Impossible Creatures Come to Life: Ishara Interviews Katherine Rundell at the Library of Congress

In this magical episode of Ishara’s Reading Podcast, Ishara goes behind the scenes at the Library of Congress for an unforgettable conversation with bestselling author Katherine Rundell, creator of Impossible Creatures!

Together they explore mythical creatures, fantasy worlds, storytelling, imagination, and the magic behind creating unforgettable adventures for young readers. From dragons and griffins to courage and friendship, this episode is a journey into a world where impossible things become possible. 

Featuring backstage access, literary magic, and one incredible author interview, this is an episode fantasy lovers won’t want to miss!

Stream now on Ishara’s Reading Podcast YouTube Channel: Check it out!

#ImpossibleCreatures #KatherineRundell #IsharasReadingPodcast #FantasyBooks #MiddleGradeFantasy #LibraryOfCongress #BookPodcast #YoungJournalist #KidsWhoRead #FantasyAdventure

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Hi, it's the Char here from the Stars Raising Podcast. Right now we are going to the Library of Congress to have a behind-the-scenes interview with Miss Katherine Rundle, the offer, actually best-selling international offer from the UK of the Impossible Creature series. Come on! Help yourself. Here's some snacks. Do you want to help yourself? Yeah, here it is.

SPEAKER_00 0:57

Hi Catherine. Hi, I'm loving to meet you. How are you? I'm great. My name is Hiya Shara. Thank you so much for coming to speak to me. It's exciting to meet you.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

You too. Right now we are at the Library of Congress with best-selling international offer Catherine Rundell. Rundel? What root word is that actually from?

SPEAKER_00 1:19

No, I think it's from the French. The word Echondelle, which means swallow like the bird. What?

SPEAKER_01 1:29

What advice would you give kids wanting to write books like your Impossible Creatures series? And right now you're promoting the new one, the sequel, The Poisoned Kick.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Do you know? I think I have two pieces of advice that I would give young writers. One of them is when you write, if you get stuck, allow yourself to just write badly. Often people get a little bit um worried that what they're writing won't be good, so they just stop writing. But I think that if you allow yourself to say, I don't mind if it's bad, I'm just gonna write as practice, then sometimes in amongst the bad writing, there'll be a surprise that will erupt out of it. And the other thing is, you can always make bad writing into good writing, but no writing just remains no writing.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

I had to write an essay about the pros and cons of trees two days ago, yesterday, and the day before that. And at first I couldn't understand it, though, so I scratched out a couple of words of this and me. Wait. These words of one of the points I have a little bit of a bad construction, but I just kept writing it because I kind of enjoyed writing the part more than I used to. And the cons were a little harder because trees have a lot of good trees. So, like I thought of it, and I'm like, think of it from someone else's point of view, because I love trees personally, even though they don't love me back that much.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

I don't know what to call it. Oh no, do you sneeze? Yeah, I know a lot of people who have allergies, but I think you're completely right. The trees are surely among the finest things on the entire planet.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

The poisoned king, the plot line. I haven't read the book yet. I'm still in book one, but what inspired you to call it The Poisoned King? Did something really get poisoned?

SPEAKER_00 3:20

So it's based on a play by William Shakespeare, Hamlet, in which a king is poisoned by a wicked uncle, and the prince has to discover the truth. And this is in this story: a king is poisoned by a wicked uncle, and a princess has to discover the truth. Her name is Anya, Princess of Dusha, and she has two birds. Um, her name is Gangonas, which you find in Russian mythology, um, and they have golden beaks and silver claws, and they can speak, and they flock around her, and they're like her guardians and her guides and her protectors.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

I like your version because it's a princess. Okay, maybe.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

Where did you get the idea of the flying coat? That came from, you know, have you ever been at the top of a big hill in a really strong wind? And it feels like if you jumped, you might like fly on the wind. It comes from that feeding.

SPEAKER_01 4:16

In today's world, there is so much AI. What do you think you would do if you had to talk to a kid like me? I also am trying to write a book, who wants to write an book about adventure like the impossible creature series, but they don't know how to do it because there is so much AI and you don't understand. Where do I get inspiration from? Because there's so many things, not like physical, there's just so much technology around us now.

