As her latest novel hits the shops, Darlington author Jenna Burtenshaw shares the local places that inspired her to write.

I HAVE lived in Darlington all my life, and ever since I first learnt to read, I have loved books. Whenever someone picks up a story and reads the first few lines, they step through a papery door and let words carry them away into another world.

Books invite readers to explore unlimited places and times. They lead us down streets we have never walked and introduce us to characters that never would have existed unless someone decided to write them down.

Books challenge, excite, and scare us. They free our minds from the restrictions of everyday life, teach us how our own world could be made better and show us how people cope when life takes a turn for the worst.

When I was younger, I often visited local libraries and read anything I could get my hands on. I was amazed by the varied worlds that could grow from writers’ imaginations. One day, I decided to create worlds like that for myself.

My first book, Wintercraft, was published in May 2010. It follows the story of Kate Winters, a girl who can see into the veil separating the worlds of the living and the dead, and Silas Dane, the sinister man who is hunting her. I wrote Wintercraft for teens and adults. It is set in a fantasy world that is very different from ours, but I did not realise just how much the local area had influenced me until the book was complete.

I always treat writing stories as a puzzle that needs to be pieced together.

It is easy to overlook the things we see often and dismiss them as unimportant, but ideas and inspiration really are everywhere.

During my years at Longfield School, I walked through North Cemetery every day. One dark morning in winter, snow was clinging to the gravestones, the abandoned Victorian chapel was shrouded in white, and when I stood beneath its archway I could imagine the building as it had been when it was newly built. I didn’t know it at the time, but that chapel with its crumbling roof and stone carvings would eventually breathe life into what would become Wintercraft’s ancient spiritfilled city of Fume, a vast gothic-touched graveyard with black towers and gargoyle-guarded streets.

Visiting the drift mine at Beamish Museum showed me what it was like to walk underground and helped me to develop a subterranean network of tunnels in the books known as the City Below.

And a few years ago, medieval skeletons were discovered under Darlington’s market place and reburied under a sunken locomotive wheel near St Cuthbert’s church.

That event – and the wheel itself – directly inspired the listening circles, which play a key role in Wintercraft’s world.

Next time you are in Darlington town centre, ignore the shop windows and look up at the old mismatched buildings that make up the main streets. Walk through the narrow Yards and you can feel the past surrounding you. There are many hidden treasures and mysteries to be discovered, if you know where to look. The town is alive with history, from the railways – which inspired the monstrous Night Train – to the market streets that double as Kate’s home town at the very beginning of the book. Darlington sneaked its way into my stories and helped bring places I had imagined to life.

Following Wintercraft’s publication last year, the series was sold to countries including Australia, Poland, Indonesia and Brazil, and will be published by Greenwillow/ HarperCollins in the US in June.

Since the UK release, I have been lucky enough to visit schools and libraries and talk to young adults who have a real interest in reading. From what I have seen, books are more popular than ever. Almost every person I meet has a favourite book or writer, and there is nothing better than hearing readers talk about the stories they love.

There are also many writers-to-be out there, and it is always a pleasure to talk to people who are interested in writing and let them know that being published is not an impossible dream. It is a challenge, certainly, but it can be done. If you want it enough and work hard, nothing can stand in your way, so take a chance.

Once you see your own book in print, it all becomes worthwhile.

􀁧 Jenna’s second book, Wintercraft: Blackwatch, continues Silas and Kate’s story and will be published on Thursday. She will sign copies of both books in the series at Waterstone’s in Durham on Saturday, April 16, and Waterstone’s in Darlington on Friday, April 22, before beginning a UK book tour in May.

For further details visit the official Wintercraft website at wintercraft.co.uk, or Jenna’s personal blog at jennaburtenshaw.blogspot.com