Steve Bradshaw, Brave at Home.

Thanks, Steve, for appearing on the Adventures in the Heart of Children's Book Authors podcast.

My pleasure.

Thanks for having me.

Steve has mentioned he's written a children's book, Brave at Home, and I look forward to our conversations.

You know what, Steve, When I read your book and I thought, wow, it's a compilation of really 19 children's stories, which is cool.

And it's all in one book.

And when I looked at what you sell it for on Amazon, I thought that's terrific value because really people are getting like 19 books in one.

So hats off to you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I did want to keep the chapters at a certain level experience where the child can explore these issues that are developing the book with the child, say at bedtime or at reading hour, something that they can do very quickly.

Once they've read the whole book, they can then pick out individual chapters which kind of reflects where that day.

Before we jump into any more details about your book, I'm curious because I looked at your background and we'll get into that a bit so that everybody understands that.

So tell us, what does it mean to you to be a children's book authority?

I thought about this myself and I thought about how I was steered this way, really, after your listeners will look at my background and think, how the heck did he end up being an author?

But I've always had an interest in writing, but it was never something which developed to a point where it could pay the bills.

And everyone has these moments across road in life about do you follow your heart or your head?

Do you want to be that creative frustrated person or do you want to be someone who's got a good job and able to get on in life?

Once I retired from the police in 2022, I started a business called TV Cop which gives police advice to TV and film here in the UK.

And I was part of that work is dealing with a script work, although it's police and procedural stuff, got my juices flowing really in relation to writing and structure and narrative art and having your three act play or your five act play and just showing it on TV and also being exposed to some really good writers.

We're talking major network UK writers here.

Like I was getting more and more experience and I wanted to express myself in a way and I was thinking, how do I do that?

Now I've helped a friend with the police procedural stuff on a very dark and gritty Northern England crime drama called Mirror M I double R A and certainly not children, but I felt that after that, where did I want to go?

And I was being pulled towards the children's aspect of it.

And that really comes from conversations I've had with police officers during my service and since about really the families that also serve.

And I'm not just talking about police officers, I'm talking about anybody who's involved in the emergency services.

And also really children who just generally worry about their parents because the children just parents going off into night at 8, 9, 10 o' clock at night and wondering where are they going and what they doing.

My dad was in the armed forces for 25 years and he was a paratrooper.

My brother and I, when we were younger, thought that was pretty glamorous.

And my mom used to make parachutes out of.

Out of his kerchiefs and she would tie him to an army toy and then we'd throw it off our bunk beds.

And that was kind of.

And so that's how I saw my dad for years until I understood exactly what he did.

And like you said, when they go away for two or three months, you're wondering, oh, are they ever coming back?

And so thank you for sharing that.

My pleasure.

And it was really from that development where it was, I just think, what are these children thinking and feeling?

And after doing a bit of research with colleagues and ex colleagues, as I used to work on, the Armed Response unit, which is a armed police in the uk is completely different than what it is in America.

And I'd speak to officers and they'd say, I try and explain to the children that I'm going to be okay and in a mature way.

But there's no reference materials to just making it up as they go along.

So it was very much an epiphany where I thought that's where I need to go.

Not only is it servicing the writing side of it, which I wanted to do, but it also allowed me to try and develop my experience from work.

Like we were talking about in the beginning.

You have 19 stories within your children's book.

They're very diverse and they also have.

And I don't want to give anything away because that one of my questions is to have you talk about inspiration behind your book.

But I noticed that you have two strong female characters in your book, which is Leo's mom and the main character and is Nan.

Talk to us about that.

I don't want to get into the character development, but talk to us about is there female people in your life that are the inspiration behind the book or you Just decide to use a female as the parent rather than having the father be the police officer.

The two elements of that question really are linked but separate in many ways.

As far as a female inspiration, my own mother would was a bit like me, really was write the odd short story throughout her life.

Longhand.

It's only recently where she's actually published her first book at the age of 81.

Terrific.

Fate takes a Hand.

So there was a lot that was real, not a kick up the backside, but it was more of a get on and start doing it now, Stop procrastinating.

It's not around the corner.

You're going to do it and you're going to do it today.

That's what kind of got me going.

But in relation to.

And they probably influenced a little bit of Leo's mum and Leo's grandmother.

But what I wanted to show is that sometimes families are not the hallmark, I think you would call it over in America, wouldn't you, the Hallmark family where it's everything's nice and rosy.

Sometimes you've got a lone parent.

