Jodie Lancet-Grant: The Wild West Twins

Jodie Lancet-Grant is the author of The Pirate Mums and The Marvellous Doctors for Magical Creatures. and The Legend of the Wild West Twins, The Pirate Mums made history as the first book with a two-mum family to be read as a Cbeebies Bedtime Story, when it appeared in 2021, read by Sue Perkins. In her day job, she is Associate Publisher at Bluebird, Pan Macmillan, where she commissions high-profile non-fiction books. Jodie is the chair of judges for the Polari Prize for Children’s Books, which celebrates LGBTQ+ books and creatives. She lives in East London with her wife and their twin daughters.  

Transcript

Nikki Gamble

Hello, everyone. Joining me in the reading corner today I have Jodie Lancet-Grant. I'm pleased to be welcoming Jodie back. We talked three years ago about the publication of The Pirate Mums. 

The Legend of the Wild West Twins is Jodie's third book, and I'm looking forward to delving into that. But we've got an opportunity today to talk about some of the things that Jodie has done in publishing to promote the presence of LGBTQ publishing for children and young people. 

So, a huge welcome to you, Jodie. Thank you for joining me. 

Jodie Lancet-Grant

Thank you so much for having me back. It's lovely to be chatting. 

Nikki Gamble

You have a new role in publishing, Associate Publisher of Bluebird at Pan Macmillan. Tell us a little bit about that role.

Jodie Lancet-Grant

I worked in comms for many years. My first job in publishing was at Puffin in 2006 when you and I first crossed paths, and I was the communications director at Bluebird for seven or eight years.

The LGBTQ plus interest is how I first moved across into being an associate publisher. We had seen an explosion in sales of queer books in the fiction space driven by BookTok. And it showed that there's an appetite for these stories and these voices that maybe the industry hadn't quite realised.

We felt there was a business opportunity to commission some nonfiction in the area. The publisher, Carole Tonkinson, approached me to ask if I would be interested. None of the other editors had the contacts and knowledge in this area.

And I thought, okay, this is interesting. And I started doing it, and I absolutely loved it. Very quickly, I signed up three titles to be published in 2025. Then I thought, oh, okay, this is a completely new way to use my now 20 years of expertise and knowledge in PR and marketing and apply it in a new way.

So last summer, Bluebird had a big restructure. I moved across into the editorial team in an associate publisher role, commissioning across our whole list. We'll have two or three books a year in the LGBTQ plus space, but mainly it's personal development, health, food and drink, parenting, and lifestyle with a serious, elevated, big ideas edge.

And what I'm finding is the books that I'm really attracted to, which chime with The Legend of the Wild West Twins, are the ones in which those areas that we publish overlap with feminism. 

Nikki Gamble

Tell us about your involvement with the Polari Prize.

Jodie Lancet-Grant

This came about because when my first book, The Pirate Mums, came out, a couple of other titles were published at the same time: Nen and the Lonely Fisherman, My Daddies, and Grandad's Camper, which went on to win the Waterstones Prize. It felt like we were at the forefront of this mini explosion of books in this area. But as a publisher, I know how hard it is to get attention for books. That's the biggest problem we face is discoverability. 

I'd long been admiring what Paul Burson had done with the Polari prize, with the first book prize and the main prize. I thought that there was an opportunity here to get some more attention for children's books in this area. There is some pushback about children's books, especially in the picture book space featuring LGBTQ+ representation. I think the more we can focus on these books as being a good thing, the better.

I approached Paul and pitched it, and I thought it would be a great idea if I could secure sponsorship. The prize is completely voluntary. So, for somebody to win something, you must get a sponsor. The first sponsor was Little Box of Books. For this second one (we're doing it every other year.) Ash Literary Agency is sponsoring. 

I didn't know how many books we would get submitted, but we ended up getting absolutely loads, and reading them was a really, really joyous experience, seeing all of these different experiences of LGBTQ+ life, where it wasn't necessarily the centre of the story, was really wonderful. 

Nikki Gamble

Look, we can't tease people any longer. We've got to tell them about The Legend of the Wild West Twins

I was delighted, Jodie, to watch a little clip of you with your daughters talking about, where you get your ideas. And you said, ‘you! So are they the starting point for this book as well? 

Jodie Lancet-Grant

They are in some ways. I love the bond between my daughters, who are twins. I wanted to put that in a book. People are interested in twins, and I think exploring the world with a partner in crime is a really fun thing to do. 

But the core idea of this book is that it's about feminism. It's about how the world responds to girls when they don't present in a way that society approves of. One of the twins in the story, Buffalo Jill, is traditionally girly. She wears ruffly dresses. But it's more than that; she's a real people-pleaser. She doesn't like to cause a fuss. She's always smiling even when she doesn't feel like it.

Her sister, Lil, is much more raucous, a bit moody, and can be a bit aggressive. I wanted to explore how society responds to different girls. They're not comparable to my girls but using twins to explore that felt like a real gift. 

I also wanted to convey teamwork. I always say to my girls to work together on things, and I think this bond that sisters have is a really lovely thing to put in a picture book. 

Nikki Gamble

Why the Wild West theme? 

