Secret of Grim Hill, The

Linda DeMeulemeester is from Burnaby, British Columbia

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Linda DeMeulemeester is a teacher and program adviser in Burnaby, British Columbia. She graduated from the Clarion West Workshop for writers of science fiction and fantasy in Seattle and has had several short stories published in magazines. The Secret of Grim Hill was her first novel, and was inspired by her "inner eleven-year old" who loves adventure and believes in magic. It has gone on to win the 2008 Ontario Library Association Silver Birch Award, and was named a Canadian Toy Testing Council’s Top Ten “Great Book” of the Year. What inspired Linda's writing style? Here's some background, straight from the author:

My grandmother was a storyteller. She was born over a hundred years ago and knew a lot of cool stuff from back in the olden days. For instance she had friends who had been on the disastrous voyage of the ship, the Lusitania, when it sank after being torpedoed in the Atlantic. Also, a neighbour of hers had lived in China when there was a huge earthquake and the street opened up right at the girl's feet pulling everything into a huge crack in the earth. The way my grandmother would tell those stories would have me sitting on the edge of my chair, ready to fall off if I didn't find out what happened next: "Would they be saved?" I'd shout.

I learned that danger made good suspense.

My grandmother also had a really big trunk that she kept in her bedroom. It was full of amazing things, old fur stoles and coloured glass bottles containing whiffs of foreign perfumes, kind of creepy tin toys and books and pictures from a long, long time ago. That trunk contained such strange and exotic items, my fingers would itch to open it up and find out about everything inside.

Mystery, I discovered, was interesting.

I guess I'm what you'd call a person who enjoys a few thrills and chills, for example that feeling you get at the very top of the roller coaster when your stomach lurches in anticipation of diving down that amazingly steep hill. Yup, a little spooky is good. Not flat out scary, though, like watching movies between my fingers such as "The Swamp Thing" or "Invaders from Space."