Adventures of Dylan and Dougall – and Deirdre?

I’ve mentioned before that I have plans to bring out a Dylan and Dougall omnibus. A collection of their stories, that is. I even got the title – The Adventures of Dylan and Dougall.

The other week I was reading a book for middle grade readers that starred some boys. The only women in the book were over forty at the very least. And I found it odd.

Then I realised that I do the same thing. There is mention of a couple of princesses in the first story, and of course Lady Carolyn features large, but she’s an adult. Where are the adventurous girls?

Where are the girls?

So I’ve decided that Dylan and Dougall are going to find a friend and share their adventures with her. I wanted to review the stories for sentence and word length anyway, but this will involve rewriting all three of the novellas to include Deidre. I think that might be her name. I always liked it, and its vaguely Celtic – I must check for really Scottish names beginning with D.

Does she have to be a D? Does a third D name become confusing? I don’t think it will, as long as its not Dilly, or something really close to theirs.

And I’m also planning a short story for her in the leading role. So that’s four stories in the book. I hope a collection of 20,000 words or so will fit just nicely in the children’s Adventure market.

I have a new beta reader, a ten year old. By the time I’m ready, I might have a nine-year old one, too. And they’re both girls. Anyone got a boy beta reader of the right age? 🙂

But this won’t be out in time for this Christmas now. It’ll be better, though!

2 Replies to “Adventures of Dylan and Dougall – and Deirdre?”

  1. An excellent idea! By the way, if you do use Deirdre, be careful of the spelling—you used Deirdre one time, and Deidre another. One of my best friends is named Deirdre. The spelling mnemonic is “I before E except in Deirdre.” Or just spell it backwards—Erdried gets both R’s in AND the i and e sorted out 😀

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