L.D. Lapinski: ‘Artezans: The Last Spellbreaker’

Welcome to episode 38, season 3, of the Teacher Book Club Podcast!

This is a recording of our most recent special author chat, with author L.D. Lapinski!

This episode is in partnership with Hachette AD | PR

Tara had the pleasure of speaking to amazing author L.D. Lapinski about their new middle grade children’s book, third in the trilogy, ‘Artezans: The Last Spellbreaker.’ Tara asked our Teacher Book Club questions plus a few extras! It was great hearing all about the ideas behind the book, the messages behind it and the best bits to write. We hope you love listening to it as much as we loved recording it!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Hello, welcome back to Teacher Book Club Podcast. I am the last time I was teaching, and I am here to give you the next Teacher Book Club podcast episode. So this one was recorded only last night with the wonderful author Eldie Lipinski. Had an amazing time chatting to them. Unfortunately, it did not work on Instagram live. So we had to try the week before to go live. So we tried again yesterday and again there were still issues. Who knows why we could get the move? However, we then had a phone call so that we could still have the conversation. Unfortunately, obviously that means you can't watch it back to hear it so that you can listen back to it. Um I managed to record the audio so that you could hear it, but just not see it. So hopefully it's still okay with everyone. And then hopefully you will still be able to enjoy listening back. And I think sometimes it's much easier to listen to something in the club, in a commute, for walk, whatever it may be. So you don't actually need to see our lovely faces. Um I hope you can enjoy listening anyway. So we had a wonderful chat all about the artisans trilogy, and specifically the third book, which is out now the last spellbreaker. It was great getting to hear Audio Lupinski's opinions on characters, kind of her the backstory between each of the three books in the series as well. So I hope you enjoy listening back to it. I'm just going to start by giving you the blurb so that you know a little bit about what the story, or the third book specifically, what it's all about. Magic is bad and stronger than ever, but not everyone is using it for good. Twins Elodie and Edward Crane are artisan masters, holders of a strange and powerful magic, after surviving epic battles and even a shipwreck, they and their friend Laurie are now in search of the last spellbreaker. The true hopes that the last spellbreaker can help undo some of the chaos that their newly strong magic has created in the world. But the twins are separated in two different worlds, and both are in danger. With dark forces only steps behind them, can Ed and Elodie use their newfound powers to protect each other, stay alive, and bring magic safely back into balance once and for all. There we go. If that doesn't intrigue you, I don't know what will. So I definitely recommend the series to children, probably kind of year four and upwards, maybe year five, here in England. Um, yeah, I hope you enjoy listening to our chat. We are obviously here to talk all about Artisans, The Last Spellbreaker, the third book in the trilogy. Um, did you want to start by maybe telling us what the book is about? A bit of a summary of the series as well.

SPEAKER_01 3:26

Yeah, so actually this is the third and the final artisans book. It's the last that ending for the prince and Ellie Crane. Now, when book two ended, the twins were in a little bit of a sticky situation. And the third book opens with the twins stranded, they are separated away from each other in different worlds completely. So not only are they away from each other for perhaps the first time in their 13 years of life, they're in completely different worlds and unable to get in touch with each other, and there doesn't seem to be any way back. So uh Elodie, who is still with her friend Laurie, decides that the thing to do is to try to travel to find the last spellbreaker who is rumored to live in Norway and could be the only person that could help bring Ed back from wherever he is.

SPEAKER_00 4:24

Amazing. So where did the idea for the series and for book three uh come about?

