I write for children, that’s a bit easier to answer. I write for children for a few reasons – mostly, because children’s books contain all the best stories, and also because writing for young readers is a huge privilege. I know from my own experience how much of an impact reading the right story at the right time can have on a person’s life, and it’s my dream to be the author of a story like that. Also, the sort of stories I love to read are stories of adventure, daring, friendship, magic, and mystery, and so that means I’m naturally drawn to stories written for children – and, sometimes, the sort of stories you love to read are the sort that come out of you when you start to write. At least, that’s how it is for me. Children’s books are my favourite thing, and I think they’re the sort of books I’ll write as long as I have the joy of writing.

After reading Sinéad’s fantastic debut, I cannot wait to see what comes next!

Make sure you take a look at the other stops on The Eye of the North blog tour.

Library Girl.