And I thought to really breast the stresses and strains that Leo's mom would feel because I want the parents to take something away from the book when they read it as well.

It's not.

It's not always happily ever after.

No, exactly.

And I want some of the things to not necessarily be picked up by the children, but also by the parents.

And the fact that like you, I don't want to lot away but it's very important to me to include part of the story where you showed Nan looking after Leo's mom just as Leo's mom looks after Leo.

As if this is multi generational.

And there's parts of the stories where we find out that Leo's mum also worried when she was a child because her father was a train driver.

There's certain beats that are repeated throughout through the generations.

And that's what I really wanted to tease out.

And I wanted to see how pressure would get to a single parent and not like everything's rosy at home because you know what?

Sometimes it's not.

And I want children to be able to see their own family dynamic in the story.

That's terrific.

We were talking about before we came on air is your website threw me off a bit and I thought, okay, I got to talk to Steve about this and for the audience you'll understand why because we'll be definitely providing links to Steve's website.

Steve, two things.

One, talk to us about your website and then I'M also curious on.

I know you had that website, but I couldn't find your children's book on the website, so that's why I was thrown off a bit.

Explain to us that whole dynamic and it's fine if you want to get into your current role and explain that through.

I appreciate that.

You're absolutely right.

You.

If you looked at tvcops.co.uk.

you'd wonder whether you came to the correct place for a children's book author.

Because like I said, predominantly, I did 27 years in the place here in Lancashire.

Now, my career was within the armed response world.

Armed policing within England is a specialist department.

Not all officers carry weapons.

And I retired.

What it's a very grand title of the Firearms Commander, where it's the commander who gives the instructions in relation to the deployment of armed officers.

Very serious world, very structured world.

And when I left policing, because I'd already done a little bit of acting on TV here in England, I noticed that there was a gap between the police advice that productions, TV and film productions were receiving.

So it was very easy to step into that world.

I set up TV Cops, where predominantly we were giving police advice on set.

So on the day of filming we would be there and we would help.

Now that very quickly developed into also being able to help with the script side of work, like I said previously.

So predominantly our work, I would say 90% of our work is dealing with giving advice to writers, script executive, production companies about police procedural stuff for tv.

And with my background in armed policing, I also set up courses where I could teach actors how to shoot, okay, to look like they knew what they were doing on screen.

If you've got an actor who's supposed to be an ex Navy Seal, they need to be able to look like they can shoot correctly.

Sometimes you wonder when you see these cops and robber shows and how the guy's holding the gun and you're thinking, come on.

It doesn't seem to make any sense to me, especially when they hold it on the side.

I'm thinking there's a lot of what.

We do which we have to suspend realism because cannot wait six weeks in production timeline for the DNA results to return.

We need the DNA results at the end of episode two.

We can't carry on or else you could just have people sat around the office waiting, wouldn't you?

I understand.

We're not making a documentary, we're making drama.

And you need to actually people to watch it or else you're not going to sell your Advertising space.

Isn't that the truth?

Exactly.

But you do notice, especially with my background, you do notice the people who have had some training regarding weaponry.

The big one is Keanu Reeves.

He's just master of it.

But if you also look at things like the old film Heat, Val Kilmer's mag changes.

But from one thing I've watched recently, an American show, the Night Agent leading, that he's exceptional with the handgun.

And also our own Marsha Thomason, who has appeared in some of your productions, handgun skills are exceptional.

So you do see it.

That's really where TV Cops is.

And that 90% of our business is with production executive writers, whether that be at a pilot stage, whether that be pitch stage or anything.

Because it's so competitive at the moment, people want their scripts to be as good as they can be even before the approach production company.

So yeah, that's the most of our business at the moment.

Okay.

And so the website itself, are you going to.

Because I mean it's dedicated to service.

Are you going to incorporate a link in there?

Yes.

To Brave at Home?

Yes, the it's currently under construction.

I did some work on it just before Christmas.

So you're going to set up a separate website for your book.

It's going to have its own address.

It's going to be part of the TV Cops.

Okay, terrific.

And it's going to be tvcopts.co.uk/rave at home.

And that should be live in the next week or so.

Just tweaking the last little part of it.

Yes.

Because every day I seem to be adding another copy and paste from a review that I've received.

They want to get all the reviews on.

But yeah, it explains about Leo's journey, explains about moment, it explains about projects coming up as well.

Okay.

And I noticed that when I went to Amazon, you have a paperback and you have a hard copy version.

Yes.

