18 MARCH 2020 http://www.writers-online.co.uk
‘This is my third attempt at a dragon story. Initially I tried to
do one with a Conan setting. And then a kid’s book. But it
was funny, when I thought what if it’s an adult book, that it
ploughed ahead.’
As a book for adults, Eoin plays with fantasy’s dragon tropes
from a knowing perspective. ‘The idea of a dragon being
sarcastic about another dragon is funny. And if I like an idea,
and it makes me smile, I’ll put it in. You don’t imagine a dragon
watching X-Factor and watching Game of Thrones – but he
would, if he was the last dragon, and a sentient being.’
It also gives Eoin’s brand of fantasy his own original stamp.
‘It gives you a way in. I don’t have an interest in writing that
mythological creation and trying to do what other people have
done brilliantly well. I love genre fiction but I’m not interested in
trying to recreate someone else’s masterpiece.’
Beyond his humour, he believes his other trademark is having
unexpected central characters. ‘I don’t think my protagonists
are typical – what I do like to do is take a secondary figure and
promote them. Artemis Fowl would be the bad guy in most
books. Vern is a lead character. I try to surprise the reader. The
cover of Highfire is very telling of what I do – you think, it’s
a dragon reminiscent of the Game of Throne covers – but the
dragon is holding a martini, so that throws you a curveball.’
Eoin writes fantasy from the position of a lifelong member of
the club. ‘I think I’m interested in fantasy because that is where I
found my tribe as a young boy at secondary school. I just found
a few guys in my class who were into reading fantasy and comic
books and I was able to bond with these guys. It gave me a club
to be part of, a place where I was as good as anybody else, and
we got along anyway.
As a writer, he loves fantasy because of its scope for imaginativeflight. ‘Writing-wise, I’m drawn to fantasy because you can do
so much with it. You can escape the world you’re in, be taken off
to a different place and escape where you are. Kate Bush, David
Bowie, Pink Floyd too – you can pretend to be somewhere else.
Me and my friends read the books, listened to Pink Floyd. It was
a club to be in. I think a lot of young people want that club –
we’re all individuals, but we want to be with other individuals
who think like us.’
He’s keeping his fingers crossed that Highfire will appeal to
the people who grew up with his children’s books. ‘I’m hoping
this will go out to a whole new set of readers, but people who
grew up with Artemis Fowl too. Those books are read by three
generations – I’ll never, ever get used to that. When a teenager
says, this is my favourite book, that means a lot, because I
know how fierce it is when you’re a teenager and you have your
favourite book.’
He knows what that feels like – his own choice is Hitchhikers’
Guide to the Galaxy. ‘So forty years, and that’s a long time to be a
fan of something.’
After graduating, Eoin worked as a primary school teacher, until
his writing career went stratospheric with the publication of Artemis
Fowl. For a children’s writer, it was an invaluable learning experience.
‘Teaching had a huge and lasting and profound effect on my
writing,’ he says. At the time, he was trying his hand at thrillers.
‘When I started teaching, I was writing in the vein of people
who’d written before – I was not trying to reach children on their
level. When I was teaching and planning lessons I very quickly
realised how smart they are, and how the same thing would
happen in writing.’
One of the things he learned was never to underestimate his
pupils. ‘In my experience of teaching, most kids are very bright“Though my books are fast-
paced, they’re not simple.
I will never present things
on a platter and I will never
stop making kids think.
One of the things I had
when I was young was that
I read my parents’ books
and I would not understand
some words. I loved fi nding
out what they were.”