Jodie Lancet-Grant

Some of it was about language. When I was writing The Pirate Mums, I loved being able to tap into this mini dialect. I felt there was something similar with the Wild West.

I also thought it’s an evocative setting that you don’t see much in picture books. In my reading, I like genres with specific tropes. I like the idea of playing with those tropes, and the Wild West was so rich for that.

In this book the town hero, Yeehaw Jack I wanted him to be in an unrealistic all-white cowboy outfit. So you've got this town hero who turns out to be not who you thought. And then, towards the end, I had so much fun with the idea of a mysterious stranger cresting the ridge at sundown to save the day. It's fun to have those tropes to play with. 

One of my worries was that it wouldn't be visually interesting because it's a desert. I was just so impressed with how much colour and vibrancy Katie Cottle has put into this book. Every page is saturated with colour, and the horses' expressions are some of my favourite bits.

Nikki Gamble

You talked about the language. There’s a huge amount of playfulness with it. In that little clip of you on Newsround with your daughters, you seem to be enjoying playing with language.  I'm guessing that that's probably part of family interaction.

Jodie Lancet-Grant

Oh my gosh, so much. Delilah, one of my daughters, has invented a game that she's been making us play at mealtimes. One person thinks of a word, and then the next person has to have another word, but you can only change one letter. And you have to go round the table and do it. We were wondering if some families do games with numbers, but we can't do anything with numbers. They're only in year four and I already can't do their maths homework. But when it comes to the words and the language play, we're totally all there. 

Nikki Gamble

There is a lesson to be learned is this story. Do these girls learn from each other? 

Jodie Lancet-Grant

Yes, I guess so. Jill is quite inspired to be a bit more like her sister and a bit braver, and I like that. Normally, in a story, the main character is the one who goes on the journey and changes and learns something about themselves. But in this book, Lil doesn't really change. She already knows exactly who she is, and that's fine. And it's more the townsfolk who change.

There's a section where no one in the town likes Lil. Mostly, she doesn't care, but sometimes it does get her down. And she says to her sister, oh, maybe I should be a bit more like you, dainty. And Jill replies, Oh, you're brave.

Sometimes, I wish I could, but then she doesn't get to finish her sentence because Yee Haw Jack rides into town. So, I think her sister inspires her bravery.

Nikki Gamble

I read a quote in an article recently that expressed the view that people from marginalised groups have the best stories. I think that’s an interesting view. Do you agree?

Jodie Lancet-Grant

That is fascinating, isn't it? What I want to do with my books is make the story not about the thing that makes the people different but have a wider understanding of what their story and what their adventure could be.

But I do think that being from a marginalised section of society can drive creativity. Growing up with a feeling of difference and wanting to express that somehow is really powerful when it comes to writing or creating art. So, I definitely think there's something in that.

Nikki Gamble

You seem very at home in the picture book. space. Do you have other writing that is being developed at the moment? 

Jodie Lancet-Grant

Yes. My day job, as you can probably tell, is extremely busy. And I seem to have taken on a lot of things, like with the Polari Prize. However,I am in the process of trying to write a YA novel. , I don't know if it will ever come to fruition simply because of time. But I've got a great idea and great characters that feel fleshed out to me/ The last time I worked on it was in the summer, before I remembered when my deadline for this book was.

Nikki Gamble

Tell us a little bit about squeezing writing in amongst being a mum and  all the other things.

Jodie Lancet-Grant

I try to keep Fridays for writing, and I try and do some on the weekends sometimes, but my girls are always around. So it's mainly one day a week I get to write and do book promo.

I really enjoy my day job. I love that I get to be a writer and I also love to do events and perform. I did a lot of drama when I was younger at university and then just put that away and thought that was done. One of the things I hadn't expected in my journey as being an author is going to school events, going to literary festivals, being on stage and performing these books. I really love it. I don't have time to do everything, but I try and think how lucky I am to have so many things that I like doing that the only issue is squeezing them.

Nikki Gamble

You've talked about enjoying events, so maybe as so many of our listeners are teachers and librarians can you tell us what they can expect if they book you for a school visit,

Jodie Lancet-Grant

So, I've just got a new author website. You can look me up. I'm very keen to do a lot more school events. I can speak to quite large groups, and I tend to do very interactive reading. I get the children to do activities. For this book, there's a version of the game Captain's Calling; I'm going to be teaching them various Wild West moves, like doing the lasso and riding their pony. The one that does it with the most attitude gets a prize. They can also find out what their Wild West identity is and what their pony would be called if they were a cowboy or a cowgirl.

I've bought two varnished coconut halves. A volunteer will be doing horse clip clopping with the coconuts, so it's quite old school. It's not a high-tech event, but I think it will be lots of fun.

Nikki Gamble

That sounds like great fun. 

So what’s next?

Jodie Lancet-Grant

I'm due to do another book with OUP, and I've got another idea for a picture book, something slightly different, a bit more lyrical and poetic.

And then I'd love to get my head down and write the novel, . 

Nikki Gamble

Fantastic. Thank you so much for joining us in the reading corner today and bringing us up to date. 

Jodie Lancet-Grant

It's lovely talking to you. Really lovely chatting with you.