by Kim Hood
I honestly don’t know if I captured that experience. Only those of you with bipolar will be able to tell me how close I have come to that goal.
It turns out this book isn’t really about what I thought it was about though. I thought I was writing about a girl with undiagnosed bipolar disorder, who has a sister struggling to overcome cancer. It seems that I don’t know what my books are about until they are written.
Though I’ve been fortunate enough to enjoy good mental health so far and was also spared any close encounters with childhood or teen cancer – when I reached the end of writing this story, I was surprised to find my own experiences and struggles strongly reflected in it. I am from a town much larger than Jane’s village of 423 people, but growing up I felt the same disconnect between what my peers seemed to aspire to and what I felt – at a gut level – was possible. Like Jane, I didn’t know what the alternatives were; I didn’t have anyone to give me any hints. It wasn’t until I moved from my home town that my gut feeling for wanting something ‘more, different’ began to take a tangible shape. I wasn’t lucky enough to meet a ‘Farley’ before then.
It took me a while, but I’ve been fortunate to meet a handful of ‘soulmates’ in my life, who have been a mirror for who I am. They have illuminated parts of me that I somehow knew were there, but couldn’t articulate. My one piece of advice to you would be to keep open to meeting these rare souls. You’ll know them when you see them; they will be the people who make you think, ‘Yes! You really do see me. That’s the person I am!’
At its heart, this book is about the bond between two sisters. I really didn’t think it was. It is only in the final stages of editing that I see how central the relationship between Jane and her sister Emma is to the book. I have two sisters myself, and like Jane and Emma, my sisters and I are all very different from each other. We have grown up to live busy lives in three very separate places – and though I think of them daily, I don’t tell them enough how much they mean to me. That can be the way, can’t it? There is this dichotomy between the people who mean the most to us, also being the ones we take most for granted. Maybe, just maybe, this book is a reminder from my subconscious of what really matters – family, in all its imperfect and complicated guises.
About the Author
KIM HOOD grew up in Canada, but now lives in the west of Ireland with her partner and daughter. She has an eclectic background in education, therapy and social services, which hasn’t helped her one bit in her latest endeavours of smallhold farming and running a local newspaper. Plain Jane is her second novel. Her first novel Finding A Voice was nominated for the YA Book Prize in 2015.
Copyright
This eBook edition first published 2016 by
The O’Brien Press Ltd,
12 Terenure Road East, Rathgar, Dublin 6, D06 HD27, Ireland.
Tel: +353 1 4923333;
Fax: +353 1 4922777
E-mail: [email protected].
Website: www.obrien.ie
First published 2016.
The O’Brien Press is a member of Publishing Ireland.
eBook ISBN: 978–1–84717–854–1
Text © copyright Kim Hood 2016
Copyright for typesetting, layout, editing, design © The O’Brien Press Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or in any information storageand retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Cover image courtesy of iStockphoto
Jo’s got used to keeping her head down and getting on with things.
Between looking after her mother and avoiding the mean kids at school, she’s never had much time to think about what she wants – and it wouldn’t occur to her to ask for help.
She has to be the strong one, always.
When she meets Christopher she wants to help make his life better and will go to dramatic lengths to do so.
But she finds out that friendship is a two-way street …
A moving and compelling story of friendship against the odds.