But I noticed you don't have an ebook and I really thought this would be one that really translates well into an ebook for format.

Do you have plans for an ebook?

I wanted to allow the paperback and hardbacks to breathe a little bit because what I've actually received a lot of feedback for and one of the things, when I was doing the initial research, they wanted a physical book so they could sit down with their children.

Yes, but also the hardback, both of them really.

But the hardback they wanted to be able to.

They could read it to the child, have a discussion with their child and then all children do.

They'll ruminate over it, they'll have a good thing.

And then I want it to be on the bookshelf so they can go back, pull it out and just, even if they just want to look at Bramley on one of the chapters, Leo's the Fox, just I want it to be tangible.

I want for them to be able to pick it up and read it.

But yeah, I'm getting to the point now where I think perhaps an ebook might be appropriate, especially over the winter months and over Christmas.

I wanted to really focus on the tangible item and that's a great strategy.

A lot of my guests have told me what they find is they generally use their ebook as one of the ways to market their books.

So as a promotional item.

And they also find, and we're finding this too, is that people, they'll purchase the ebook but they end up going and also purchasing the hard copy.

So it's quite interesting.

And I just, maybe it's because people have iPads and Kindles and all that nowadays, but children like to be able to pick up their book up and flip through it and read it.

Yes.

And there's elements to the of the book where it's inviting some interaction from the child as well and asking them questions of what some blank space where they wanted it to be as interactive as possible, but make a very valid point about the ebook.

And it's certainly something which we will move on to in the coming months.

You know what, Steve?

Even like with us, we're trying to encourage our young readers to be storytellers themselves.

So we actually have added pages for someone to write their own story and then we've even added frames that are made of railway tracks where they can draw their stories.

Fantastic.

Yeah, those kinds of things.

And it's nice to have that interaction.

Yes.

So I want to talk to you about your publishing approach because there's generally three ways to publish.

One is to be an independent publisher where you do all the work, you publish the book.

There's the self published hybrid version where you hire a company but you direct them.

And then there's the traditional publisher who takes all the rights to your book and sends you a couple of bucks and you don't get to keep any of your rights.

So I'm just curious on, can you explain to us your publishing approach?

Yes.

I wanted this one really to be me self published because then I had complete control.

So when you say self published, you mean independently published or okay, you did all the work?

I did all the work, yes.

In many respects it obviously stands alone on its own.

But also I wanted a proof of concept really to approach welfare, emergency service, welfare institutions, both businesses and charities.

And it's a lot easier to actually go to them with a book than it is with an outline or an idea.

Yes, absolutely.

This is what I've done.

This is what I'm thinking of in the future.

Are you interested?

Because I really do think it's something because we've got many charities in the UK and I'm sure the similar guarding people who want to look after the mental well being, the welfare side, absolutely.

Not just police officers, paramedics, doctors, but I've also included those organizations on board and to drive not only this.

You know, it's interesting because I'm seeing more and more of that with children's books.

A lot of times there's such a diversity of books now on the subjects around children.

So it's, it's interesting.

I just had a gal from Buffalo, New York.

She reached out to me.

She actually purchased a couple of books and a plushie and they're using it to fundraise kids for cancer.

Those type of things are going on all the time.

I was going to say.

Also, by publishing it myself, I control over the price.

It is a color book and that normally sends the price way up.

So I wanted to keep it.

I wanted to keep it under $10 US right, paperback.

When it came to publishing your children's book, what do you think?

What was your biggest challenge or obstacle or frustration?

Frustration was getting the Kindle direct, okay, getting the COVID to fit on the template okay.

But not really frustration.

But the thing that I had to make myself do is to say no more edit, no more tweaks, press, publish.

Don't wait till tomorrow, don't do it tomorrow, because tomorrow you'll have another read and you'll end a comma somewhere.

The beautiful thing about being an independent children's book author, or even a self published hybrid children's book author is that you can go in and make changes.

My mantra has changed over the last few years.

My mantra now is done is better than perfect.

So important to understand that.

Just get your book done.

To Steve's point, you gotta hit print.

And then if you need to make changes, you can make those changes.

Because it's not like you're printing 10,000 or 20,000 copies a lot of times it's just print on demand.

And if you're selling through Amazon, you just have to update your files.

And you're right, because if you make it perfect, you're never Going to publish it.

It'll never be perfect.

I'm also curious about the illustrations in your book.

I know it's not a traditional children's picture book, but you've got some great illustrations in the book.

So talk to us about.

