EP93-Unlocking the Magic of Reading: A Journey with ML Ayer

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:00:19

Today I have the pleasure of introducing ML Ayer. ML is the author of magical tales and an advocate for increased reading by middle schoolers.

As a child in Bangkok, she had no access to tv but plenty of books and pictures. She taught herself to read and consumed books voraciously. She would read books to her sister and tell her stories every night.

When her sister wasn't around, she told stories to the dog and cat. Stories have been a part of her life longer than she can remember, and she is still telling them today. Welcome, ML. It is a pleasure to have you here.

And we're excited for the show.

M L Ayer: 00:00:58

Yes. Oh, wonderful. Well, I am delighted to talk to you, you know, so that's great. Where would you, would you.

One of the things I was thinking about starting is I have, I have a little description at the beginning of the book, which is a, which is a magical section that I think that would be a good thing for people to hear.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:01:18

That would be awesome. It's like, as we encourage our families to read and explore this thing called the magic of reading. Yes, please share that beginning.

M L Ayer: 00:01:26

Okay, so I'm going to read this to you. The egg wasn't normal. Not really. There was a yolk surrounded by a white, but they didn't look like any yolk or white Simon had ever seen.

I've never seen an egg like that, his sister, Rook said, flicking back her long dark hair. It's all glowy. Wondered Simon, reaching in a finger to touch it. Don't, said Rook, pushing away his hand. We don't know what it is.

The yoke was a bright shining gold. Gold like a wedding ring. Not like the colour people think of when they say dandelions or buttercups or golden.

He pushed his glasses up to see more clearly. It looks as if there's tiny flecks of real metal in it. The white shifted and undulated when he moved the bowl. Not clear like a normal raw egg white.

It looked instead like liquid silver. Rook put her head on one side and considered the contents of the bowl. Did Livia really lay that? What on earth has she been eating?

Simon shifted guiltily. Where had his hen, Livia, been yesterday? And what had she found to eat when she was there?

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:02:48

Yes, what can happen when you crack open those special eggs? Or in this case, maybe crack open that special book. You open the COVID and find out what the stories are happening inside. Oh my gosh.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:03:02

That's a nice way to kind of grab your attention and want to read more. You leave them with the questions instead of answering it right away. So that was really nice. Thank you.

M L Ayer: 00:03:12

Thank you. You're welcome.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:03:13

So tell us a little bit about how you got started writing. I mean, in your bio that we just wrote or read it talked a little bit about that, but give us a little bit more.

Why this continued intrigue of writing and sharing these stories? Why is it your passion?

M L Ayer: 00:05:08

Well, as I said, you know, part of it was, is having read these stories, I wanted to recreate those stories in my life, you know? And so some of it was telling my sister or the cats and dogs about, you know, what the stories were.

It was also something that I like to be able to, like to be able to write my own stories because there are things I have been telling my sister, for example, and my dad used to tell us stories. He used to tell us stories about three brothers who lived on the moon. And that was, that was a fascinating story for us.

So we had that storytelling environment in there. And so when I was really, you know, when I was.

When I wanted to, when I was writing, then I started writing stories for myself and then for my teachers, and, and it was great just, just writing down the things that I had. And the other thing is I have dreams. I have very vivid dreams, and the dreams that I have end up being really other stories that I write.

I've written about, I don't know, ten different stories, at least, based on the dreams that I've had. And they had plots, they had all kinds of things. They said, I just have to write them down now.

And I still remember so many of my dreams I haven't written down that were there that are sort of back plots that I can use. So some of those things, it was just, it had to be brought out from my head and onto paper so that other people could read them.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:06:41

Yeah. So I was an avid reader growing up. I read lots and lots of books, and I never got into the writing aspect of it.

It seemed like whenever I tried to write, I couldn't keep up with the story in my head, and I would get so far behind trying to write down. How did you go from the reading and loving of the reading of the stories to actually start writing them?

Because that is two completely different things altogether.

M L Ayer: 00:07:07

No tv. That's the big thing. We had no tv.

So some of that, you know, that was a lot of what we had to do is if I was going to tell them and no one was listening, I had to write it down and had to get them into, you know, get them on paper so that other people could read them. And that was more of what I did. And most of the time, it was. The ones that I wrote early were, you know, there were things.

There were mostly descriptions of the dreams that I had somewhere, and I put them down. I think I wrote at one point, there's one of my first, most vivid dream was looking at.