SPEAKER_01 4:34

So when I'm planning um like a trilogy, I always see it as one great big story, and it's just a case of knowing exactly where to put the breaks in, much as you put chapter breaks in there to put the individual. I would love to write that out on it. I'd be pleased if um a 200,000-word middle grade novel landed on her desk. So for some reason they they make you slice them up. Anyway, so I really um wanted to, um, with the actual artist and story as a whole, have children who are not born into magic, who have been adopted into it and have been accepted by their adoptive family. Um, mainly because adoption is is a really big part of my own life. Um I'm not an adoptive person myself, but my great grandparents are, and due to the nature of it being um like the first world war and just before, we can't trace any further back than that. That's where things come to a sudden halt. And the only thing, the only kind of clue we have about one of our grandparents is that they were born into a Jewish family. So it always kind of tickled me in a sort of sad way that I have this sort of lineage, this heritage, this religion that I have no knowledge of because my great-grandmother, who was born into this family, was adopted into a white Christian household. So that part of her identity was essentially erased, and therefore we never knew anything about this for decades. And it always kind of makes me sort of half smile because that is a culture that I am technically, if you want to sort of squint part of, but have never experienced and never been brought up in.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

So I wanted to tip the honey's head when it came to Ed Melody, and they have been brought into a culture and accepted and welcomed and desperately wanted by their parents into something where in the first book they're not quite sure if they belong or not. But you know, spoiler alert, magic doesn't care if you've been adopted into your family or born into it, you belong, and that's what's important. So, yeah, the books are about belonging and about celebrating who you are, really.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

Yeah, that's lovely, and a great message for children. I mean, obviously, as being a teacher, we teach so many different children with different backgrounds, different stories, like yourself. So, yeah, I think that would be lovely for children to kind of relate to but also learn from as well.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

And you've got to have a bit of magic as well.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Always. I love that. Yeah, amazing. So, we are teacher book club, so we would like to ask you some questions all about kind of you as the author of the book, so we can find a little bit more about the series and also then obviously share the book with the children that we teach. So, my first question is who is your favourite character and why?

SPEAKER_01 7:44

Oh, you know, it's probably it's probably kind of obvious, but my favourite character um is Mr. Biscuits, who is not a person at all. He is Elodie's cat. Um he's in he's in the books from the word go. He was only kind of meant to be a sort of passing mention, but in the way in the way of cats, he sort of wandered in and firmly planted himself on the page and refused to leave. So he's in having all three books, and in the first book, he actually becomes kind of a superstar. Um and he and he has some very daring adventures, and he's at the centre of a daring rescue. Um I just love him so much, and because LED can understand uh the language of animals, we are able to get his point of view and his his dialogue as well, which is which was fantastic fun to write. I'm not normally a fan of talking animals in books, but I think you know, I'll make an exception for Mr. Biscuits because he's just such a little sarcastic gnarly. He's fed up, he's completely fed up. By the time they get to Norway, he has mentally checked out the situation that he would never leave Elodie at all.

SPEAKER_00 8:55

Oh, I love that. I mean, I'm a cat lover myself, so I definitely appreciate that. And I liked I loved that we could understand him and he had a voice. Because, like you say, the sarcasm, I think, yeah, I think children, children and myself enjoy that.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

If you if you've read my first series, if you've read The Strange Worlds Travel Agency, Mr. Biscuits is very much Jonathan as a cat.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

Yes, fantastic. Yeah, I love that. I see the link. Brilliant. Um, I I mean I loved Elodie and I loved Edward as well, but um, I just think Elodie was what Edward needs. I think they're like she's the yin to his yang. Um, she's just happy, go lucky, um, very sweet. I think she kind of is so uplifting and positive, and yeah, I just loved that she could obviously understand animals. What an amazing quality and yeah, magical treat to have. I loved it.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

Oh, absolutely. I mean, who wouldn't want to be able to understand what the animals, friends, and all the birds and things are saying? It must be absolutely fascinating, although it does get kind of overwhelming throughout the day as well. Yeah, she she has like a big pair of ear defenders that she wears to school and things like that just to try and give herself a break from the noise. Yeah, they are very much two halves of a whole bit a thing with a capital T really since the first book, because they are twice made, and things being twice made is a big deal of sand series, whether it's magical objects such as a broomstick, which has been twice made because it was once a tree and then it was manufactured again into a broomstick. Um Ed Sea Glass began life as sand and then it was glass. Yeah. Um, and the twins are essentially twice made because they are copies of each other, even off identical.

