yes book club is back friends and we are doing what we do best talking offerings books amazing
authors and illustrators and of course find out what you've been reading now for this return of
book club i thought we would do it in style with not one not two but three guests well four kind of
first off we've got the author of the jamie johnson book series dan friedman will be
joining us and then we're going to be joined by the planet omar book series author and
2021 world book day author zainab mian and we're going to be joined by co-authors and
real life brothers did you say real life brothers are danny and mick gonna be on book club no
not danny and mick hacker our guests are two brothers who are also co-authors and
members of the amazing diversity dance troupe it is ashley and jordan banjo
hey what's happening bro what's up hello guys welcome to book club um now we are very very
excited obviously you are phenomenal dancers but now great authors of your new book fly high crew
the green glow read us a little bit of the paragon let's get excited for this book why don't we let's
go let's go straight in from the opening ready tip top ready let's go
as soon as the school bell rang trey and jack's race to their street dance rehearsal
neither of them suspected that the cataclysmic life-changing event was just around the corner
cataclysmic life-changing events simply didn't happen in a place like this oh listen i can't lie
chills are body popping all over my body i'm trying to control them
beautiful use of the word cataclysmic i'm a big fan of that but now trey and jack's loving the
fact that they're always struggling to find some place to rehearse and they've got to deal with his
teaching with the crank short or mrs stankshore great way to switch up his name like that um
this teacher likes to call the police in them when they use the school hall to you know practice in
which is totally unnecessary did you guys ever find uh yourself struggling to find places to
dance as well when you were with diversity we knew a few crankshaws in arsenal yeah a few busy boys
let's i'm sure everyone does yeah we were quite lucky because we actually had a studio right we
had a studio that was one of the kind of points of differences with the characters we were almost
like i wonder what it would be like if we were in school we didn't have our own studio how would
that look in a world outside of our own because we we believe what we've done and you know being
in diversity and having a group all of that is possible for whoever wants to make it happen
so we thought we'd just kind of explore a bit of a different version of the story to our own
obviously now from what i'm hearing dance going to a dance classes i feel like you're writing
from experience here um i don't know where did the inspiration come for writing this book i
think you might i think you're right there dude obviously there's definitely some inspirations for
our own lives but you chuck in some epicness some action maybe some exaggeration on how skilled we
actually are and you get a very a very very poor look that's the brilliant thing about writing a
book you can kind of exaggerate what you want right the big question i that we need to know
that everyone at home needs to know for their own safety is if they do catch their teachers
drinking green coffee what should they do if you catch your teachers drinking right first of all
i hope trail only lesson in a book listen to your little brother okay that's the first take advice
you need a bit of teamwork you need to stick together most importantly run though secondly i'd
say watch and observe i'm too curious like that i'd be like could you imagine if i see a teacher
drinking a green coffee i'd be like what's going to go worse advice i'm sorry you're going to get
ashley just wants invaded do his own like david attenborough now watching as you can see the
teacher has mutated and doing weird things here we have whoa hold on there lads that alarm means
only one thing it's time for the great emoji book challenge with zainab mian hello zainab it's great
to have you here with us on book club to take on a very very illustrious challenge it's called the
great emoji book challenge i will give you free emojis and you must hit those emojis and create an
incredible story that moves my soul and brings me to tears possibly in a few sentences all right are
you ready for the emoji zaynab all right reese i'm ready let's go all right okay so your emojis are
an alien the alien emoji a baby bottle and the 100 emoji you know the red 100.
go all right and alien was sent down to the earth with a challenge of finding 100 baby bottles
so he whizzed around in his spaceship and snatched baby bottles from a hundred kids leaving them
absolutely in tears and mums were just throwing their prams out the spaceship and it went down
how do you reach that level of darkness to create a story like that i am shaken to my core the last
i've got to ask you zainab can you name that give it a title do all of the baby bottles
i mean wow so uh now my job is i need to rate that with an emoji myself so i'm trying to think
of them it's definitely got to be the scream emoji of the the hands on the face like oh
because that made me want to do that internally but um wow zaynab i said bring them to tears and
you stepped up oh oh oh venom so sorry actually enjoy the back i've got to go but thank you again
i'm rocked to my core now tell us a bit about the aliens how did you guys come up with their
characters and stuff what was your process me and ash for one of a better word sci-fi
superhero action-based notes that is me and ash so to be to be in a place where we're writing a book
where the characters have losing inspirations from ourselves it's kind of fun to put yourself
in a scenario where trying to think back which seems like too long ago when i was a kid what
would have been the coolest but probably scariest thing that could be happening the
alien situation you know to have the motive where in a weird way trying to do something good but
not the best but not the best way you know that was kind of emotional when you're writing stuff
as like myself as a kid watching superhero shows i'd always be i'd always be thinking how would
i be in that so i'd always think of what i could do so i used to sprint so i was like well i'd be
a speedster so obviously with you guys you think well i'd spin on my head and kick them away easily
done but i can't i can't have you on here and and not at least be cheeky and ask can you teach me
just some moves some arm actions that i can do in something that i could probably just impress
where it comes from for you as a sprinter not a dancer listen
i've got i've got many i've i dabble i dab with a lot of different things
about yourselves worry about yourselves yeah so go clap yep
yep
duke and then clap at the end right okay all right here we go
love the banjo brothers you know i've definitely got the moves look at that
i can so join diversity not with my laces though there's untied that's very dangerous give me a
minute it takes 30 seconds for me to tie him up i struggle all right hi guys it's dan friedman here