Did you hire an illustrator?

And if you did, who was that illustrator and how did you to come upon them?

I'll talk about the illustration developed initially.

There was a good friend of mine, again the author, who helped him on his book Mirror M I Double R A.

He really had a strong opinion about making the illustrations to be colored in by the children.

He wanted it to be like a coloring book side of it, because I'd.

Also.

Because I'd expressed the interest in making it as interactive as possible, I had to wear that up for quite a long time and decided to now go with the illustration to be more impactful and I think it would really sink the messages in.

And the illustrations are AI?

Oh, yeah, the illustrations are AI.

But not easy.

The amount of tweaks and the prompts and stuff that you have to do and to find that style and try to be consistent.

Because that's one thing I noticed is all of the illustrations were consistent.

Yes.

And that takes a little bit of developing because you have to keep feeding in like a master image.

So I've got a master image of Mum, Leo and all the children and that's what actually developed.

One of the very first pictures I had was near the book.

It's like a family portrait picture of all the characters in the book altogether.

And that's really an amalgamation of all the master images that I used for it.

And, yeah, it took a long time to try and get it just where I wanted it.

But, yeah, they were all AI.

Just so you know, you've got a lot of great illustrators in your country.

Yes.

Yeah.

Because our illustrator, Simon Goodway, who did both of our books, is from the uk.

Oh, fantastic.

Yeah.

You have to send me the details.

Yeah.

And he's such a great guy and actually he's.

He's never been to the Rocky Mountains, but.

Because all of our stories take place in the Rocky Mountains.

But I just sent him pictures of what we were trying to convey and he did a phenomenal job.

I also want to talk to you a bit about.

We talked about your website and how you're developing that and how you're going to build in a link to Brave At Home.

But I'm also curious about how are you going to start building out your social media around Brave At Home also.

It's a hard one, really, because it was a question of do I start from scratch with the Brave At Home profiles.

I felt I have enough profiles as it is.

I'm my own Bradshaw.

Side of me is called Noah Bird.

N O A H B U R D and then I have the TV Cops profile as well.

And I was really torn about setting up a Brave at Home or.

Because I could see it being more than just the one book, see it being a series of books, different themes, but with some consistency through it.

And I thought, what do I do then?

Do I set up another profile with another book?

So I made a decision to keep under the heading of TV Cops.

I know it doesn't really reflect it.

By keeping it under the TV Cops banner, it adds that emergency service credibility.

Yes.

Because if anyone's pointing towards Brave at Home now, if it was me and I didn't know the author, first question I would ask is, what's this person's credibility in being able to tell you what it's like to work or have family who worry about you when you go out, work in emergency services?

So you will get that credibility straight away by looking at the website as it details my history, et cetera.

So I wanted it to be.

Although, like you said before, you wouldn't naturally think an armed officer would then move on to children's books, but I wanted the whole experience and the whole credibility of TV Cops to support.

It's interesting you should say that, Steve, because I've had such a diverse amount of children's book authors on our show, and I'm talking.

If you.

If I think you're the 75th Children's Book Authority that I've interviewed.

But the backgrounds.

There's a lot of people that come on the show that have come from children's teaching backgrounds, but I've had a mother, Cody Bogart, on episode 35, who was also a helicopter pilot.

And.

Yeah.

And she's written a series of books called.

It's called Hilo Girls, and it shows women who are helicopter pilots, pilots in so many diverse roles as a helicopter pilot.

So whether it's in combat, whether it's medical, whether it's agricultural, it's quite diverse.

And so to your point, is you capturing the brave at home and keeping that banner within.

You're building a brand and keeping it within your.

The role of what you're doing.

Yeah.

Fits within the wheelhouse, I think, of TV Cops, but it's not something you would naturally think would be a development from Tabs.

And I Think where I want to go with it with the support services and the welfare organizations.

I think it supports them with the.

Background in terms of motivation.

I know you talked a bit about your mother and it's phenomenal that she's written her first book at 81.

I just had Anne Gorsch, episode 66.

She's 93 or 94, and she had written her first children's book.

You know what, it's just incredible.

And she came from a children's entertainment background on television and just later in years decided, you know what, she'd been around children for so long that she wanted to write a children's book.

Pretty incredible.

To that point.

I've got a good friend called Sarah Carville, who is the creator and writer of a UK show called the Bay.

It does come over to the U.S. i think on Brit Box.

Okay.

And he always says, just get it out, get it down.

Draft number one.

