Join Eden - a beautiful, yellow butterfly - on a journey of discovery as she sets out to find a place to call home. As she embarks on this great adventure, she meets some wonderful friends who desperately need some new wings of their own. They heard a legend of a mysterious king who can grant the gift of flight and sweet delight…

 

We spoke with Mandi about the darker sides of life and why children need to learn how to deal with them, how her bright lived experiences helped her writing this bright book, and how she brought that vibrancy to life through colourful and fantastic illustrations.

 

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Your time spent working as a Spiritual Director will have impacted on the telling of this important but emotional tale. Why do you think it’s important for children to grapple with large themes, such as grief, at an early age?

 

It is important that we help children deal with grief in a simple, honest and age-appropriate way. In a world full of beauty but also brokenness many of them will experience loss and we need to teach them that emotions are a normal way to express sadness or grief when we lose something or someone precious.

 

We can use grief as an opportunity to assist them with creative outlets to acknowledge and process our response to sadness. This will empower them to healthy emotional-well-being and equip them to learn some important life lessons through loss. It will also enable them to build empathy and foster mental resilience.

 

I encounter many adults in my work as a spiritual director who has never learned this crucial skill of processing emotions in a healthy way, and it impoverishes them and those they serve and love. Children are curious and should feel safe to speak about anything and everything that concerns or challenges them. They need to know nothing needs to be hidden or avoided or kept in secret.

 

 

Out of the darkness of such heavy emotion comes a beautiful bright world. Living in South Africa, the Philippines and now Australia, you’ve seen your fair share of the beautiful bright world too. What did you want to share with young readers about your lived experiences?

 

I think I wanted to impart the message that life is a mixture of both darkness and light. Sadness and Joy. Grief and Glory. That its normal for these seemingly opposites to co-exist together and that we could gather all its threads and learn to winsomely weave them into the tapestry of our own unique life. I desire deeply to reinforce the message that we cannot always control what happens to us, but we always have the power of choice in how we respond. How we recover. How we resiliently start again. We can intentionally look for what is pure and lovely and excellent and noble amongst what isn’t.

 

 

Butterflies are stunningly majestic, bringing a much-needed splash of colour to all our gardens. Have you always had an affinity for them, or did you picture something else as the lead of your story?

 

I have always loved butterflies. There is just something magical about them. I also love that they come from very humble beginnings. A small little caterpillar transforms into a gracious winged wonder. In a way we are little like them. We learn to grow from something seemingly ordinary into something beautiful and marvellous, don’t we?

 

 

How did the vibrancy of your words come to form these colourful and fantastic illustrations?

 

The illustrations for the book were the delightful collaboration of working with a very gifted young Australian artist, Sarah-Lyn Lewis. We creatively explored and designed what each scene should portray to add a radiant richness to the narrative. Sarah added so much depth and dimension to my ideas. She could paint what I pondered! In her drawings she encapsulated what I envisioned magnificently. A good illustrator always makes the story come alive vibrantly, and she did this wonderfully!

 

 

Finally, you’ve shared with us previously that post-pandemic, you believe the world needs to re-learn the power of community and camaraderie. Are you aiming to tell more stories in the vain of The Wing Whisperer, to help further us on our path forwards?

 

Most definitely. In fact, I am planning on writing a sequel, in which the friends of the Wing Whisperer face a crisis similar to the pandemic and how they skilfully navigate its challenges through the power of companionship and community. I sincerely hope our readers would like a sequel.

 

 

 

The Wing Whisperer is available now in paperback.