SPEAKER_00 10:55

Yeah, no, that's brilliant. A great feature to have. Um, what was your favourite part to write in the story?

SPEAKER_01 11:03

This is really hard to answer without doing spoilers.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

I know.

SPEAKER_01 11:07

Um when you sent me the questions, um I sat staring at this and thinking, I can't actually say what I think my favourite bit was. There is a wonderful bit. I do say so myself. There was a wonderful bit towards the end where the twins make a decision and it's going to be something that impacts them quite negatively, and they decide to go through with it anyway because it is something selfless.

SPEAKER_00 11:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

And thinking about where Ed started in the first book, what he wants more than anything is to be a really powerful artisan. He wants to be a super powerful, magical person that everyone is in awe of. And Elodie, you know, she kind of takes it for granted that she's going to be fine, you know, she's she's kind of blase about it. She's a little bit nervous, but not nearly to the same extent as Ed. And they have changed so much by the time we get to the last spellbreaker that both of them are willing to go through quite a frightening change in their lives in order to improve the life of someone else.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

Yeah, absolutely. Um, my my favourite part again, I can't do any spoilers, but the ending to me was very satisfying, I think, to end the trilogy. Um, I think just the drama, the adventure, and just how it came together, I think, yeah, you've written it brilliantly, and yeah, as a reader, I was I was happy with the ending.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

Oh, thank you so much. That's so good to hear. You do worry that you're going to like maybe leave someone wanting more, or you've perhaps not killed off the right video. And did everyone get their come up as always a thing? But yeah, no, that's lovely to hear, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

Yeah, no, you're welcome. Um, what is your favourite quote from the book?

SPEAKER_01 13:01

Oh, so I've button marked very optimized. So, so this is Elodie who says this to someone who, for the time being, will have to remain nameless. Yes. We don't choose to be born, and we certainly don't choose to be born with whatever traits we have. It's up to other people to accept us, to make space for us, whatever we bring. We should not have to give anything up to make anyone else's lives easier.

SPEAKER_00 13:34

Oh, yeah, that's lovely. An amazing message for children.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:41

Yeah, that's lovely.

SPEAKER_01 13:44

Never change who you try and decide someone else at all. You know, you're brilliant the way you are, I promise you.

SPEAKER_00 13:51

Yeah, yeah, no, that's fantastic. Um, I have got a quote which is a description, and I've chosen it because I think your descriptions are beautiful, and as a teacher, I'm always on the lookout for brilliant descriptions to share with children to kind of you know help them with their own writing and yeah, just to enjoy reading as well. Um, and I think in this part in particular, the beautiful description kind of takes you away from the drama just for a second, kind of takes you into that world, but yeah, kind of you're so kind of in that moment with them that you're almost blocking out everything else that's happening. So I'll read it to you. The mist that surrounded the prison peaks had dropped again, making the air cold and damp, but filling the passageways with rainbows. They slanted and shafted in every sunbeam, filtering through to create stained glass images on the cave walls, and outside the world seemed alive with colour, shimmering in the ever-moving mist. It was a beautiful walk into the unknown. And I just love that last bit. It's like, oh yeah, this might not be good if we're going into the unknown, but it's beautiful. Yeah, I really love it.

SPEAKER_01 15:09

Thank you. Yeah, I I really love planning um what the Prison Peaks was going to look like, and it was it was really important that it was a beautiful place. Yeah, um, yeah, I think um a lot of the times if you're gonna have like the final showdown or the final battle, it's gonna be somewhere that's kind of dark and desolate and scarred. And and actually, no, this takes place somewhere beautiful that shouldn't be, you know, subject to to fighting and strife, but it does anyway.

SPEAKER_00 15:38

Yeah, yeah, no, that's brilliant. So, what do you want readers to remember most from the book or from the series, even?

