In Conversation With: Hiba Noor Khan – author of MG novel 'Safiyyah's War'
Know that rejection is part and parcel of the journey. For every book an author gets published, there will be plenty of others that never made it… | This is a 10-minute read.
Hello and Salam alaykum friends 👋🏾,
I hope you’re well and have been having a fab writing week so far! Today’s post is an interview featuring an author who I greatly admire and have had the pleasure of working with in the past, Hiba Noor Khan. Hiba shares lots of great gems about the writing and publishing process.
About Hiba:
Hiba Noor Khan is a children’s author, her books include The Little War Cat, Inspiring Inventors and One Home. She has two titles to be published in 2023, including her first novel – Safiyyah’s War. Her books have been listed for national awards and translated into Swedish, Korean, Turkish, Breton and counting. She secretly wants to be an explorer, and is happiest surrounded by nature, especially near the ocean.
Name: Hiba Noor Khan
Literary agent: Megan Carroll – Watson, Little
Book title(s): Safiyyah’s War, How to Spaghettify your Dog, One Home, Inspiring Inventors, The Little War Cat, The Extraordinary Life of Malala Yousafzai
Publisher: Andersen Press, Bloomsbury, Pan Macmillan, Walker Books, Puffin
Genre/category: children’s middle-grade fiction, illustrated non-fiction, biography, picture book
Where do you get inspiration from?
Anywhere and everywhere to be honest.
I write across genres and subjects so it really does vary a lot from book to book, but I’m a firm believer that inspiration can come from the most unexpected places. From within, as well as from the external world, and perhaps when the two are combined is the most powerful.
I find a lot of inspiration in the natural world, perhaps because the heart is most connected when surrounded by it… I’ve also found inspiration through my own personal journeys of trauma and healing, grief and hope; Safiyyah’s War has these themes woven through the book.
Moments in history are also hugely inspirational for me, as well as forgotten/erased heroes. My inspiration for The Little War Cat first struck when I was in Syrian refugee camps meeting families, and the seed was formally planted for the story on hearing about Mohammed Alaa Al Jaleel, the real life ‘cat man of Aleppo’.
The inspiration to write One Home compounded over years of witnessing the degradation of the planet, most intensely while snorkelling in the Red Sea, staying in the Peruvian Amazon, and working on reforestation projects in Tanzania. While for Inspiring Inventors and How to Spaghettify your Dog I’d say the mental seeds were planted through my engineering undergrad degree and while working as a physics teacher.
I’ve learnt to regard every moment and experience as potentially layered with inspiration, even if it doesn’t formally strike until years down the line!
Have you always known you were going to be a writer? When did it become a dream (and reality) for you?
I wanted to be a lot of things as a child, ranging from pirate to farmer, astronaut to explorer, but somehow never considered writing as a feasible profession for myself. On hindsight I do wonder if this may have been because of the lack of representation at that point; I grew up on Enid Blyton, Louisa May Alcott, and Darren Shan!
It took me a while to realise how innate writing is to me, how beloved and important words are to my heart and psyche. It was during university that I seriously put pen to paper and attempted a novel (still unfinished on my laptop somewhere!), and I also began writing articles for newspapers and online publications. Deep down I still didn’t think author-hood could actually be a realistic option for me, let alone a profession, but thankfully I honoured the need within me to process my world through words and continued to write bits and pieces.
In 2018 I responded to an open call put out by Puffin for writers for a new children’s series, and on a whim submitted an application, absolutely not expecting to hear back. By the grace of God this materialised into my first ever published book, and this process was the catalyst for my writing career. Seeing the book on a shelf in Waterstones somehow made it all real and opened my heart to the idea that maybe, maybe I could do more of this, and showed me how much I’d loved the book writing process.
What’s your favourite part about the writing process?
It’s difficult to name one specific bit! I do really love the moment that some sort of inspiration begins to take shape into a solid idea that I can see manifesting into book form, that’s a very exciting moment!
But I’d say nothing compares to holding your book for the first time as a solid, real life thing that now exists after being a figment of your imagination for so long. That always feels surreal and a bit magical!
What was the most difficult part of the writing process for you?
Being on submission is pretty awful, the constant email checking that can stretch on for weeks and months is torturous… I’m also not a huge fan of editing! I’m beyond grateful for amazing editors who make this stage smooth and easy because I find it quite tedious.
