By NATALIE GALLENTI
ASPIRING young Brimbank novelists will be get a glimpse of literary royalty tomorrow with the arrival of a best-selling author.
Michael Wagner will be a special guest at Sydenham Community Centre when he hosts a workshop referencing his new teenage novel, Destiny’s Right Hand.
Wagner, known best for his classic children’s series Maxx Rumble and the Undys, will unravel the art of storytelling to reveal the basic ingredients of all stories, including satisfying endings and how to effectively create moving pictures in the reader’s mind.
A former Radio Australia employee, Wagner wrote his first short book in 1999 and after a positive response from publishers created the Maxx Rumble series, which tells the story of a sports-mad school kid who loves to recount his sporting glories – albeit with slight exaggeration.
Wagner said despite what many people believe, writing children’s fiction is a lot of hard work.
“It’s easy to come up with old ideas,” he said.
“You have to dig really deep to find something new and it helps if you have a quirky view of the world.
“You can write more originally if you have an original outlook on the world.”
He recalled the anxious moment when his first book was about to be launched at bookshops across the country.
“I remember going to the bookshop when they first came out and thinking what if no one buys one.”
But he needn’t have worried, the successful author has written countless short novels since and received a great response from his target audience. He is now in the process of writing his latest Maxx Grumble series looking at the world of soccer.
