Year 6 Meet Author Phil Earle

Today, Year 6 were extremely lucky to take part in a live Zoom event with author Phil Earle, who joined us to share his brand-new book, Finn's Epic Fails.
Phil began by telling us about his own experiences at school and how he actually found reading very difficult when he was younger. He explained that some of his teachers — who he jokingly described as “dinosaurs” — believed that reading only counted if it was a very long book, with no pictures, written before the 1900s. Because of this, he said that books often looked like “walls of words”, which made them feel quite intimidating.
However, everything changed when Phil discovered comics, especially Roy of the Rovers. Comics and graphic novels helped him find a love of reading because, as he described it, reading allowed him to be “living a life that wasn’t his own.”
Phil then shared the story of how he began his journey into writing. In his twenties he worked in a bookshop in London, where he was eventually moved to the children’s department. His manager told him that if he wanted to recommend books to young readers, he would need to read them himself first.
One book in particular completely changed how he felt about reading: Holes — a firm favourite here at school too! Phil explained that Holes had drama, comedy, western adventure, love and crime all in one story, and he described it as the book that “lit a fire” in him and made him want to read more.
For the next two years, Phil read as much as he possibly could. Eventually he began to wonder whether he could write a story himself. He talked about how writers find inspiration and reminded us that we are surrounded by stories everywhere. Phil encouraged the children to think of writing as playtime, where you can be anyone, go anywhere and imagine anything — which makes the process far more enjoyable.
We were then very lucky to hear Phil read an extract from Finn’s Epic Fails, and we are very much looking forward to the book arriving in school so that we can all enjoy reading it together.
The children also loved hearing some very funny stories about Phil’s extremely naughty dog, Lenny!
It was a fantastic, informative and thoroughly enjoyable session, and we feel very honoured to have met — albeit virtually — a real author.

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