What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received?
My mum told me to read The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, and the daily/weekly practices in there like writing morning pages are so wonderful and beneficial! She also told me to take a break and come back to it whenever I feel stuck, and getting out for a walk or having a change of scene works wonders in overcoming blocks.
Can you tell us a bit about your path to publication? How long did it take to get from idea to publication?
I signed my agent in 2019 after The Extraordinary Life of Malala Yousafzai was published. From her sending out the manuscript for The Little War Cat to publication day, there was a period of almost two years. And the wait between idea and publication for How to Spaghettify your Dog has been nearly four!
The others varied, but naturally when there’s a lot of illustration to be done things do take longer than with a novel. I love the process of being paired with an illustrator, it’s always so so exciting to find out who might bring the world in my head to life.
As a veteran writer who’s gone through the publishing cycle a few times now, what has been your biggest learning?
I’ve never associated the word ‘veteran’ with myself before ha!
To be flexible and adaptive with my ideas, to be open to feedback while remaining true to my heart and voice. I suppose it’s something I’m definitely still learning and will be an ongoing process. I also do often feel like maybe the lingering impostor syndrome will never go away! That’s not a learning but I’d love to learn how to overcome it…
What did you find most surprising about the publishing industry?
Probably the long lead times for publication, I thought I’d heard wrong when I was given a publication date four years down the line! I also hadn’t expected the majority of book deals to be pretty measly in comparison to a normal salary, and was horrified when all the publishingpaidme stuff came out on twitter revealing the discrepancies according to race and gender.
Very disheartening, but it made me more grateful to have an agent to be able to negotiate on my behalf, and also gave me the conviction to try not to undersell myself in future.
If you could share one piece of advice with an aspiring writer, what would it be?
Know that rejection is part and parcel of the journey. For every book an author gets published, there will be plenty of others that never made it, and likely still break their heart a little when they come to mind! Turn to God in those difficult moments and trust that there is a beautiful plan for you. Take some time to grieve and then dust yourself off and continue on your path.
It’s also great that nowadays the self-publishing sector is lucrative and booming, keep an open mind. If one door isn’t open at a particular time, others will be. Consider other platforms or forms for your writing and develop your craft, and God willing, before you know things will all work out.
What do you hope readers would get out of your books?
I hope they are inspired to be the best they can be, to be kind and empathetic, and to never, ever lose hope. I’d say hope is a key thread that runs through all my books.
To care deeply for themselves and everything around them, and to think critically, to read between the lines of what appears at first sight, past, present and future. To dig deeper than what textbooks or newspapers present to us.
If there were no publishing barriers, what would your next book be on?
I’d love to dabble in nature writing for adults, and also think that I’d consider re-attempting an adult novel at some point in the future potentially.
As someone juggling several responsibilities, what does your writing routine look like?
Juggling is definitely a good analogy for how it feels… I’m forever trying to be more organised, but tend a little towards chaos!
Writing usually involves too many cups of tea and snacks, a cat on my lap, and lots of staring at a blank document… I end up getting bursts of motivation dangerously close to deadlines which isn’t ideal, I’m hoping to try working after fajr and see how that goes for some intense writing time… I make sure I always have a notebook and pen on me when out and about in case writing strikes, and do also enjoy popping out to local cafes with my laptop for a change of scene which can be really refreshing. I also think I need to start turning the internet off when working on my laptop because I’m way too easily distracted
Where can readers find your work?
My books are available from all good bookshops and retailers, including Waterstones, bookshop.org, bookdepository.com (free global shipping to everywhere in the world!), Amazon etc
How can readers connect with you?
I’m on twitter and Instagram at @hibanoorkhan1 and I’d love to see you over there!
What’s on your bookshelf?
I tend to have a few books on the go at any one time and am a major mood reader! I’m listening to The House of Trelawney by Hannah Rothschild on Audible, and switching between reading Celestial Bodies by Jokha AlHarthi, rereading the Purification of the Heart by Hamza Yusuf, and The Shark Caller by Zillah Bethel. I love having the option of different vibes and genres according to what I feel like, but it also means I perpetually have an aching shoulder from carrying too many books around with me just in case!
Thank you so much for having me, it’s an honour!
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Till next Friday,
Suad x