It might not be pretty, it might not be good.

Get it on paper, get it out there.

That's what starts people from being.

I think I've got a book in me too.

Just write it.

I was thinking about your mom, but I'm curious, is there a specific person or event that finally.

And maybe this is the person you just mentioned that finally said, you know what, Steve, come on, you got this great children's book idea.

You got to get at it.

Tell us about that.

No, because A funny story, I, although I'd had some conversations with ex colleagues about their children were feeling and any issues that they had, I was quite reserved in saying what I was going to do quite a long time because I'd have to do it then, wouldn't I?

I told everybody what I was going to do.

I'd have to.

I'd have to do it.

And I wanted to be absolutely sure.

I had a book, had something I'd be happy with.

I the content and I'd be able to write it.

So although, yes, there are some very key people who have given me the inspiration to just do it.

One of them being the gentleman I mentioned, Derek Carville, who, although I never told him what I was thinking of doing, listening to him speak, listening to him give lectures, it was the kick up the rear that I needed without him knowing that he was kicking me up the rear.

And a funny story, my.

My partner, Janet.

No, I was writing this book until I was on draft 5 or 6 when I asked her to read it.

Wow.

And she had absolutely no idea that I'd been writing it because I seemed.

Were you hiding in the closet or what were you.

Where were you writing it?

Did you go to the local coffee shop or what?

No, not quite.

Because Janet's.

I'm a bit of a night owl and Janet goes to bed quite early, so I always had two or three hours in the evening, I think, you know, just developing and just writing and just thinking about a few ideas.

When I asked her to read the book, she was a little bit taken aback.

I told nobody.

Good for you.

Tell us about the character development, because we've been talking about your main character, Leo.

Also, I want to talk more about your fox Bramley, and a little bit about the mom in the story and the nan in the story.

Start with Leo first.

Okay, Leo.

First of all, I needed to pin an age to him, and I wanted it to reflect the readers between 6 and 10 years of age.

I think Leo sits somewhere around 8, 9, 10 years of age.

But I wanted it to be, if you're a child between 6, 10, you are the same age as Leo.

I want you to think you're the same age as Leo.

And the name Leo.

This is a really odd story.

I was thinking about what now, I wanted an easy name.

I wanted a short name.

And I'm a massive fan of the West Wing.

Okay.

For no reason whatsoever, I just like John Spencer's character, Leo McGarry.

So I just named him Leo because great father of the West Wing.

And it just kind of really just fit.

It fit his story because it was a short name.

It's not a very common name here in the uk, but it's not an uncommon name.

Right.

What I mean.

And it's a strong name.

When I first read Leo.

Now, again, I'm just thinking of my own experience, but I thought of Leo the Lion, and I guess maybe that's why I think it's such a strong name.

Yeah.

You're not the first person to ask me if it has any reference to Leo the Lion and the courage.

The aspect of that.

But no.

Okay, I'll quite happily let you take that.

But you know what?

At least you get the benefit of that.

And to.

For listeners, especially aspiring children's book authors, is sometimes it's as simple as what's Steve's talking about?

He just liked the name.

And sometimes it's.

I'm interpreting it.

It's like Leo the Lion.

So it's a strong name and has a lot of positive attributes behind the name.

You can think about it in both ways.

It doesn't have to be just one way.

Exactly.

Exactly.

So Leo, very quickly.

And originally I had Leo's teddy, if you will.

Is that what you call them?

Teddy's in America?

Yeah, you bet.

Bramley.

I originally had him very early on.

Chapter one, chapter two, but it was too much all at once.

I wanted it to develop a little bit and I wanted him to really come into play later on when he was.

When the girl loses her bunny.

Again, Bramley's name.

I was thinking of a name for him and I was thinking.

Wanted to be really recognizable.

Really.

That was it.

And it just came from the apples and that was it.

And it was just something I'd heard somebody say and I was thinking Bramley.

That sounds nice.

Yeah.

First, a friend of mine named her daughter Bromley.

But Bramley, like you said, you don't hear very often.

But again, it's a fun, you know, know you got a fun character, has a fun name.

Even though we're recording this in video, I only sent it out in audio.

But Steve's got such a cute fox as a character and Leo's plushie and it's just fantastic.

So the name fits the fox.

It doesn't.

It.

It does.

But once I allowed it to ferment a little bit in my brain, I thought that's it, that's his name.

And the other thing about Bramley, I didn't want him to be like a tall, a Toy Story character.

I didn't want him to come alive when there was just him and Leo.

