Author Interview with Trilby Kent

You might remember that I chatted with London author Trilby Kent after the publication of her first book “Medina Hill”. Trilby now has TWO new books out – one for adults and another for children. I had the chance to ask Trilby a few questions about her work.

(Just a note — DISCLAIMER — yes, I know Trilby. Yes, I’ve known her since she was a little girl. Yes, some would say this would make me biased towards her work. However, I truly believe that even if you haven’t known Trilby since she was a youngster, you, too, would find her brilliant, talented, and quite charming).

BBNB: Trilby, what are your new books (“Smoke Portrait” and “Stones for my Father”) about? Can we get them in the US?

This is the publisher’s blurb for ‘Smoke Portrait’ (currently available in the U.K. and – soon – Holland. North American rights have yet to sell): “Set in 1936 in Belgium and Ceylon, Smoke Portrait traces the development of an unlikely friendship between a young Belgian teenager, Marten Kuypers, and Glen Phayre, an Englishwoman in her twenties. Glen has left England to live on her aunt’s tea plantation in Ceylon, where she embarks on the task of writing charitable letters to a Belgian prisoner. But the letters go astray, and are received instead by Marten, eager to discover the wide world outside his small village, and desperately missing his older brother Krelis, who has vanished and is presumed dead.

“Marten decides to reply to Glen in the guise of the grown-up prisoner she is expecting to hear from, and as their correspondence evolves, they both assume identities that, while false in many respects, remain true to their own selves in other ways. Gradually they come to depend on each other, and their pen friendship proves to be crucial when events in their real lives take on a darker, more threatening turn in the shadow of the impending world war.”

‘Stones for my Father’ is a YA novel, published in Canada and the U.S. It follows a 12 year-old girl through the darkest days of the Anglo-Boer war, through a trek across the battle-scarred Transvaal and internment in a British concentration camp. Amid the suffering and hardship, a figure of hope emerges in the form of a Canadian soldier with whom she forms a tentative friendship.

BBNB: What’s next for you, Trilby?

As for what’s next – I’m currently halfway through a PhD in Creative Writing, for which I’m having to develop a new novel and accompanying thesis. The book I’m writing takes place in the 1950s and is set in a boarding school on an imaginary island in the North Sea. More on that soon, I hope..!

Thanks for taking the time to chat with us, Trilby!! I can’t wait to read your new books!! -Beth 🙂