I dreamt that I was on my bedroom looking out the window and seeing this witchen fly past, and she was spraying out from the. From her broom. She was spraying out wrapped american candies. This is very important in Thailand, because you didn't get american candy.

So all of these brightly colored candies were dropped all over the backyard, and it was sort of like snow, but colored snow. And I thought, I can't go out, but because I know the house is locked. And I said, I'll wait till the morning.

And when I, you know, when I went down in the morning, it was all gone, you know, and I figured, well, must have just melted, you know, into the ground. And I never saw those candies again, but it was very vivid, and I still have this really clear image of this witch in the sky.

So things like that, that I can use those images to be part of the story, and I write from that.

A lot of my stories are based on images of what I see or have a picture or have an image in my mind about, and those characters end up becoming characters in my stories. So that's been it. I have a. Yeah, it's a picture of that person. That's the very start of any story for me.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:09:07

We used to tell stories with our granddaughter when we would be driving her home. We would start a story and then basically ask her where she wanted it to go. And then we would ask her what characters she wanted in it.

So she would start building the story, and then we would tell it, and then get to a point where we needed something else and have her direct it, and then we would go off on the story again. So we have some really vivid pictures and memories of how to build those stories, but never got to the point of writing them down.

So hearing your process and. And boredom is a wonderful thing for children. It really is.

I grew up in a real small town, and we did have television, but we only had three stations when I was growing up, so. And it was very limited. So I spent more time outside playing than I ever did watching television.

But even then, writing wasn't necessarily a big draw for me, but reading definitely was.

M L Ayer: 00:10:05

And I think also because my dad was. My dad read early. I mean, there's apparently a photograph in my grandparents house of my dad lying naked on his bed reading a book.

And the comment was, this is Fred half an hour after he was called to breakfast. Yep.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:10:29

He was more in tune with the book than actually getting downstairs to breakfast.

M L Ayer: 00:10:34

Exactly.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:10:35

And that is the most beautiful place to be.

M L Ayer: 00:10:37

Right.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:10:38

And in your bio, you're talking about encouraging the middle schoolers because many of our young children have that engagement or encouragement, especially because the parents are reading to the kids or reading with the kids.

M L Ayer: 00:10:50

Right.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:10:50

And talking about the stories and making it come alive for them.

But then as they get older, those middle schoolers, if they don't, if they are having trouble reading or they're not quite into books as much or they get drawn into the video games, et cetera, they kind of lose that. So I love how your stories are really aimed towards that middle school group and trying to get them back into the reading and feeling that magic.

And one of the things you were talking about before we jumped on live with the camera was, where does the character and where does the setting that house come from that are in these books?

M L Ayer: 00:11:25

Well, I can talk about. Well, let me talk about the house, and then I'll come back to that. The house is the house that we have. And I have a picture of it.

I think I have the COVID that has it. Let me see if you could. If I can share this with you. Can I share? Yeah, absolutely.

So this is a cover that a friend of mine created for the book, and it's based on the house that my sister lives in. They have a. They live in a house in the country that is. Oh, I have. It's disabled. Can you.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:12:01

I just got it. Go ahead.

M L Ayer: 00:12:03

Okay.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:12:09

For those of you who are on audio only, she's bringing up a picture of the house. So jump over to the YouTube channel to see the actual picture.

M L Ayer: 00:12:19

It did not. It did not properly share, I don't think. Let me see. This is just me. Sorry. So here is the COVID that my illustrator created.

This house is built in about: 1200

It's quite a long way to ride over from Canterbury to here. But he used as his hunting lodge, so this was his base. This was the main room of his hunting lodge, and this was his bedroom upstairs.

So this was the main house. And so the house has grown and developed, you know, in multiple ways up to, you know, modern times.

You know, they've got, they have just redone their kitchen, for example, you know, so. And this is Simon, who is based on my nephew when he was nine. And this is his. I don't know if you can see her.

This is his friend Abby, who was his, a good girlfriend of his. They were at school together and so they played together. But these two ended up being much better friends in my book than they.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:13:45

Were ever in real life.

M L Ayer: 00:13:49

And this is their mother, who is, who is she is. She was, her name is Grace and she's a jazz singer. So she's Grace Smith, not Grace Jones, but that's who she is. And this is a fairy. He is blaze.

He has his ponytail, blonde ponytail. And he has come from fairy. And he's one of the, the only three fae who have come across from Faerie into earth right now.