But I wanted the bid to be some kind of.

Leo knows he has a personality like everybody does with the Teddy, I suppose.

Absolutely are.

Like I said, our Caboose has lots of personality.

And so for sure.

Yeah.

And I wanted it to be.

I wanted Bramley to be his extension of his bravery.

So when you see Bramley turn into Super Bramley, that's when Leo is really manifesting his desired action, when he's feeling.

Fearing his most vulnerable.

But I wanted adults to pick up on that.

We don't necessarily say that in the book, but yes, when you see Super Bramley, it's because Leo needs Bramley to be brave for him.

When we develop Caboose, Caboose is actually a female, not a male.

And Caboose is spelled with a K, not a C. And that's because my oldest granddaughter is a co author of our first book and a co author of.

Of our second book.

And her name is Kira, which starts with a K. So Caboose and Kira.

Caboose has taken on Kira's attributes and.

Personality and they'll always be that association now.

Absolutely.

There's no.

No question.

No question.

The thing I loved about your book, because it has those 19 chapters, is there's an interconnection of all your stories.

But they could be standalone books.

You could have taken each chapter and created a children's picture book from each chapter.

If you can talk to us about how you tie that all together into this one book.

The theme, the overarching theme is Leo's journey, if you will, from hearing those sirens in chapter one to.

With some gentle encouragement from school, from Nam, from Mum, from his friends, even his silly friends, he gets to the point where he's better informed, really.

If you see the journey from chapter one, Leo doesn't really have any information or any reasonable cognitive understanding of what his mum does.

So he just fills that vacuum with worry.

He doesn't really know what blue light, a blue light run is that we call.

He just hears it and thinks, oh, someone's in danger.

And from speaking to his mum.

And things go on in the background, like, obviously, Mum's had a word with Nan, Mum's had a word with the teacher.

We get these different ways of him dealing with it.

One is acknowledging his worries and that's very early doors when we look at the worry jar and his ability to articulate it and Mum saying to him or suggesting to him he should be able to draw what he's thinking about or write what he's thinking about.

So he does that naturally and he develops that skill right the way through.

So it shows how he is understanding his fear.

Yes, probably in a child way.

I'm articulating this really, from an adult perspective, from a child way he's acknowledging and articulating.

He's then speaking to people about it, then he's wanting to find out more about what Mum does because he just drops in odd questions to Mum about what do you do?

And do the sirens mean that you're Someone's in danger?

And Mum says, no, it means that we're going to help Yvonne.

What those blue lights mean and therefore what Mum does.

And that even to the point of Mum's not always driving the car with the blue lights on, she does other things as well.

And it culminates nearly towards the end, the last few chapters, where she actually goes, mom, realizing all this, takes Leo to the police station.

So he gets to see going on what people are doing.

And then he meets the police dogs and he is.

And he looks around the station and he's.

And he just.

It's not a magical world anymore, a magical unknown world.

It's just like any other world.

There's cold cups of coffee on the table, half eaten cake.

Just he puts it into perspective.

And then by developing those feelings with his mother, he's able to, I won't say completely get over them because it's not something to get over.

But he's in a better position where he can.

And that's where the final chapter, being brave at home, is in a more contented state.

And it just.

He sat on the sofa with his mom and nobody saying anything because he's content.

And that's the journey where we wanted to take Leah.

And I love how you, like you said at the back of the book, you've created some, I don't want to call it a lesson plan, but some central teaching.

So just talk to us a little bit about that.

And why did you think it was important to do that at the end of your book?

When I was storyboarding the book, when I was thinking about its arc and the structure and the points, I wanted to get into it.

It originally was like 30 chapters and I got it down to where it is today just by focusing in on that I wanted to deliver okay.

And I ended up making a note just like those Bramley tips back.

I ended up making a list because they were the points we wanted to hear.

And then I thought to myself, I kept referring back to them as we were going through the book.

I kept referencing the list that I'd made.

So I'm thinking to myself, if this is a small child who's reading this book and they get to the end, okay, I just need them, if you will.

I want the messages.

I want to.

Yeah, I remember that Bramley did that.

I remember what he did then.

So they just got a reference of really details the journey that Leo's been on and the understanding that Leo has.

It's all about expressing yourself.

Don't not being frightened to express yourself.

Talk to your friends, talk to your family.

And also you are going to be scared.

You are going to be scared about your parent going off to be a firefighter or police officer or whatever, but doesn't mean that you don't love them and they don't love you doing something else.

