The Appeal of McKay's Casson Children

by Sally Lodge, Children's Bookshelf -- Publishers Weekly, 2/16/2006

First introduced in 2001's Whitbread Award-winning Saffy's Angel and reappearing in Indigo's Star and Permanent Rose, the irrepressible Casson children resurface in Caddy Ever After, scheduled for a June release by McElderry Books. Abundant humor and affection among characters mark Hilary McKay's novels chronicling the frequent ups and occasional downs in the lives of these four siblings, all named after colors of paint by their artist parents.

McKay, who has created other memorable fictional families—the Conroys in her Exiles novels and the Robinsons in the trilogy that debuted with Dog Friday—explains that these characters are not based on her own experience growing up in England as the oldest of four sisters. Rather, her novels' entertainingly eccentric family members come "entirely and utterly from my imagination, I am sorry to say! I suppose they were the families I would have liked to have."

Her inspiration for Saffy's Angel, in which Saffron accompanies her disabled friend Sarah and her family to Italy, where the girls uncover secrets about Saffy's past, had numerous sources, McKay says. "There were quite a few factors in writing Saffy, all unrelated, that I put together. Some were just very vivid images—a yellow climbing rose in Italy. A very vivid dream about an angel in a stone garden (I am lucky with dreams). A disabled child I knew who made me wonder wherever I could find a book which they could read and identify with without having to think, 'Yes, but….' Also I wanted to try and set a story in a very ordinary town and see if it would still be possible to get the extraordinary, almost fairytale feel of more obviously inspiring places."

The author did not initially envision Saffy's Angel as the first in a line of novels about the Cassons, believing at the time that it was "definitely a one-off. At the same time, I did know more about the characters than I put down in the story, so I suppose the potential was there." It was what she calls "readers' lovely reactions" that moved her to revisit the clan in subsequent books—even though these appreciative fans almost didn't get the chance to read Saffy's Angel at all. "I wrote it uncommissioned, and the night before I sent it off to my publishers, I gave it to my mother to read," McKay says. "She was so utterly bored by it I nearly threw it away. I was astonished when it was accepted."

Striking a Resonant Chord

Asked what she feels most draws readers into her Casson stories, McKay pinpoints youngsters' ability to identify with the characters. "I get lots of letters saying, 'I am just like Saffy/Rose and my sister/brother is just like Caddy/Indigo and my mother is very nice but hates to cook/won't stop singing, etc.' And they like the jokes. And they are appalled by the food the family eats—and quite rightly. I get menu criticisms."

Karen Wojtyla, executive editor of McElderry Books, took over the editing of McKay's novels after her original editor, Margaret K. McElderry (who edited Saffy's Angel and Indigo's Star) retired. Wojtyla believes that the appeal of these books is largely due to their "incredible humor and humanity. The author is able to get to the emotional core of every situation, but with such a light touch. She has impeccable comedic timing. These novels speak to kids of a variety of ages, boys as well as girls."

Wojtyla explains that, while editing these books, she doesn't change any of the dialogue, in order to ensure that the narrative "keeps the British flavor. We do very slight Americanizing—trainers may become sneakers and a jumper a sweater. Our editions now come out at the same time as the British editions, so Anne McNeil, McKay's editor at Hodder Children's Books, and I communicate with each other and look at each other's edits. We like to be on the same page."

Like the young readers who write to McKay, two booksellers who are ardent fans of the Casson capers cite the compelling and realistic characters as key to the novels' success. Carol Stoltz, children's buyer at Porter Square Books in Cambridge, Mass., comments, "I love how real the kids are, and how real the parents are—they are definitely parents with warts. But they all have a wonderful sense of family and care for each other. There is a warmth in these books that I find just lovely."

Similarly, Julie Klein, children's book buyer at Book Revue in Huntington, N.Y., remarks that the Casson kids "are very quirky but very real. This is a kind of unusual family in that the parents are separated and they deal with that but also don't deal with that. They are still very much a family and there is lots of love there. The children find their own ways through their problems, yet there is a sweetness and an innocence that comes through with these siblings. McKay has a refreshingly understated way of dealing with traumatic events and she deals with them realistically from the kids' point of view."

Though these buyers have a sense that sales of McKay's Casson family novels have built since the release of Saffy's Angel, they both expressed frustration that the author doesn't have the widespread readership that she deserves. Each does her part to bring more youngsters to McKay's novels: Stoltz by handselling the books and Klein—whose children's section is large enough that handselling is often difficult—by including the novels in displays featuring recommended reading signs. According to the publisher, although it is difficult to determine a specific sales pattern for the various novels, since Permanent Rose is fairly new and there are no sales figures available for Caddy Ever After, sales are most notably increasing with each book through education and library wholesalers, and the novels are also selling well at retail.

Both booksellers are thrilled at the news that McKay may pen another Casson tale. "I think there might be one more," muses the author. "It depends on how Caddy Ever After gets on—if anyone likes it. After that, no more. The Casson children are all growing up too quickly."

Wojtyla is pleased that another manuscript may land on her desk, commenting, "Hilary's publishers and booksellers in this country and in England begged her to write another book about her most endearing family yet. Thinking that there might be yet one more novel about the Cassons makes us all happy."

And it seems unlikely that Caddy Every After will not "get on" quite well indeed, given McKay's impressive accumulation of critical praise, awards and positive reader feedback. Of the last-mentioned, she exclaims, "Feedback from readers is fantastic! I love it and answer every letter that arrives with an address." She also has constant contact with youngsters through her work with a youth group and her job running a school library, which, she notes "keeps my feet on the ground very nicely."

The author is rather less bullish on bookstore visits as a way of connecting with her readers. "I do the odd bookshop signing thing," she remarks with characteristic humor and candor. "But I hate it because hardly anyone every turns up and then the store managers have to start ringing their babysitters to rush round and look admiring, and it is a case of dragging in kids from the street and their mothers protest and my children who have sworn to bring all their class slide off and won't answer their mobile phones and say, 'Why can't you get a proper job like everybody else's mother?'"

Au contraire, McKay's fans likely feel otherwise—and quite strongly—that she should not abandon her impressive writing career for any other.