YASSMIN ABDEL-MAGIED‘s Silverbrook is a thrilling middle grade fantasy adventure that highlights the power of community.

Read on for a Q&A with the author.

MEET YASSMIN ABDEL-MAGIED

What sparked the idea behind Silverbrook?

A few things came together: I grew up reading mystery novels set in small villages, and love these cloistered, quaint worlds where so much is often h

appening beneath the bucolic surface, so I really wanted to write a story of my own in such a setting. I have also been desperate to bring to audiences a tale inspired by the myths and fables that I grew up with; prophetic stories, stories from the Quran, even the stories of djinn that we told around the playground and in our bedrooms. Finding a way to incorporate elements of a world I knew so well with bigger social issues – perhaps a modern fable, if you will – was what I set out to achieve. I guess the readers will let me know if I hit my goal!

Did any folklore or mythology influence the worldbuilding or the magic in this story?

Definitely. I was born in Sudan, but raised in Brisbane in a vibrant multi-racial, predominantly Muslim, community. What this meant was that I was exposed to many myths and folk stories that are faith based – stories in the Quran, and of the various Prophets for example, but also steeped in the myth and mystery of so many cultures from around the world, including my own. Djinn stories – stories of spirits and beings in a parallel realm to us – were especially popular, as readers of Silverbrook: Yumna and the Golden Horse will find out exactly how I incorporated those myths into the narrative!

How did you approach developing Yumna’s personality and growth throughout the story?

I knew I wanted to make Yumna a curious character; I find curiosity an incredibly charming quality and I like to enjoy spending time with my characters so making her infinitely curious was a fun way to begin! I also knew I wanted her to be a dreamer, in the way a lot of young teenagers are. She would have hopes and ambitions and a wild imagination … but she also needed to have flaws, right? Because that’s what makes a character compelling, that’s what makes you want to follow them through adventure after adventure. So, her flaw, or her need, you could say, is her desire for belonging. She has some big questions, and so much of her drive in life comes from the hunt for answers.

As for the growth, the journey she goes on … much of that unfolded as I was writing. I find that characters, once they’re fleshed out on the page, have this way of telling you what they want to do. I followed that!

Can you tell us more about the sleepy town where the story is set and why the setting is important to the narrative?

Oh, this was a lot of fun! When I started to write this story, I knew I wanted it to be in a small town, but I didn’t want to pluck the town just out of complete fiction. So, I spent some time googling and ended up booking a room in a very cheap but delightful BNB in a tiny village – with a name that half the folks who live there pronounce differently to the other half! This encapsulates so much of what I love about small, sleepy places. They might look sleepy – but there is always so much drama underneath the surface. And it’s the same type of drama wherever you go – whether in Australia, England, Sudan or Saskatchewan. It’s human drama. Who said what to whom, who is friends with whom, who has the nicer house, the biggest farm, the reddest roses. And beyond that – who owns the farms, who makes the decisions, who has the power. Do people come together and trust each other, or do they turn against one another in times of need? How do they treat outsiders? How do they treat each other?

All these are the questions I wanted to explore, and the town of Silverbrook felt like the perfect place to do that!

Do you have any plans to return to the world of Silverbrook in future books?

You bet! I’ve already written the first draft of Silverbrook: Book 2 … so stay tuned! 😉

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Yassmin Abdel-Magied has published five books, most recently Stand Up and Speak Out Against Racism (2023), named a Best Book of 2023 by School Library Journal and longlisted for the 2025 UKLA Book Award and 2024 SLA Information Book Award. Her previous books include the essay collection Talking About a Revolution (2022) and two novels for younger readers, You Must Be Layla (P2019) and Listen, Layla (2021).

Listen, Layla was longlisted for Book of the Year by the Children’s Book Council of Australia, and named a 2022 Honor Book for Children’s Africana Book of the Year by the Center for African Studies at Howard University in the U.S. Her TED Talk on bias has been viewed over 2.7M times. Sudanese by birth, raised in Australia, Yassmin now lives in London.

Visit Yassmin Abdel-Magied’s website