Three years of endless juggling – moving cattle to agistment, selling hundreds more, running out of water and moving the family unit – has given self-confessed daydreamer Paul Currin plenty of thinking time.
Paul and his wife Kathy and their four children usually live at Meroondah Downs, 120km south of Longreach, but they ran out of house water about two months ago and moved in with Paul’s parents on the other family property, Consentes, north of Julia Creek.
While many men might use time at the wheel to plan how the next round of mustering might happen, Paul has spent the hours clocking up the monotonous 630 kilometres between the two places imagining what the fluffy and scaly dragons in his children’s novel might do next.
His preoccupation with fire-breathing medieval animals stems, ironically, from a dislike of reading books. Kathy likes to read to their children before bed at night, but Paul thought it stifled their imagination.
“I wanted to involve them and got them to choose the things to put in the story,” Paul explained. “Then Ted (their eldest child) started telling his teacher the story, and she thought it was worthwhile.
“I was in town waiting for Kath to have our third child and started getting cabin fever. I just went and wrote 2000 words.”
He and Kathy laughingly agree there was plenty of scope for improvement but with advice from his schoolteacher mother and some online courses, his fantasy tale about two boys on an outback sheep property riding horse and motorbikes, going fishing and chasing pigs with their best friends Doug and Sarah, was soon being lapped up by the Year 2/3 class in Julia Creek.
“Their mates Ted and Bill were the main characters, and apparently I had the attention of everyone,” Paul said. “The kids started sending me pictures they’d imagined from the story, and then the school year was coming and I had to finish it for them.”
After 18 drafts, Paul had written Do You Believe in Dragons, thanks to Longreach publisher Strictly Literary. It has chapters that snugly fit a bedtime reading session for younger children, but can be read alone by older children.
Paul asked Nelia property-owner and illustrator Maree Power to add her special touch to the pages. She said she related well to the story, growing up in the same district, and having the same affinity for life on the land.
I’d like it to rain, and be in a happy place to keep writing.
- Paul Currin
As well as subject matter that appeals to country kids, Paul hopes the story gives them a sense of what it means to believe in a dream, and to look beyond the obvious in life.
He’s now planning a whole series that put a country spin on favourite childhood legends.
“I’d like it to rain, and be in a happy place to keep writing,” he said. “Who knows, there could even be a movie option!”
Paul officially “launched” the novel at the Longreach School of Distance Education graduation on Tuesday night.
You can get your own paperback or ebook copy of the book at the following links:
Paperback: http://goo.gl/48qE7b
Ebook: http://goo.gl/6T5epb
