Blog Tour: FANNY FITZPATRICK AND THE SIRENS by Dana Hammer

 

FANNY FITZPATRICK AND THE SIRENS

Dana Hammer

 

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GENRE:  Middle Grade Fiction

 

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BLURB:

 

It’s the end of the school year. For most kids, it’s time to relax and get ready for summer. For Fanny, there’s work. She has a brand-new baby brother, and she’s been hired by Zeus to look after his “injured” son. And she still has her and her friends’ cheesemaking business! Fanny is overwhelmed.

 

But then she meets three sirens who want Fanny to join them on Feather Island for a summer of singing, instrument playing, and fun at the beach. The program is totally free and could start an amazing musical career-the thing that Fanny has always wanted the most.

 

Athena and Gemma are dead set against it. Athena says that the sirens are bad news; that their whole purpose in life is to lure men to their deaths with their beautiful singing. Gemma says that Feather Island is part of a network of unmappable islands, the type of place where criminals and sketchy organizations hoard their wealth and do their crimes.

 

Surely, the sirens don’t do that anymore, right? All that stuff was a long time ago. If the sirens want to keep their island paradise a secret, well, that’s not so weird, is it? Fanny has talked to them, and she just knows that they aren’t as evil as everyone says. They are perfectly nice ladies.

 

Right?

 

Follow Fanny Fitzpatrick as she navigates big sisterhood, friends who disapprove of her life choices, burning ambitions, and a bunch of sirens luring her away to their private island.

 

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Excerpt Two:

 

But I don’t have a chance to practice or not practice, because I remember that I have a Zoom date with Gemma and Athena. I head down to the computer and log in to the meeting.

 

Gemma and Athena are already in there, talking about something. They look serious and sour, but Gemma is wearing the most adorable newsboy hat with embroidered flowers on it, and I squeal when I see it.

 

“Gemma, that hat though!”

 

They stop talking and look at me, not smiling. I realize something weird is going on, and so I stop smiling.

 

“Fanny, we need to talk,” says Athena.

 

That’s not good.

 

“Um. Gemma? How’s England?” Gemma shakes her head at me.

 

I look back to Athena, who has crossed her arms, which makes her look like a strict disciplinarian who’s about to give me a terrible lecture. And I realize that’s exactly what’s about to happen.

 

“Herman told me everything,” Athena says.

 

“Um.”

 

“You let those things in your house! After I specifically told you how dangerous they are!”

 

“I didn’t let them in,” I say, which I realize is a wimpy thing to say, but I can’t think of anything better. “My dad did.”

 

“What did they want? Why were they there, at your house?”

 

“Well—”

 

“Do you have any idea how many people sirens have killed over the course of these millennia?”

 

“But that was a long time ago!” I say, sounding desperate and silly, even to my own ears.

 

“Fanny,” Gemma says, quietly, looking around to make sure no one is listening to her. “I’m not supposed to say this. But there are these islands. A few of them. And they have special deals with the UN, NATO, the African Union, and a few others that I’m not allowed to even say the names of. They have diplomatic immunity. They operate under their own laws, and they answer to no one. They’re unmappable, untraceable. I’ve been talking to Athena, and I think these islands are owned by the sirens.”

 

“You sound like conspiracy theorists,” I say, rolling my eyes. “How do you even know about these top-secret islands if they’re so top secret?”

 

“My parents,” Gemma says, like it’s obvious. I guess it should be obvious. I still have no idea what her parents do for a living, but they seem to jet around the planet a lot, with machete-bearing security guards, so I guess it must be important. Still.

 

“Well, Feather Island is a school. A school for musicians,” I say, trying to reassure them. “There’s a brochure and everything.”

 

I wish I had the brochure so I could show it to them, how lovely and harmless the place is, but my parents have put it somewhere and I don’t know where it is.

 

“How do you know about Feather Island?” Athena demands, looking even more furious.

 

Whoops. I guess I’ve gotta tell them now.

 

“That’s what the sirens wanted. To tell me about their music camp.”

 

“NO!” Athena shouts, banging her fist on the table in front of her. Splinters of wood fly everywhere and I’m kind of scared now. This is intense, even for Athena. “You can NOT go to this island. I don’t care what they told you. It’s bad news.”

 

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 What Makes a Good Middle Grade Story?

 

This is an excellent question, and one that can only be answered subjectively. So I’ll do my best, but I’m sure plenty of people will disagree with me.

 

First of all, middle graders are people, and they like the same things in a story as older people do. Interesting people tackling big problems, satisfying character arcs, and readable prose are all indisposable to a good book. It should be engaging, not preachy, and make the reader think outside of their own experiences. All of these components make for a great novel of of any genre, for any age range.

 

The difference is how subject matter is tackled. Most middle graders are probably not interested in epic tomes that span generations and shine a light on the plight of the working class, and have long, meditative passages about chopping onions as a metaphor for union busting. But a middle grader might love a book about a fellow classmate who is experiencing homelessness, and is forced to chop onions in the school cafeteria to pay for their schooling, and gets teased because she always smells like onions. Both books deal with poverty and struggle, but for a middle grader, you have to scale the problem down.

 

One thing that is super important in writing a middle grade book is to remember what middle grade was ACTUALLY LIKE. Think about yourself when you were eleven, twelve, etc. Were you always thinking about your parents, and schoolwork? I know I wasn’t. I was thinking about my crushes, fashion, bands, and what I was gonna do with my friends that weekend. We swore. We gorged ourselves on candy and chips. We played truth or dare. We froze each other’s underwear at slumber parties. (I don’t know why we did this, it was the nineties, ok?) We gossiped, a lot. We were interesting, complex people. I think it’s important to remember all that when writing for middle grade.

 

I’m not saying a middle grade novel needs to be gritty and profane to be relatable. No one wants Trainspotting for Tots. But it shouldn’t just be “I hate homework. My mom makes me do chores and eat broccoli. My little sister is annoying.” Because that’s not life. Or rather, that’s only a small, uninteresting part of life, and not what makes for a riveting story, or compelling characters.

 

Anyway, I don’t pretend to be an expert on the subject. If I was, I’d be a lot richer. But in my opinion, this is what makes for a good middle grade novel.

 

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

Dana Hammer is a novelist, screenwriter and playwright. She has won over forty awards and honors for her writing, few of which generated income, all of which were deeply appreciated. She is not a cannibal, but she is the author of A Cannibals Guide to Fasting. Dana is also the author of middle grade fantasy My Best Friend Athena which was inspired by a desire to write something her 9 year old daughter could read. 

 

Website: https://www.danahammer.com/

 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/danahammerwriterofthings

 

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Fanny-Fitzpatrick-Sirens-Dana-Hammer/dp/1962308243/ref=sr_1_1

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