Introducing Sean Walsh: A Moment of Magic

Once in a while magic happens in the real world.

If you blink you will miss it, but sometimes you are lucky enough to actually see it happen. Now I’m not talking about wizards swirling wands around or witches with blue lightning crackling from their fingertips. Oh no. I’m talking about the solid variety, the kind that maybe, just maybe changes someone’s life.

I am one of those lucky people, in the right place at the right time to see such a moment. It all began on the last day of the York Festival of Writing. I’d spent most of the event guarding the door of the One to One sessions. It’s a tense place, that room, lots of people passing through, their hopes and dreams all lovingly packed into their perfect manuscripts, the agent or book doctor or editor of their choice about to bolster their career or send them off to try harder.
Many had left smiling, others frowning but most of them were determined to press on.

It had turned quiet and just a handful of writers were waiting. One left a table then took a seat to wait again. He sat patiently, keeping himself to himself. I now know, that’s his way. He had just been to see Debi Alper, who had helped him to hone his book and prepare it for presenting elsewhere. The queue at the door had cleared so I stood with my colleagues, fellow writers Susan K Franklin and Lesley Eames checking what was up next. Debi came and joined us.

“So, how’s your day been?” I asked. I hadn’t met her before so it was a chance for me to get chatting with her.

“Oh it’s been great. You should see the guy I’ve just been talking to, he’s very talented.” She pointed at the man sitting on the chairs, still waiting. She told us that he had sketches with him and that his book was brilliant. My interest was piqued.

“That’s it,” I said, “I’ve just got to go see.” So I did. “Hello, I’ve just been told I should see your drawings, may I?”

The man blushed a little, and his eyes didn’t quite meet mine. He gestured towards Debi and said, “Oh, well, they’re just sketches, I don’t know how they compare to real artists. Debi’s just being kind.” Reluctantly he held the scrolled sheets out to me.

I took them. I took a breath. I’ll be honest, my mind was divided. Either I was in the presence of an undiscovered genius or he really wasn’t being modest. The next moment would tell.

Slowly I unraveled the pages. I tell no word of a lie when I tell you that my jaw dropped. I stared at the image before me. I thought it was stunning. It was just pencil on paper but it had life. There were two pages and I sat quietly looking at them for a few moments before I was able to respond.

His name is Sean Walsh. His book is called Peripherealm.

I chatted with him for a while and he offered me a spare copy of his first three chapters. Sean had another appointment with Beverly Birch, Commissioning Editor from Hodder Children’s Books so I left him to prepare and started to read.

Let me assure you his writing equals his drawings. He paints scenes with descriptions of light, colours as vibrant as any fairy tale book and characters that may as well jump off the page screaming their name and their business. The style of his writing reminded me of the authors I loved reading as a child, Roald Dahl’s characterisation, Alan Garner’s sense of drama, J K Rowling’s relationship development. (OK I wasn’t a child when I read the latter but you catch my drift I’m sure!)

I caught Sean again as he sat back on the waiting chairs. He was going to be introduced to David Headley, from D H H Literary Agency. By now the excitement in the air was palpable and even the reserved writer was starting to believe us when we told him how talented we thought he was.
I asked him a bit more about his writing.

Back in 2004 Sean started writing Peripherealm, partly because some of his pupils at school encouraged him to. Even then he thought his market was limited. Three years later the book was finished and he self published it purely to sell it to the small group of interested people. He never promoted it and barely thought of it until he decided to go to the York Festival of Writing last year. That was when he met Debi and they started to work on perfecting the book.

And so, finally, Sean met David and the moment of magic happened. Sean left finally standing tall, he stopped to say goodbye to us at the registration desk and said, “Looks like I’ll have to start believing you all!”

Beaming I dashed over to see what David had to say and he was as keen as we were. The next day I found out that David had signed Sean up along with another children’s fantasy author we met shortly after, Hilton Pashley.

So, there you have it, one man quietly working on his story and his art. Maybe that day was the start of something amazing. I certainly hope so.

David Headley

Debi Alper

Beverley Birch

York Festival of Writing

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