Novelist, Efua Traoré, has found that children can be the most challenging audience: ‘Children are not very patient and they are brutally honest. You have to keep them engaged from page one.’
First Draft is our interview column, featuring authors and other prominent figures on books, reading, and writing.
Our questions are italicized.
What books or kinds of books did you read growing up?
I devoured books as a kid and luckily for me, we had a fantastic public library in our then still small town of Ekpoma. Like most kids in Nigeria in the 80s and 90s, I grew up with the usual books that were available like Enid Blyton’s Famous Five, C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and many more. After that, I moved straight to the adult section in my library. Here, I read a lot of classic literature like Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Conan Doyle and books by Georg Elliot, the Brontë sisters, Daniel Defoe and many more...
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