When I write an adventure story for children, I do not begin with a list of trends or a formula. I usually begin with a memory — the sea, an island, a family trip, a camp, or the feeling of being young and certain that an ordinary day could turn into an adventure.
I grew up in Trinidad and Tobago, and some of my strongest childhood memories are tied to the outdoors. I spent time camping with the Fatima Sea Scouts, travelling around the island with family, being on the water, and visiting the smaller islands around Trinidad. Those experiences gave me a sense of place that still finds its way into my fiction.
As a child, I also read constantly. The Famous Five, The Secret Seven and The Hardy Boys were favourites because the children were not standing at the edge of the story waiting for adults to solve everything. They were in the middle of the mystery. They had to observe, make decisions, trust one another and keep going when things became difficult.
That is part of what I wanted to bring into Adventure Seekers and The Secret Hideaway. The setting is Caribbean, but the emotional core is universal: friendship, family, loyalty, fear, curiosity and courage. I wanted young readers to feel the heat, the sea, the uncertainty and the excitement, while still caring about the people at the centre of the story.
Writing from memories also helps me avoid making the Caribbean feel like a decorative background. For me, these places are connected to real experiences — boats, camps, coastlines, weather, family outings and the particular feeling of growing up on an island. I can then reshape those memories into fiction rather than simply describing a location from a distance.
The same approach influenced A Dog's View. That book comes from a different part of my life: my love for dogs and the bond between pets and their families. Telling a story through a dog's eyes gave me another way to explore loyalty, fear, home and belonging without losing the sense of adventure that I enjoy writing.
I want children to enjoy the story first. The book has to pull them forward. But if they finish it also thinking a little more about courage, family, animals, friendship or another part of the world, then the adventure has done something more than entertain them.
That is the kind of children's fiction I am trying to build: stories rooted in real memories and real places, but written to give young readers the same feeling I had when I was a child reading long after I was supposed to be asleep — that there was always one more mystery around the corner.