Welcome to Savenridge Academy!
This blog is to serve two functions. The first is to promote my novel The Magi, which I will talk more about below. The second is to share excerpts from The Magi and get feedback.
BACKGROUND TO THE MAGI-
In the fall of 2010, I had a professional crisis. I have been a middle school English teacher my entire career and each year, it seems, kids want to read less and less. I would take my class to the library every other week, and every time I felt like a pinball scoring no points as I ran from student to student asking them if they found an exciting book to read. I felt like a complete failure when the following trip to the library produced the same students returning last week’s unread book and searching for a new one.
I finally decided to change my strategy. Instead of asking each student individually what type of book they wanted at the time, I created a survey for every student at once, listing questions about what they thought the perfect book would be like.
As you can imagine, many answers were quite diverse. However, there were some ideas that almost every student mentioned. Over and over I found myself reading some of the same requests.
I found myself slightly obsessed (okay, VERY obsessed) with their answers, and as I continued to pour over their surveys, a storyline began to form in my mind. I began to think that I could write this unmade story that students this age are demanding.
For almost half a year I worked on constructing a plot that eventually became The Magi, making sure that I stuck to the requests of my students. It’s been about a year now, and I’m finally ready to share my story. I may have initially written it for my students, but if it’s good enough, I hope to be able to contribute something fun to read for kids everywhere.
Because I am still trying to promote the book I will only release portions of The Magi at a time . I have placed the prologue on THE MAGI tab at the top of the page. Once I have 10 subscribers (you can subscribe on the tab to the right), I will release the next chapter. I welcome any and all feedback through comments or email. Thank you for your support.
Kevin M. Turner
Kevin I am very impressed by your efforts and ability to reach out to reluctant students, especially the upper elementary and middle school.
This is a wonderful idea! I have often wished I could do something similar for my students. I have not had the time or patience (or creativity, for that matter). I am so excited to see what you’ve written. Good luck, and I hope to see your idea turn out better than you expect!
Thank you so much! Sorry I’m so late at this response. Busy, busy bee. Hope you enjoy it.
It’s off to a good start. I can definitely see that appealing to some middle-schoolers I know. Best of luck with the project.
I hope you’re right! I think it has appeal to that age, but then again, I wrote it, so I’m probably not the best critic 🙂
[…] In the interest of shortening this entry, I will skip why I wrote The Magi. For more detailed information, click here. […]