So he's, he's a little lonely, but he's trying to make sure that he can, can bring others in. So. And this is basically their, up top here is their house. And they have several ponds that are around. This is, there's.

They have horses on the other side of here. They have. It's a big, it's a big garden. Surprisingly big garden. So that's, that is based on the house. This part here. The treasure down in the.

This is the underground treasure house is my creation. And it has, it's spread out all underneath the house and the garden and the land. So that you, you don't know how. It's huge. It's a huge place.

And they have all kinds of magical instruments and furniture and creations that are in here. Among them. There is, there's, you know, there, there are magical harps. There's a magical piece of, there's a magical piece of armor.

There's a throne that belongs to a mermaid. And surprisingly, there's the Tardis and there is a tent which comes, that really.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:15:32

Looks like the Tardis. But I didn't want to bring that up because that's like completely.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:15:36

And for our audience, who's listening on audio only, she's describing these underground chambers that are below the house that she's developed and grown in. These things are hat down there.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:15:46

And there's a giraffe and a couple of dragons.

M L Ayer: 00:15:48

Yes.

M L Ayer: 00:15:50

And so, and so they've also, so you can go through, as you've read the book, they will find out about the tent in book three. They won't know in book one, but you know that what it. Where it is, what it is.

And they have all kinds of things she put in, there's a mysterious dragon that sort of, behind this name that's a cloud dragon that is coming in. There's a dragon's egg in the pond that it will be hatching.

And this is a drum kit that is in honor of one of the persons who lived in the house before them was the drummer for Rolling Stones.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:16:34

Oh, wow.

M L Ayer: 00:16:35

And he bought this house. He was the first rock star to buy a house in the country, which is what this house was. And so we had him.

I posited that he might have thrown his drum kit away because, you know, for whatever reason. So it's there in the pond. So these things are there just so they're little. They're little, you know, Easter eggs that come through from the book.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:16:59

I love that.

M L Ayer: 00:17:00

Awesome.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:17:01

So then go ahead and tell us. We hadn't even talked about that. There's not just one book that we're talking about here.

This is a series that's being developed or a series that has been published.

M L Ayer: 00:17:10

There are three books that will be the book two is in production now, and book three will be published by the end of the year. So we'll have the first three. And I haven't decided yet what happens after book three. There may well be other things coming through.

I'm not sure yet, but this cover was just a way she did this, and she's also done, she's created a print of the COVID without all of the words on it so that you can buy a print, if you want to, of the COVID and you can look at what there is, but that's there. And then what happens with this? Let me stop sharing. Yes. Thanks. If I stopped, you know, so this is.

This is something that people can, can look at and relook at.

And because the COVID itself has so much intricate detail about the books and about the stories that will come through in one, two, and three, you'll be able to see how they all.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:18:21

So how do you go about encouraging schoolers to start reading, middle schoolers to start reading? How. So you wrote the book. How do you get them interested? How do you go about getting children into the reading?

M L Ayer: 00:18:33

Well, part of it is some of it. I'm trying to make it simple, but not too simple, so that kids can actually go back and reread the words that they have.

There are a couple of words that, because it's, the kids are english and they're also american, they have both views. There's some vocabulary that people aren't quite sure of, but people can actually look up.

And it's a thing to look up and see what words mean, which is a way to find out. And I know with the Kindle version, you can go and you can just highlight a word and it will give you a definition.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:19:11

Oh, cool.

M L Ayer: 00:19:12

So that was helpful. You know, that that can be helpful for people, too.

And again, it's something that they can, some of the younger people, the younger people I've known have had their parents read it to them.

So that the both, there's a friend in New Zealand who's reading it to her daughter at night, and some things she was saying, I don't know, what is a copse? And I said, which is just a small group of trees? And she says, why didn't you just say a small group of G's?

And I said, well, yes, I could, but this is what people call it. So it was some things I didn't know, but I can, and what else can I do? So some of the things, do I want to put in with words on that?

Do I want to do footnotes? Do I want to explain british terminology or american terminology?

So I'm not quite sure where to go within that, but that's something that would be, that might be helpful at the moment.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:20:08

I love that because as you have, people develop their vocabulary, you have younger children listening to different vocabulary.

And then the middle schoolers looking up and wanting to figure out that other vocabulary that does, it expands their growth, expands their reading, their writing capabilities, because now they have a new pool of information to draw from.

