Yarrow Townsend

Yarrow Townsend was a special guest speaker at the Hampshire Writers’ Society in February 2023.

Yarrow is a Hampshire writer who has an affinity with the New Forest.  She lives on a narrowboat and is inspired by the natural world around her.  She writes for children and young adults, and is best known for her book The Map of Leaves, published by Chicken House. The book has been a Sunday Times children’s book of the week and shortlisted for the Branford Boase Award 2023.

She reminds us that Henrietta Branford was also a local writer (she lived in Woolston for a while). Just like Henrietta, Yarrow knows the area well – she went to school in Romsey and lived in the New Forest.

The first thing Yarrow talks about is her route into publication (“the timeframe can be so variable…”). She estimates that for her, the process was easily ten years from the start of her career until the publication of The Map of Leaves. This incorporated, she explains, the dreaming up of ideas, the transition to considering herself a serious writer and finally “…having the book in my hand.”

Yarrow is eager to share with us where her inspiration came from. She explains that it comes from growing up “…in such a tactile place.” She describes how she was “immersed” in nature and gardens as a child. With a broad smile on her face, Yarrow describes some of the stories she and her family retold whilst exploring the natural world.  She shows us a photo of her, her sibling and her father singing songs from Winnie the Pooh whilst out and about. This, she says, provided her with a connection between real life and fables (She refers to these as her “raw materials”).

She shows us a picture from a Shirley Hughes book and explains that she loves how the childhood experience is portrayed in her stories. When she is asked “Why children’s books?”, she explains that it is the exploration of the world through children’s eyes that Yarrow attempts to recapture. She touches upon The Hobbit, which describes real forests and nature, yet combines it with fiction to “…create something fantastical.”

 With Yarrow’s love of plants, she poses the question “Why didn’t I become a botanist … or go down the scientific road?”  She explains that it was because of “…all the mythology and stories that surround those plants.” She tells us that she wanted to learn how these stories were created. As a result, Yarrow studied French and English literature rather than science as she”… really wanted to have that deep dive into craftsmanship.” This enabled her to focus on the relationship between stories and reality. She reveals that she really got into the poet John Clare due to his connection with nature and the accurate record he made regarding sightings of animals such as red squirrels and pine martins.

Yarrow explains that through her studies, she began to focus on the craft of writers who were able to write with vivid, almost tangible descriptions. She shows us an image of one of her sketchbooks, and explains that it is basically “a list of titles.” She goes on to explain that she had no shortage of ideas, but needed to consider how to develop them into something publishable. With this in mind, she explains that she needed to find a way to develop as a writer, as she found it hard to write and she tells us, she still does. “I went down two routes,” she explains. One was to develop storytelling, and the other focus was to develop her connection with nature and the world around her in order to influence her writing.  To do this, Yarrow joined the RSPB in the New Forest. Here she was trained to do tree-work and bird surveys, bringing her into closer contact with elements that would enhance her writing.

When Yarrow was teaching, she tells us, she often felt that it was hard for children to understand what they were reading, as they’d had little or no experience of what they were reading about. “How can we get them to picture these realities that they’ve not experienced?” With this in mind, her work with the RSPB allowed Yarrow to write confidently about these places, focusing on the smells and the feel of things. She shows us an image of an ancient woodland at the edge of the New Forest and explains how it reminds her of The Hobbit. She says that this demonstrates that it is clear where writers get their ideas. “You have to be in contact with the world around you to develop your stories”

Yarrow went on to study for a writing  MA at Bath University, originally thinking that this was “cheating”.  However, she describes the course as “an apprenticeship for a trade.” The workshops enabled her to reflect and examine her craft, forcing her to write outside of her comfort zone. It was this course where Yarrow began writing The Map of Leaves. However, this was only the beginning of it and the book went through “at least” twelve drafts before it was published.

Whilst on the course, Yarrow spent a lot of time looking at what other writers were doing and what books were selling well. She was particularly interested in audiences that were younger than YA but maybe didn’t want the typical YA issues-based darker stories, but nevertheless wanted to be challenged further than some of the middle grade books (she gives author Frances Harding as an example).

Once Yarrow had finished her book, she began to look for an agent.  She is currently with Jenny Savile who has visited us before.  Yarrow first developed a list of criteria of things she was interested in when looking for an agent. However, it was extremely important that she found an agent with whom she could work with collaboratively, and would “…understand my writing and would understand where I was coming from.” After looking through the Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook “…the things that stood out for me…” she tells us … “were her back catalogue,” where the stories has similar themes to her own. Jenny also works editorially, and this too was important to Yarrow. “For me, she says “this was fantastic” as they were then able to work for a year editing her book.

The timing of this editing period is very significant.  The Map of Leaves was ready around the time of the pandemic. As a result, some publishers were not interested, claiming that Yarrow’s story, which features disease, had come at a time when children needed something lighter in tone. However, other publishers felt that this was exactly the right time, as the subject matter of the book would be useful for children who needed to understand grief and illness. Yarrow points out that since the pandemic there has been a noticeable trend of children’s stories that focus on the positivity of nature. Ultimately, Yarrow signed with Chicken House.

“I want to challenge and I want to entertain” Yarrow tells us.  She goes onto say that her experiences over the years have given her many ideas for stories, but she needs to ensure that she chooses the ones that “…tell a good tale,” and reminds us that “children are very discerning.”

Being published via the more traditional publishing house route has been invaluable to Yarrow because of the collaborative and editing process through which she has gone, ensuring that her work is the best it can be – something she feels would not have worked had she made the decision to self-publish.

Yarrow is now working on her second book and says that she is enjoying remembering the process she went through when she began her first book.

Report by Sarah Noon