So you might worry, you might be sat at home still worrying.

But it's okay to also be a child, do the other things that you're allowed to do.

You can laugh, smile, read, play, whatever you need to do whilst missing mum or dad or Nan or uncle, whoever it May be for sure.

And it was just to really list the.

It's like a lesson plan.

You have your learning objectives and a lesson plan, don't you?

The points you want to hit.

So really the child is getting to the end of the book and going, this is what I've learned.

But it's Bramley that's telling you, that's terrific.

I know you talked about your friend who said, just write, which is phenomenal.

I'm curious about your writing process.

Did that in any way influence you or what does your writing process look like when we're talking aspiring children's book authors?

I have no formal qualifications in writing, so I've never been to a.

A writing class, a creative writing class, or even a screenwriters class class or anything like that.

I've never been taught the acceptable way of getting this done.

What I am exposed to is people storyboarding TV arcs, right?

Because if you think, although I've got 20 episodes, if you will, 20 short episodes, normally you would get six to eight episodes, TV series.

So I can see how those develops.

Where do we want to be at the end of episode one?

Where do we want the cliffhanger to be at the end of episode three?

So I see a lot of exceptionally good writers create timelines, create storyboards.

Okay, we're talking 20, 30 page documents here.

Yes.

For six, one hour program.

So I can see just by taking that.

I know it's screenwriting the same as writing the children's book, but that was the experience I had.

So I just applied it and I thought to myself, right, like I say, I was originally at 30 chapters.

Where do I want to be?

How do I get there without it being pedestrian, without it being laborious or.

I don't want to skip over points.

So it ended up being to a point of chapter one, start lesson, lesson learned, end start, lesson learned.

And it developed from that, really into a couple of paragraphs about how am I going to get there and then just script it out?

So I didn't actually write it, if you will, until I knew exactly every scene, because in my brain it was like scenes of a TV program.

I knew every little scene that was to play us to the end.

That's what I find with a lot of the children's book authors I talk to now.

They haven't.

Most of them write a single story book, children's book, heavily illustrated, but they always have more books in mind.

And a lot of times it's in a series.

Ours with my five grandchildren, we've written 38 stories in our books.

Wow.

Now, of course, the cost of bringing them to print because we're not the illustrator.

It'll take a while before we get all 38 of them to life.

But one thing I did do is I got about half of them recorded by my grandchildren where they actually have done the audiobook.

Fantastic.

Yeah.

So it's fun.

But like you said, it's interesting how you lay out.

You could just doodle on a piece of paper.

That's why we have the pages for writing and drawing at the back of each of our books, because we want to encourage children to do that.

So I appreciate you sharing that.

I'm curious about when you started this whole thing about being a children's book author, especially with your background.

How did you envision success?

What did success look like?

And then what does it look to you now as a children's book author?

First of all, it's certainly not monetary because kept the price really low to the books.

I wanted to those families of the stories feedback, the reviews.

In fact, I put one of them on the back of the book because somebody had an early draft, some feedback, and I put it on the back of the book for when I actually finally published it.

And it was like, I wish I'd had this.

I was worried about my.

And it's just.

It might seem like a very political answer, but just getting the message out there, really getting it, getting it there.

And in many ways, the success really was first one of these.

Yeah.

Arriving at my house is an author copy.

Right.

Going.

I'm gonna.

Because I've dropped off loads at libraries and places in cafes and I don't even have this in America, but cafe seemed to have a children's book corner.

Just adding them into cafes or local mom and pop kind of coffee shops.

We have right now where I live, just flipping one on the bookshelf.

That's it.

Because I just want to get it out there.

That's fantastic.

I love it.

Advice for aspiring children, children's book authors.

What kind of advice would you give someone starting out?

The biggest advice would really be bring other people's advice to me.

In any kind of writing one book.

Just keep going.

Just keep writing.

Just.

You might be writing and thinking, this isn't right.

Just keep going.

Because you can edit.

You can't edit about a blank page.

What keeps you going as a children's book author?

I think not feeling a.

Any pressure to do it because I look forward.

Do it because you feel a release from.

Don't see it as a Chore.

And I'm not ashamed to say that there's parts of this book I was writing and I was tearful because of the things that I was writing and still whenever I read it and I come up to certain point still make me emotional and it's a matter of just words on a page.

If it can have that sort of effect on other people, it's just mind blowing.

It's so true because I had mentioned we've written 38 stories with my grandchildren.

What's incredible about that is they're all based on a nugget of truth.