M L Ayer: 00:20:28

And particularly if you look at, if you look at the first book of Harry Potter and the rest, the first book of Harry Potter was the, it was english version, and then they translated the american version into american terminology. Okay, I have the american version. It was, and it's, it's, it's sort of like when I'm reading it, it says, why is he calling his mother mom?

That's not, you know. Right. He's mom. Right. Usually mom.

And all these words, they had, they had changed them because they figured, oh, american children aren't going to understand. But, you know, by book, two people were reading the british version, and that was the only version available.

And they were, they were using the vocabulary in that all the time.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:21:15

Yeah.

M L Ayer: 00:21:17

And that, that is something that people. And they were, they were all wanting to go to Hogwarts. This is, why can't I go?

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:21:23

Because it's in another country and it doesn't exist.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:21:27

And I was actually very appreciative of the guy who actually read the books online. I had his name and just as Jim Dale.

M L Ayer: 00:21:37

Jim Dale, yeah, he did the american version.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:21:41

Well, he did the other version, too, because there were so many words that I didn't know how to pronounce.

M L Ayer: 00:21:47

Like Hermione.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:21:48

Like Hermione. So for the first several books, we read it to our children, and it was Hermione. And then Jim Dale came out, and it's like, oh, Hermione.

Is that how you say that? So there were so many names and so many words that came to life in a different way once we actually heard a british person speaking it.

So, yeah, so, yeah, Hermione became Hermione.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:22:12

And that reminds me, when I was in the classroom with my kids, I would pull up books that I read as a child. Right. And it would talk different. So one of the book series that I really love is called Harriet the Dirty Dog. It was based in the UK.

They would use words that the kids didn't understand. So I was able to say, oh, you know, this is English, but from different country. And then the other one, I believe, was Lyle. Lyle Crocodile.

M L Ayer: 00:22:37

Same thing.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:22:37

It was based out of either the UK or something where the English was a little bit different.

But I loved reading those to my students because of just that built their vocabulary, built an understanding of English, but from a different country kind of thing. And it just really brings connection instead of separation. Right. It really helps kids understand that. Oh, cool. Books come from all over the place.

M L Ayer: 00:23:01

Well, even like. Like Peppa pig people saying, you know, everything's so british. Why are they so british? They said, because that's who they are.

And then bluey, you know, they're Australians. It's sort of. They're. They're australian shepherds. That's what they do.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:23:16

Yeah.

M L Ayer: 00:23:16

Yeah.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:23:17

Well, many, many years ago, about what is about 15 or 20 years ago now, we took our children on a tour of the United States, our teenager. Now, people in England a lot of times don't understand how big the United States is.

So in nine and a half weeks, we drove 12,000 miles, and we never left the United States. So.

And we would drive to different parts of the country, and we would start talking to people, and it'd be like, I know they're speaking English, but I can't understand a word that they are saying. And they use different dictions. They use words differently.

So even within the same country, there are times where the dialect and the diction and the vocabulary is a little bit different.

M L Ayer: 00:24:04

Yeah. My family's american, so, you know, we have the whole american side within us. And then I was born. We were living in England.

I, and I went to boarding school in England, and then I went to college in Scotland. And which was, I just wanted to get as far away as possible. That's the closest that I could get to. So I went up to St. Andrews, and it was so weird.

I arrived. I went by plane, and I arrived in Edinburgh and had to go to the train station.

And in the train station, I could not understand what anyone was saying. And even when I went to go and buy a ticket to the train station for St. Andrews is called Lucharst. And I did not know how to pronounce it.

I had to go and I said, I don't know, it's a place that it's l e U. And they said, oh, luchas. I said, okay, thank you. That place. Give me a ticket, I'll go there.

But it was definitely, it's like I have no idea what people are talking about. But then again, then my accent turned scottish, and it was fine. I love it.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:25:26

My accent turns scottish. Oh, my goodness. That is amazing. And that so reminds me again, back in the classroom.

We live in a small town where intel is very, very big computer chip company, right? But they bring in people from all over the place. And one year, I swear, I have the international classroom.

I had seven different countries represented in my room that I was teaching to, right? And one of the little boys was from Scotland, and it was the same thing.

He came up to me, goes, teacher, I don't understand a word you're saying, but we speak English and you speak English, and I just don't get it. So I even had to slow down a little bit and pronounce things a little bit differently for him. Right?