i'm the author of the jamie johnson book series and while reece is tying up his laces i've got
30 seconds to tell you my top tips for creating characters so my first one is use real people
the people that you've met in your life because then you're going to be confident you're going to
know how they look and what kind of person they are although you don't have to stick to exact
real life when you're putting them in your story secondly know everything about them what's their
favorite pizza what's their biggest secret what's their favorite music what's their dream in life
and thirdly listen to them if your characters start talking to you then they'll write your
story for you oh man that was a tricky knot anyway whilst i was down there i came up
with a great idea for a new dance move so basically just like flick my leg up like
sorry guys that's a doorbell let me quickly see who that is
hi guys that was me who rang the doorbell and while reece is answering it to no one
i've got a bit of time to tell you my top tips on cliffhangers so cliffhangers are that bit
in a story where it stops and leaves you wanting more and makes you want to read on and my tip for
cliffhangers are this one if you know the ending of your story that's going to help you because
then you can work your way back and maybe put in five gaps in your story where you're going to cut
it and leave the reading wanting more secondly have your character that they desire a goal that
is a clear goal that they want to achieve and just as they get close that's the time to put
in a cliffhanger to really make us want to read on and thirdly it's all taste but i would suggest use
clicks hangers during the story rather than at the very end because we all like to know what's
going to happen it can be a bit frustrating if the cliffhangers at the end so put them in the
beginning and the middle and close to the end but maybe not the very end okay i better go now reese
is on his way back or is he will he trip over his laces that's how you write a cliffhanger
whoa that was that was weird there was none at the door is someone playing a prank on me
because if you are i'm not amused all right pack it in when i feel like you guys know something
something i don't like how to write a great character or a cliffhanger or something
anyway i caught up with zainab mian about world book day and all to talk about her book planet
omar operation kind i guess i'm just curious teddy i mean what if i try a bit of meat piss and then
i like it and then i'll try more and more jasmine hackers got them left and then what if hacker is a
dog and then he eats me and then i've gotta be laughing no no wrong clip take me to zainab so
your book is called planet omar and firstly i want to know where did you get the inspiration for omar
well when i started writing the planet omar series my very own son was nine years old and
he was just super cheeky always learning himself into trouble accidentally because
you know deep line inside he's a great kid and he has a really kind heart just like omar so i wanted
to write a character which i'm special like him i can so imagine you like you get called into school
one day because he's done something cheeky and you're like this is great you give me great stuff
uh that's brilliant uh now the thing about omar as well as well as being the main character he's
a muslim character as well which is so brilliant for young muslim kids to feel represented
how important do you feel is to be represented in stories like this
thank you i think it's just such a wonderful thing to be able to pick up a book in your classroom
or in the mainstream bookstores that you walk into and see a book where there's a character just like
you it makes you it makes children feel like they belong in the world that they're in which
is incredibly important absolutely and you know one of the best ways that we sometimes discover
books like that is on world book day so and you have been named one of the authors four world book
days so congrats cause that's brilliant um can you tell me what does world book day means to you
welcome day is just um incredible because it gives children the chance to own a book even if perhaps
otherwise they might not have been able to easily and it's just a day when everyone's celebrating
the fun that you can find in reading it's a day that every kid knows about and remembers
so i think it's just a great way of getting children reading and enjoying that reading time
hello i'm catherine rundle and i'm the author of sky steppers and i love world
book day because it's two of my favorite things books and celebrations i love the idea of a day
in which we come together to talk about how books can sweep you away on a wild adventure
and change the world a day of treasuring that to me seems a truly spectacular thing so since omar
in your book zainab is quite the troublemaker we've come up with a quiz for you okay so i'm
going to give you some fictional troublemakers that we know and love i'll give you some clues
and you've got to guess who that troublemaker is so this quiz is called writer or wronger
oh and also something to add zainab is if you get them wrong i get to slime you what
how you do know reese that i'm at home i'm not in the same studio as you so that's impossible
there's no one here to slimy it's time to do the quiz all right it's time for writer or wronger
question one is a shakespeare character mischievous fairy replaced bottom's head with the
head of a donkey is it a romeo b puck or c macbeth b puck oh right okay god of mischief brother of
thor can control other people's minds is it a loki b nearly headless nick or c danger mouse
i'm so tempted to say the c but it's a loki oh i was gonna say go for it you know no correct
all right for the clean sweep one of the fires to be invited to willy wonka's chocolate factory
labelled a bad nut whiny stubborn and spoiled is it a charlie bucket b baruch assault or c
violet beauregard uh i think it's b erica salt oh saying you absolutely smashed it well done
congratulations you know you're troublemakers i guess no slime for you you're lucky but just for
suggesting that i should be slimed i think you should be slime so somebody in the studio slime
wreath please wait hey well first off because of you know social distancing is not very safe
however i am a man of my word and i do understand that yes i did do that too i will self-sign myself
for the culture for the entertainment dip book club here we go three two one ah
you're serious i'm not so mean so i switched the slime for confetti thank you
zaynab thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us and do a bunch of nonsense
and make sure you're checking out zayna's book planet omar operation kind
i have been through all the emotions today but thanks to our amazing guests zainab mian dan
friedman and ashley and jordan banjo for joining us on book club today and if you would like to
see yourself on book club we'll head over to the book club page on the cbbc website send us a video
of your book review send us a book selfie or just comment on what books you're loving at the moment