Teleporters Invade Thorngate Hall

Through February I was privileged to write a progressive story with a bunch of primary school kids from all across South Australia. “Escape From Thorngate Hall” has thirty chapters; I wrote the first and last. The rest was entirely up to the kids. Each chapter was published in the Adelaide Advertiser one day at a time, with illustrations by Stephen Stanley. I played only a very small role in suggesting what might come next.

So it was an absolute treat when the students who wrote Chapter 25 included a teleporter! Which meant it was illustrated! You can see the Thornage Teleporter in all its glory to the right. And what a fantastic mess of glass, knobs, and cables it is. (Anyone familiar with the world of Twinmaker will be whispering, “Don’t push the red button, whatever you do . . .”)

“Escape from Thorngate Hall” concluded today with a reading from the final chapter at Adelaide Writers’ Week. It was an absolute pleasure to be part of this amazing project for Literacy and Numeracy Month. The teleporter was pure bonus.