There is something special about watching someone chase the thing they love and refuse to let it go. For Etienne Fourie, that thing has always been stories. The Trompoppie filmmaker and Man in die Maan author has spent his career telling them on screen and on the page, and now he has written the book his younger self was searching for in a bookshop almost a hundred kilometres from home.
I have always believed that a good story can change the shape of a day, and sometimes the shape of a whole childhood. Some of my favourite memories involve losing myself in a book long after I should have been asleep, and I still get that same rush whenever a new world opens up on the page. So seeing a proudly South African fantasy series for young readers land on a national Christmas list, right next to some of the biggest names in children’s publishing, makes me very happy indeed.
Here is everything you need to know about InterVille, along with a conversation with the man who dreamt it up.
InterVille, the first children’s novel from Trompoppie filmmaker and Man in die Maan author Etienne Fourie, has cracked Bargain Books’ list of Christmas Picks for Children, alongside Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Fight or Flight and Gruffalo Granny.
For parents bracing for a long December of screen time, it’s the timely story of 12-year-old gamer Patrick Newberry, who suddenly becomes allergic to electricity. Worse, his every sneeze makes electronics explode.
When he is sent to camp, Patrick is fairly certain he won’t survive, even before he discovers Verdigris Island: home to a magical Gate leading to InterVille, where impossible worlds and terrifying creatures await.
Published by Penguin Random House South Africa as the first in a planned five-book series, InterVille is aimed at 9- to 12-year-olds.
In The National, Taschica Pillay called it “wildly imaginative… a fast-paced fantasy adventure”, while bookfluencer Roelia Reads hailed it as “funny and deliciously entertaining. Middle grade fantasy at its best.”
We caught up with Fourie, who also illustrated the cover, to talk about South African magic, misfit camps and childhood bookshop pilgrimages.
Why was it important to set InterVille in South Africa?
Growing up, the magical worlds I loved always seemed far away. They were in London, New York, a European forest, another country or another planet. I rarely found South African stories that offered the particular kind of escapism I was looking for.
InterVille is my attempt to scratch that lifelong itch. It’s a love letter from my adult self to the younger version of me who wanted to believe that something vast, strange and magical could begin here too.
InterVille is completely and proudly South African, although I can’t yet reveal exactly where in South Africa it takes place. That question forms part of one of the larger mysteries that will unfold later in the series.
Without giving too much away, what makes Crooked Creek Canyon Camp unlike any ordinary camp?
According to its brochure, Crooked Creek Canyon Camp is a place for “stubbornly unique individuals”.
Patrick correctly points out that this is a fancy way of saying it is a camp for social outcasts and juvenile delinquents. It is populated by children who, for one reason or another, don’t quite fit anywhere else.
Patrick first has to accept that he might be one of those children. He also wonders whether his parents sent him there to help him or simply to get rid of him, as some of the other campers’ parents or guardians seem to have done.
Then he has to work out how to survive the place, because he is spectacularly unprepared for wilderness life. Of course, the camp is also hiding something far stranger than difficult hikes and mosquito bites.
InterVille moves between humour, wonder, adventure and some genuinely frightening moments. How did you balance those different tones?
That mixture of tones feels true to life. Life can be funny, wonderful, adventurous and frightening, sometimes almost simultaneously.
I didn’t consciously calculate how much humour or fear the book needed. I followed my instincts and wrote the kind of story I would have loved when I was younger – and, frankly, still love now.
Were you always a reader?
Yes. Some of my happiest childhood memories are of our local library. For me, there was nowhere more exciting than a room filled with stories.
From the age of nine, we lived in the Eastern Cape, between St Francis Bay, Jeffreys Bay and Humansdorp.
There weren’t many places nearby where I could find the books I wanted, so we occasionally travelled nearly a hundred kilometres to what was then Port Elizabeth. I’d save my pocket money, arrive with a list, and spend five or six hours browsing the bookshop and Musica while my parents ran errands. I was perfectly happy there.
Although I make my living telling stories across books, film and television, I am still first and foremost a reader and a viewer.
Who do you hope finds InterVille?
I hope InterVille finds readers who are looking for a world they can disappear into and a series they can genuinely look forward to.
It is especially for the outsiders, the misfits and the children – and adults – who sometimes feel that the adventure they are searching for doesn’t exist where they are.
InterVille is available now from Bargain Books, as well as Amazon, Exclusive Books, Takealot and all good bookshops.
What people are saying
“Monstrously entertaining… I loved every page.”
Beloved children’s author Jaco Jacobs
“It’s an outrageously original story. It sweeps you into an adventure so full of heart, wicked humour and delicious scares that you can’t help but fall in love with it.”
Helena Spring, producer of Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight and the Oscar-nominated Yesterday
“Funny. Fearless. Fantastically freaky.”
Julia Ruchman (The Walking Dead and Goosebumps)
Key info
Title: InterVille
Author: Etienne Fourie
Publisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
Category: Children’s fiction
ISBN: 9781776355655
Format: Paperback
Recommended price: R220.00 (R199 at Bargain Books now)
What I love most about Etienne’s story is that it starts with a kid saving his pocket money for a long drive to a bookshop. That kid grew up, kept reading, kept watching, kept dreaming, and turned all of it into a world for the next generation of readers. That is exactly why storytelling matters so much to me. Stories are how we find ourselves, and sometimes how we discover that the adventure we were looking for was closer to home than we ever imagined.
If there is a young reader in your life who would rather be doing anything than opening a book this December, InterVille might just be the one that changes their mind. And if you are a grown-up misfit like me, do yourself a favour and grab a copy for your own shelf too.
