Tui Sutherland Soars Again With

Children’s book author, Tui Sutherland, joins us to discuss the latest book in her Wings of Fire series,The Flames of Hope. Named the #1 New York Times best-selling series, Wings of Fire begins with seven dragon kingdoms that are based on the habitats they live in. “There are mud dragons, and sky dragons, and ice dragons, but then in book 11, we discover that there is a continent across the ocean that they haven’t communicated with…in thousands of years and on that continent there are 3 more tribes of dragons. So total there’s 10 different tribes.” Unlike the other books, The Flames of Hope is set in both continents. Readers new to the series won’t necessarily need to start from the beginning to enjoy the books. Sutherland explained, “The beginning of each arc, books 1, 6, and 11… I feel like those are good jumping in points because it’s the start of a new story line, new problems, and usually a whole new set of characters. Even the other characters are there in the background.”

Having written over 50 children’s books, Sutherland is no stranger to entertaining young audiences. Her favorite age group to write for is the middle grade range, from ages 8 to 12 or 10 to 15. “They’re the best age… I just love them. They’re like the best kids and I’m so happy right now because my children are there. They’re 10 and 12. They are so fun to hang out with. I just find them endlessly entertaining. I also feel like that’s when you can change the world… as the writer affecting those kids…in terms of shaping me as a person, most of that happened when I was a kid reading children’s books. They’re also just the best kids to meet… and ask you any kinds of questions with no fear!”

Starting out, Sutherland never imagined how successful she’d become. Her hope from the beginning was simply to write books that did well enough for her to continue writing more books. She also wanted to write books that made kids happy. “I think that’s why I write, is for those moments where you meet a kid and they’re like, ‘This is why I read, because I started with your books’ or ‘your books helped me through something that was stressful’ and so I feel that’s why I became a writer and then it’s just been this amazing experience to have the books succeed the way they have and get to meet more kids like that.”