But it's a, again, this experiences that you can have through books, through traveling, through reading about other people and their places that really help our children understand the magic of our world, what we can do when we connect with other people.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:26:27

Especially when you read a word and you know that word and you got that word down, you go to where somebody actually speaks that word and they say it correctly, and your brain just goes crunk, crunk, crank, crank. And it shifts, and it's like, oh, my gosh, that makes so much more sense now.

M L Ayer: 00:26:46

I know.

M L Ayer: 00:26:46

I think. I think one of the first, one of the words I had a problem with was g o s s I p, gossip. But I pronounced it gisup.

And because I thought, well, you know, the words don't sound what, you know don't don't follow the vowels. I said, this must be gissup. And my mother was saying, what are you talking about? Just say the word as it spelled. Okay, yeah, fine.

But it was that complication. But, you know, but sort of with that thing is, you know, one of the things about having. And that's the thing about words on print. Yeah.

When they're sounded out, is very different from everybody, you know, who's, who's, who's talking or speaking or they, I mean, they, they talk about, with english spelling, sort of like ough can be pronounced so many, many different ways. You know, cough through, you know, enough. All of those words are ough. And, but within the books. So talk about the books. The books are something less.

I was thinking about this when I was thinking about, you know, magic with books is that it's very, it's very much a spell because you have to in, you have to interpret the squiggles on the page, and then you have to interpret the squiggles on the page when they're connected to each other.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:28:15

Yeah.

M L Ayer: 00:28:16

And then once you get it, you have cup, and it's, oh, it's a cup. Oh, yeah, I know what a cup looks like. And that's the picture you get in your mind is that cup.

And so all of the things when you're reading, when you can decipher the spells that are on the page, you get pictures you have never seen. You start feeling feelings that you've never felt, and you go places you've never.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:28:46

Been to absolutely love that because, yeah, you talk about that, explaining it like that, and it brings in my mind about the getting lost in the story, creating the dialogue, creating the picture in your brain of what's happening in the book.

And it's one of the reasons why he absolutely hates it whenever they turn a book into a movie, because it doesn't match the pictures in your head most of the time.

M L Ayer: 00:29:14

Exactly. And that's, you know, exactly. People keep saying, no, no, that's not who it is. I don't see, I don't see them that way. Uh huh.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:29:21

Like the Lord of the Rings movies.

M L Ayer: 00:29:23

Oh, yeah.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:29:24

They were visually stunning, but I just could not watch it because they deviated so far from the book. It's like, this isn't Lord of the Rings. It's just a shell of what it was. And the Harry Potter movies were just awful.

M L Ayer: 00:29:39

Yeah.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:29:39

If you had never read the Harry Potter books, they were probably pretty good.

M L Ayer: 00:29:43

Yeah.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:29:44

And as a literary person, the Harry Potter books were actually written pretty poorly.

M L Ayer: 00:29:48

Yeah, but, you know, but it's the way it is. The way it is.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:29:52

But, you know, but the stories were amazing, and humanity is, is pushed forward by stories. You know, that's, that's so that's why the Bible is full of stories. And it's not this, it's not like lists of stuff to do.

It's stories that you find meaning out of that you, that you, once you get ahold of the story and understand the story, then there's so many different ways you can look at that story and so many different meanings that you can put into it. And that's the spell and the magic of reading.

M L Ayer: 00:30:23

Yeah. And reading is going to be there. The reading is what, reading is what gives you all of those things.

And if you don't read and you're only using, you're only doing video, you miss out on so much.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:30:44

Absolutely.

M L Ayer: 00:30:45

No, because there are things that are described that, that are indescribable in a picture.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:30:53

Yeah. So bringing it back to the movie book thing, there's only one movie book combination that truly, truly matched.

And that was a movie from my youth called et the extraterrestrial.

And it's really funny because I think the book was written after the movie because, I mean, it was just spot on and it actually expanded the movie and gave you more to think about instead of taking away. So, you know, if you ever want to go back and watch a crazy old movie and read a book, those two, that's how they should be done.

M L Ayer: 00:31:29

Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, and, well, it, all the books, if books are written after, after the video or after what you've seen, then it is something that you can actually, it's a recreation of what you have so you remember the movie rather than the story itself. So I think that it's the thing with books, the book things gives you much more freedom to imagine what else is there and just to see the.

And you don't, I mean, even they're doing well, they're redoing Harry Potter as a tv series now.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:32:17

Oh, I didn't know that.

