Kids Meet author Robin Stevens
The author of the Most Unladylike Mysteries series, Robin Stevens, was in Dublin recently for the International Literature Festival. She spoke to us about the next book in the series, Top Marks for Murder, and why she enjoys writing historical murder mysteries so much
“My trip to the International Literature Festival Dublin was a really wonderful opportunity to meet my fanbase in Ireland, so I was really thrilled to be a part of it this year. “My books are murder mysteries set in the 1930s, but I think they have a really strong message of being helpful and kind and showing children that like Daisy and Hazel [the series’ intrepid investigators], they can e ect big changes, even though they’re 13 or 14 years old. I hope that my fans are children who do want to change the world.
“I’ve always loved telling stories and reading stories since I was ve or six. I’ve always been fascinated with writing and speci cally, the reason why I’m a crime writer writing murder mysteries for children is that I started reading Agatha Christies when I was 12.
“I was just thrilled by them, frightened and fascinated, and decided that this was what I really wanted to focus on. So I spent years reading as many murder mysteries as I could and watching them on TV.
“I started writing to x a lack that I saw in murder mysteries: they were very adult books that children and teenagers were reading.
“My books come in the gap between Agatha Christie and Enid Blyton. When I was seven or eight, there was
nothing to move onto after Enid Blyton except Agatha Christie and I wished that there was a sort of middle ground for young readers.
“I love mysteries because like most people, I’m very curious and love puzzles to solve. At the beginning of each murder mystery, there’s a dead body and anyone in the book could be the murderer. Everything seems so intense and frightening, but at the same time when you pick one up you know that everything is going to be solved. So it’s a very structured and a safe reassuring story. If you are somebody who is anxious about crime in real life, they show you that everything can be xed and everything can be made whole again and that is very comforting.
“The golden age of mystery writing was the 1930s but also I think it’s a very interesting time in European history, right between the two World Wars. It’s this sort of pause in all the danger when everyone was just totally focused on having fun because they had such a trauma.
I also use historical ction to talk about a lot of things in 2019. I can look at the way women and people of colour were treated in the 1930s, as a way of talking about the issues for women, people of colour and LGBTQ people now.”