SPEAKER_00 4:45

That's very true. And I'm quite wary of AI. I think that it could do great good in some places, but I think it could also do great harm. So I think that we need to be very careful in the way we think about it and use it. But I can say, if you want to try and write a story, which I'm thrilled that you're a writer too, how fan is. I would say think about the things that matter most to you. For most people, that's not gonna be anything technological related. It'll be things like the people around you, the natural world, your pets, your best friends, like ideas, history, geography, the sense of the world is huge and beautiful. For most people, I think if you think about the things you really care about, it's a great way to start a story.

SPEAKER_01 5:26

I'm writing a book about the immune system because I want kids to know about more about immunology, but not from a textbook read read standpoint. From like one of these kinds of books, an adventure book, a chapter book, but with a little more pictures. I'm gonna make it a graphic novel.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

That's spectacular.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

And I'm illustrating it. And on also, do you like pets? Do you have one? My pet is a parrot that thinks it's a dog.

SPEAKER_00 5:53

How pretty. Well, I have a dog, but the dog doesn't think he's a parrot. I have a black labrador. He thinks he's a poet. My dog. And he's he's quite old. And he's he's called Rainbow. And he he loves mostly more than anything else in the world, he loves tennis balls. But after that, he loves people.

SPEAKER_01 6:12

You grew up in Zimbabwe. And actually, the first year of my life, I cannot remember this at all, which I'm really sad. My parents worked as scientists in Africa.

SPEAKER_00 6:23

Amazing. Do you know where?

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Uh it was a lot of places. A lot of places. The one I remember saying the most is Kenya.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

Ah, fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

What was your favorite dessert if you had to choose?

SPEAKER_00 6:38

That's a great question. Um, in Zimbabwe, they make an amazing, there's a lot of mangoes. A lot of people grow mangoes in their gardens. Um, and so you can make an amazing mango ice cream, and it is fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 6:50

Yeah, my trauma. Goat. Roasted goat.

SPEAKER_00 6:54

Wow, amazing.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

Growing up with a diplomat, as I've heard as a fat, like what I've read about you, you grew up your father was a diplomat. So, did you ever get to visit Buckingham Palace when he was doing his work? Did you get to actually visit it?

SPEAKER_00 7:11

I did go to Buckingham Palace once. He got given uh like a medal, and so we went to Buckingham Palace for him to receive it. But um often when people know that I'm from England, they always say, Do you know the Queen? Um, and I have to say, I don't really know the Queen. I've met her a few times, but we're not close.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

What about the new prince? Or is he king yet?

SPEAKER_00 7:33

He's a king, King Charles? Yeah, he seems great, but um again, I don't know him.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

My grandmother on my dad's side's sister actually is actually lives in England. Amazing! Do you think you'll visit one day? Maybe. A big large maybe. Thank you, Miss Caffran, for being on my show. Because I've learned a lot about different authors and also people who write stories about a girl who uses a flying coat.

SPEAKER_00 8:07

Thank you so much for having me on your show. It's a real pleasure.

SPEAKER_01 8:11

Thank you. Wow, that was an amazing interview with Miss Rundle. Now, but don't go anywhere, we're going to the QA session. Octopuses have been in our oceans, and they are some of the closest things we have on the curve to actual alien life. Why actually, if you are able to find a mythical creature from some form of human culture, why don't it choose it to be based on octopuses' systems of octopuses? We don't know about octopuses and that's so true.

SPEAKER_00 8:54

I mean, octopuses are in one of the most amazing creatures on this world. That they seem to have an intelligence that we do not yet have enough intelligence to understand. As you know, there are lots of forms of uh creatures that are based on the idea of like octopus-like creatures. I think that the cracker is going to be inspired by so octopus and squid, and then and don't believe they were big enough to pull down the shed. Thank you. That's a great question.

SPEAKER_01 9:22

Thank you for listening. This episode of the Shars Reading Podcast. Don't forget to like, review, and smash that subscribe button. Bye bye.