M L Ayer: 00:32:19

They've started casting.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:32:20

Okay.

M L Ayer: 00:32:21

But it sort of thinks right now is that they will, they want to do the stories in more detail because it'll be a series. It'll be, you know, a whole series rather than just, you know.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:32:36

Yeah.

M L Ayer: 00:32:37

One series. So one movie. So they have more opportunity to play with it and create.

But it's still going to be different because you know that, I mean, people can say, well, Hermione's a different person now. I said, well, yes, she's, you know, she's a lot older now.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:32:52

She was just a little eleven. Exactly.

Oh, my gosh, amel, this has been such a wonderful conversation about bringing books alive, bringing characters alive, settings and things like that. And I hope that our parents have been listening to this and thinking about, oh, what can I do?

How can I talk about books that really bring that to their children, get them back interested in reading again? Unfortunately, in the United States, we have a reading crisis.

We don't have children and adults who can read at a level that they need to be able to read at the, to be super functioning, to be super literate, and to be able to explore some of these things.

So if we can get our children back interested in that reading in the primary age, at the middle school age and let them continue to grow and learn, they'll be so much better for all of our children all over the place. So thank you for bringing us your books and your ideas and the magic that really is there.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:33:49

Yes, thank you for coming on our show today. You know, so many people take, take what they know and they hold it to themselves.

They'll write their book and then they'll bury it and they'll not ever share it. Because to put it out there and to share it with the world is scary because people might criticize it, but you are brave. You are doing that.

You are taking your stories and you're sharing them with the world. You are going out and fighting your own dragons and putting those stories out there. So that's the hero's journey.

And so, like so many of the people on our that come on our podcast, you are a hero. You're out there helping children read. You're, you're doing the scary thing and you're trying to make the world a better place through your story.

So, so thank you very much for that. And thank you for coming on our show today.

M L Ayer: 00:34:33

And thank you for having me. It's been a delight.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:34:36

You know, so, ML, before we go, we have to let people know where these wonderful stories are. Do you have a website or a place that they go to find these wonderful stories? Please tell us about it.

M L Ayer: 00:34:46

My website is a very easy name. It's called readmagicaltails.com.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:34:52

Wonderful. And all the information is there, and.

M L Ayer: 00:34:55

All the other information is there. And there's some other things on there.

What I've been doing is within the books, there are some other characters or side characters, and I've done little stories about some of these characters, and I will continue to do that. And I would encourage kids who want to do that as well as reading that they can write story.

If they find a character in the book that, that they would like to know more about, tell me about them. Write a story and we can post it so we can, you know, so that people both read and write.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:35:26

Fanfiction.

M L Ayer: 00:35:27

Love it.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:35:27

Yeah, fanfiction. People read stories.

M L Ayer: 00:35:30

Exactly.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:35:30

I want to see this story. And so they'll go and write it and share it online and create whole worlds around their favorite characters.

M L Ayer: 00:35:39

My niece was in the first Harry Potter movie, and she was just in one small part. She didn't have a speaking role at all.

But she said apparently there's thriving fanfiction about her, about her character because they thought it was a completely different person. But they've been writing about her and they said, oh, yeah, we know her. It's like, no, it's not me, but never mind.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:36:03

That's awesome. And of course, all of that information is down in the show notes as well as a gift from, from ML for our audience.

So go there, check out the show notes, find the website, look for the free gift, and thank you again, ML, for a wonderful interview, for sharing your love of magic and through reading. And thank you so much for.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:36:23

So what is the free gift?

M L Ayer: 00:36:25

Oh, what is the free gift? Is a story that they'll have to read, but somebody can read it for them.

There's a story about how to, and I recipe about how to make elderflower champagne either.

So it's, you have the elder flowers and you mix them with sugar and the natural yeast sits on them and they becomes an effervescent little, sort of like kombucha. It becomes an effervescent tea that kids can drink. It's really nice. It's a nice, refreshing drink, too.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:37:00

Beautiful. Thank you again.

M L Ayer: 00:37:01

That's there. Thank you, though.

Kristina & Herb Heagh-Avritt: 00:37:03

You're very welcome.

All right, audience, it is time to wrap up our show, but I hope you have listened and got some inspiration of how to help your child be a reader and enjoy the magic that you can crack open in a book every single day. Until next time, take care, and we will see you later. Bye.

M L Ayer: 00:37:21

Thank you.