They really happened.

The only difference is, of course we're now all animals in our stories, but they all happened like the.

We have one called Hijinks at the Big Head Folk Music Festival that was really a true story based on a full day of fun and excitement and we were able to turn it into a story.

You're immortalizes you, doesn't it?

It does.

Like you said, when you.

When I read it with my grandchildren or I read it to with other children, you do, like you said, you get emotional about it because you just have this contact with your words and.

It'S your grandchildren reading it to their children in the future.

Yeah.

That must be one of the parts.

Where you just think, I hope I'm around for that.

Yeah, of course.

But I don't think.

I don't think at half past six in the evening is necessarily going to be sat there in the bedroom.

Encouragement for readers.

Steve, tell us why children's book readers should purchase your book.

It is pitched towards the children of emergency service families.

I've had so much feedback to say, I don't know if it's me because I'm getting older or the stresses and strains on children nowadays.

And it's easy to reference things like social media.

I don't know.

When I was growing up in the late 70s, I didn't really have that many worries, I would think, looking back.

But children these days have so much to work.

Pressure on them to grow up too quickly is coming at them from all sides.

Right.

External pressures, pressures that not necessarily that family members or fully protect a child from.

So what we're trying to do, what the story will give you a tool to be able to do, is to discuss ways to cope and articulate worries of that child without it seeming like it's going to be a lecture, like it's a deliberate sit down and we're going to discuss this.

Something itself to worry about.

It's in a story, I think will give children the tools or give you the ability to discuss those tools with a child.

But it also allows them to pick best tool for them.

Leo does quite a lot just drawing.

He writes in the diary.

He does, he draws pictures, he talks to his friends, talks to his nan, talks to his mom, talks to his teacher.

He does array of things.

But if a child is more comfortable just one of those things, two of those things, it just shows that it's okay to do that.

Absolutely.

And parents or the family members can just talk.

Just read the book in as if it's not a lesson.

I'm not gonna.

Now we're going to sit down.

I'm going to give you a lesson on resilience.

It's not that it's just children's book.

We'll just get the child think and to themselves that, you know, what I'm thinking is normal.

Actually there's a ways for me to deal with this without going and expressing it out loud.

Can actually find my own path.

Absolutely.

And people don't give children enough credit for the intelligence that they possess because I know that through my five grandchildren and how we've written stories together and recorded stories together is that they have a deeper.

You know what it's just like having a little adult.

And, and that's what I think people have to think about is that they can actually understand much of what you're talking about.

Yeah.

Give them the tools, give them a menu of options.

They'll pick one.

I couldn't agree with you more.

I appreciate that.

So, final thoughts.

Steve, is there anything that you said, Gee, I wish Rick would ask me that question.

Is there something that you'd like to share that maybe I didn't ask?

No, not really.

I think we spoke it all.

But one of the things, I think I touched on it very briefly early on, but I wanted to make a point of including it but not hitting the reader over the head with.

It's not just children that sometimes need that help, need a way of being able to express themselves.

And I'm not just talking about teenagers, young adults.

And we all know that the issues across the board we have with young adults, the way that they feel and their well being.

It's interesting you should say that too, Steve, because I've had several children's book authors tell me that after a book reading they've had adults come up to them and say, you know what?

I see myself in that book.

That's me.

And, and it's an adult seeing themselves in a children's book.

I couldn't agree with you more that people can actually pick up on the message and feel like it was their story.

I wanted children to look at Leo as themselves.

I wanted them to see themselves in Leo.

I also wanted the parents to see themselves in Mum and Nan.

I think there's one part of it where, and it made me laugh when I wrote it and I kept it right for the early draft where Nan says to Mum, come in, sit down, looks like Wil has landed on you overnight.

That phrase, because it was really something for the parents to say.

Sometimes as a parent, when you're juggling work, life, home, etc.

Especially as a single parent, might be just times where the world has just sat on you overnight and you can see yourself in Mum and then Nan can see themselves helping Mum.

I think there's a story for everybody.

Steve, thank you so much for being a guest on the Adventures in the Heart of Children's Book Authors Podcast.

Your generosity of time, your insights will significantly benefit aspiring authors and readers, and we promise to provide our audience with links to Steve's website.

If you've enjoyed this episode, please hit the subscribe button to listen to future episodes and feel free to share this episode with anyone inspired by or who enjoys hearing about Steve and his children's book Brave at Home.

Thank you, Steve.

Thank you very much for having me.