SPEAKER_01 15:47

I think joy. I think joy in your in in being happy with your own talents and knowing that they are going to be celebrated, even if it's by not who you expected at the start. Um, that friendship can take unusual forms. Um perhaps again that come from unexpected quarters, and that family, whether it's chosen or whether you're born into it, you know, your family, whatever form that might take, whether you've got to search for it or whether you've already found it, it's gonna be out there and it's gonna be so so welcoming, and you are gonna be so loved.

SPEAKER_00 16:27

Yeah. Oh, that's lovely. Yeah, and I think they're definitely strong messages that I have got as a reader through reading them, so yeah, I think that they'll be fantastic for the children that read your books as well. That's amazing. Um, so which other characters point of view would you maybe want to hear the story from?

SPEAKER_01 16:50

Oh, I had to really consider this one because there's some who I would like I would I would I would like um let's go for the villain. I would like um to hear what Finnavan has to say most of all. We do see a little bit of a little bit more of him um than perhaps you might be expecting. Um but yes, I would like to I would like to sort of dig into into his little psyche for a while because I think his motivation is quite clear, you know. He doesn't he doesn't want to die and he is quite outraged that he went through quite terrible things in his youth, and he will never recover from that. That is that's just written in stone. He's never going to get over it physically, emotionally, mentally. He has been through awful things. That doesn't excuse him being a really evil person at all. But it's kind of like to sort of maybe dig around in in his brain a little bit more and just go, you know, was there a point where you could have turned back? I think there probably was.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

Yeah, that would be fascinating. I always think, yeah, seeing a story from the flip side um would be so fascinating. And just their inner thoughts, like what were they thinking at that point? Why did they make those decisions?

SPEAKER_01 18:06

Yeah, yeah, definitely. And I love writing villains. Villains and endings are my two most favourite things to write.

SPEAKER_00 18:13

Oh yeah, I bet that's a lot of fun.

unknown 18:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

Amazing. So have you got any children's book recommendations you could give us, please?

SPEAKER_01 18:23

Yes, so um I'm I'm digging around in um slightly, slightly backless, but uh I'm gonna go with a classic. Um I think everybody should be picking up the Tiffany Aching series by Terry Pratchett. Um you can start with the We Free Men, and if you can read and I say this to adults, adult reading is the most wonderful reading aloud experience you will ever have in your entire life.

SPEAKER_00 18:53

Oh, that's lovely. Yeah, amazing. And it's particularly for us as teachers, that's good to know.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

Oh, yeah, absolutely, yes. Um, I used to be a teacher myself and it was uh one of our one of our just read alouds at the end of the day, and it's it's fantastic. It's so so good.

SPEAKER_00 19:14

Amazing, right? I will have to get on that.

SPEAKER_01 19:18

Yeah, and for something slightly more modern, um the Type Magic series, um which again, um that's it's it's nine to twelve. Um it is such a original and engaging magic system in it. Um I think a lot of the fantasy books can feel a little bit samey, particularly if you read a lot of them. Um, but this is so original and so engaging, and the story is written at such a pace. Um, I think the second book is out now, I think the third one comes out later this year. Um, don't quote me on that one though, um, because I still leave mine on my series reading. I'll read the first two, and then I forget to look for the third as my but then I get a nice surprise when I go in with shops. So, yeah, so Tiffany Aiking and the Tide Magic books are my recommendations.

SPEAKER_00 20:07

Lovely, thank you. Yeah, that's brilliant tonight. Thank you. So, um, have you got any tips for us teachers for teaching writing? Obviously, we have to do it every day. Um, so tips from an author and previous teacher would be amazing.

