Feature of the Week #8 The Screaming Staircase by Jonathan Stroud

Feature Book of the Week

The Screaming Staircase

by

Jonathan Stroud

A sinister Problem has occurred in London: all nature of ghosts, haunts, spirits, and specters are appearing throughout the city, and they aren't exactly friendly. Only young people have the psychic abilities required to see-and eradicate-these supernatural foes. Many different Psychic Detection Agencies have cropped up to handle the dangerous work, and they are in fierce competition for business.

In The Screaming Staircase, the plucky and talented Lucy Carlyle teams up with Anthony Lockwood, the charismatic leader of Lockwood & Co, a small agency that runs independent of any adult supervision. After an assignment leads to both a grisly discovery and a disastrous end, Lucy, Anthony, and their sarcastic colleague, George, are forced to take part in the perilous investigation of Combe Carey Hall, one of the most haunted houses in England. Will Lockwood & Co. survive the Hall's legendary Screaming Staircase and Red Room to see another day? 

A GUEST POST FROM JONATHAN STROUD

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Reading Makes You Fly

Two snapshots of my childhood. In the first, a small boy, six years old, is curled in an armchair on a Sunday afternoon. Sunshine drifts through the window, along with the sounds of neighbours mowing their lawns. Occasionally the boy’s dangling foot moves, twitching like the tail of a cat. Otherwise he is motionless. He’s reading a book – a proper full-length one, without pictures. It’s the first time he’s ever achieved this feat, and he’s mesmerised by his own new skill. He won’t get up until the story is done.

                  The second snapshot. The same small boy, a couple of years down the line. He’s in hospital now, has been for a month. Pneumonia, which the doctors are finding hard to shift. He can’t walk far, so he mostly stays in bed. But he’s a great traveller nonetheless. Piles of books and comics lie around him – tales of adventure, magic and exotic lands. He sits and he reads, and leaves his illness far behind. Books save him. They carry him away.

                  Reading is power. It allows you to escape your limitations – physical (as in my case), or social, or whatever they may be. It gives you the ability to master the world. Without reading, you’re stuck in the here and now. With it, possibilities are everywhere around you: each newspaper, novel, comic or magazine becomes a door to be walked through, a new universe to explore.

                  There’s no greater gift to give a child.

                  But reading for pleasure’s a weird thing. It’s not exactly work, but you do need discipline to master it. It’s not play either, though it gives you endless delight. It’s an occupation that can’t really be taught or enforced: kids have to discover the magic for themselves. Still, adults can – and must – encourage them. The best thing is to lead by example. Be seen reading. Read to the kid. Visit libraries. Above all, leave lots of books and comics lying around – and allow them time and space to take advantage. No one forced me to sit in that armchair and read my first novel (it was Enid Blyton’s Five on a Treasure Island, by the way). I just thought I’d give it a go. And the impulse changed my life. I’ve never forgotten it.

                  So how do you sum up the joy of reading for those who don’t know? There’s an old photograph by the French artist, Yves Klein. It’s called ‘Leap into the Void’. (Google it – it’s great.) A man in a suit jumps from the roof of a building, over a quiet street. Is he going to fall? Or is he – maybe, just maybe – about to defy gravity and soar off into the heavens? The next split second will tell. Meanwhile a bloke on a bike is passing below, entirely unaware that something miraculous is happening above.

Reading is like that. It’s a glorious leap into the void. It’s a feat of extraordinary agility, which goes unnoticed by everyone around you. When you open any book for the first time, you’re preparing to jump. When you begin to read, you’re stepping off the edge. At that moment everything’s possible. You can go anywhere, learn anything, become anyone…

                  Reading makes you fly.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

I was born in Bedford, England, on 27th October 1970. When I was six my family moved to St Albans, near London, which is where I grew up. From very early on I enjoyed scribbling stories and drawing, and for a long time the two sides were equally balanced: pictures interested me as much as words. Between the ages of seven and nine I was often ill, and spent long periods in hospital and at home in bed. During this time I escaped from boredom and frustration by reading furiously: books littered my bedroom floor like bones in a lion's cave. I tended to enjoy stories of magical adventure more than ones about real life – I think this was because they provided a more complete escape. Around this time I fell in love with fantasy.

Throughout my school years I experimented with different kinds of writing, often illustrated.  I tried comics, gamebooks, board games, and later poems and plays. Without being entirely aware of it, I was searching for the kind of writing that suited me best. Meanwhile, I was getting more and more interested in other people's writing. Finally I went to York University, to read English Literature.

Like many English graduates, I left university without a clue what to do. But I got an editorial job at Walker Books, in London, and began to learn about children's books. For several years I worked as an editor: helping authors with their ideas and their texts, consulting with designers and artists about the visual side, helping to create books of many kinds. I worked on encyclopaedias, history books, game books and even a children's Bible. This taught me a lot of things about structure, pace and style; meanwhile, in my free time, I was busy writing also. I did several puzzle books for Walker, and began working on a novel too. When Buried Fire was published in 1999, I knew that I had found what I truly wanted to do, but it took until 2001 before I finally took the plunge, gave up being an editor and tried to write full time.

The same year I married Gina, and we have a daughter called Isabelle and a son called Arthur. Most days I go up to my study, and shut myself away from the world while I write. But I also enjoy doing as many events and author visits as possible: it's essential that a writer reminds himself of who he's writing for . . .

For more information about Jonathan Stroud and his book check out his website.