SPEAKER_01 20:23

Oh, thank you. Um, well, I would I would always say um that your foundation is going to be um your descriptive writing, um, and if you can really sort of nail that, then character comes beautifully flowing on top of that because your characters then have a place to live. And if you're going to get um students to describe a certain place, um I would always do what I call doing it backwards. So if we think about the strange world travel agency, so we start with the sequence that Flick has, we would get the description of the outside of it, say it's all barnacles and salt eaten and things, okay. We know that it's gonna be something watery, she steps into it, we get the description of the world of the break, we know we get the pirates and everything, and then we know how Flick feels about it, which is excitement and a little bit frightened. But when that's been planned, plan it backwards. So start with the emotion that your characters are feeling. Say they're gonna feel frightened when they get somewhere. Okay, what frightens them? Literally just make a list, pay for a piece of paper, get down as much as you possibly can, think about all your emotions, what's gonna frighten that character and think about the method of transportation, whether that's being traveled there through a magical world, whether they have just stepped through a door, whether they have fallen down a rabbit hole, whatever it is, they got to that place somehow. So then you have being physically moved, which is always harder than it seems to do in writing, moving characters from A to B. You know, they don't want to move, put them on wheels, that's all. Um and then you have the the actual description of the place which you can build around the list that you've made, feeling emotion that your character's feeling. So it feels three-dimensional, feels real and really solid, and it it's super quick to do as well when you start doing it.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Amazing. Yeah, that is brilliant. I think like you say, working backwards, although children will think, Well, that doesn't make sense. That will make sense, yeah. That is a really logical way of doing things and getting, yeah, kind of getting the main ideas and then building on them. That's brilliant. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 22:34

Absolutely. And then when you've done it a few times, you kind of do it automatically.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:38

This is what I do now. I always start um with the emotion, excuse me, and and go back and go backwards and do the description after.

SPEAKER_00 22:47

Yeah. Oh, brilliant. Yeah, and great to know that that is clearly something that's proven to work that you've you're still using it and doing it now. Brilliant.

SPEAKER_01 22:56

Oh, definitely, yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_00 22:58

So, what is coming up next for you? Have you got anything in the pipeline? I did see that you'd finished a draft today.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Yes, I've done um a first draft, a very first first draft first. Um thinks about it, and I can say absolutely nothing else about it whatsoever. I'm sure um I will say that it has made me laugh whilst I was writing it. Which I'm thinking is a good sign.

SPEAKER_00 23:32

Yeah, absolutely. Oh, okay. Intriguing. Yeah, exciting, amazing. Sorry, I missed that.

SPEAKER_01 23:45

As soon as I can talk about it, I will not shut up.

SPEAKER_00 23:48

Great, okay. We will keep an eye out then. Amazing. So you are busy writing away mostly at the moment then.

SPEAKER_01 23:59

I am, I'm back on the drafting horse, which is lovely because drafting is the bit I enjoy doing the most. Right. I know some I think I'm in the minority actually. I think most authors enjoy the editing part. Right. But I've never been able to get my head around not taking it as a personal criticism every single time. You know, I've got 14 books out now and it still feels like people being mean. It still takes me a week after I get the email to stop feeling sorry for myself.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

I think I'd be the same. Yeah, very understandable. Amazing. So I'm glad we've got things to look forward to in the future from you. Brilliant. Well, thank you so much. I have loved the Artistan series, and I am sure getting it into children's hands, they are going to absolutely love it as well. So, yeah, thank you. It's been lovely to speak to you all about it.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

Thank you so much for having me, and thank you for sorting out our technical difficulties.

SPEAKER_00 24:57

You're welcome. I'm glad we made it work. There you have it. That was our chat all about the artisan series and the last book, The Spellbreaker. It was great getting to speak to LD Lipinski. I had a great time, and I hope you enjoyed listening to it. We are really lucky to be sponsored on our podcast by VIP Reading, who produce wonderful book boxes for our teacher book club. So please do check out their website and subscribe to our book boxes if you would like the next one. It will be coming very soon at the beginning of May. Lily said March May. And we're really looking forward to seeing your reactions and seeing what you think of the new book, obviously voted for by our members, but you just don't know which one won the vote. So we can't wait for you to open up your boxes soon. So please do subscribe if you haven't already. Thank you again for listening. I totally recommend the Artisan series. So definitely get your hands on it if you have got children in kind of year four upward. So thanks again for listening and downloading. Please, if you can, leave us a little review or star rating uh wherever you listen to your podcast. And I'll see you again very soon.