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Understanding Yourself First
The Holding follows an energetic nine-year-old and his older sister, the mysterious connection between the two, their dreams, the animals around them, and the private places where they feel most at home. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
The book started off as a gimmick; a hastily created YA type thing that my own kids might find funny, based on an inside joke and a family mythology about the relationship my own kids have. After reading the first few chapters (initially drafted with AI), I realised I didn’t want it to be that at all, and undertook the literary, fully realised work that it is now (written mostly by me, although some initial language from the first draft remains). At the core, it is a selfish attempt to provide an alternate reality for my kids, where they learn to love each other the way I hope they will one day (and Dad gets to watch).
Simon and Anna live close to one another but often struggle to understand each other. What interested you about that dynamic?
As above, the kids in the story started out as exaggerated versions of my own munchkins, although they drifted substantially from that as the book was written. I wanted to explore the nature of the kind of love that can only be made in the young, and how the searching for it is often an exercise in understanding yourself first. There is so much ‘what you should be’ and ‘what is best’ instruction in the world for young people these days, and I think it gets in the way of accepting what you actually are sometimes; giving Simon and Anna a journey toward each other, through experiencing themselves, was me imagining a future for them that I hope comes to pass.
Auggie brings both humor and wisdom to the story. What does he see that the human characters miss?
I love Auggie because she is not confused, or challenged, or searching like most of the other characters are in the book; she knows what she is already, she knows where she fits in, she knows her role and, in the end, knows what to do when things seem hopeless. The humans are in their own heads, but she gets not to be, and in not-being, sees much that passes the humans by. I should mention that Auggie owes much to the character of Mottyl in Timothy Findlay’s wonderful book Not Wanted On The Voyage, which I read at a formative time, and always carried around with me; Mottyl might be the most human character in the whole book, despite being a cat, and it was a pleasure to experience the world of The Holding through Auggie’s (and Gracie’s) noses as a result.
What is the next book you are working on, and when will it be available?
My next project is still a way off, but it will investigate more adult themes as opposed to the young ones at the heart of The Holding; without being able yet to say how, I know it will explore overcoming isolation as a grown-up, and the kind of things that pull us in and push us out of it. As mentioned above, The Holding is an AI-Assisted novel initially conceived as a joke, before taking it seriously. Before this book, I would never have thought I could be an author, and to be clear, I do not yet feel I deserve that title, despite having written most of The Holding and having deeply altered the early work I did not incept. What The Holding taught me, though, is that I CAN be an author. I look forward to learning what a fully analogue experience feels like, and to the comfort that will bring with the word author (I use writer, or creator now).
Author Links: GoodReads | Instagram | Website | Amazon
Loving your sibling is hard.
Simon is nine. He moves through the world as an outgoing creature of the moment, heart on his sleeve, sometimes too loud, sometimes too much. Anna is thirteen — guarded, watchful, sharper than she lets people see, and quietly drowning in the social blood-sport of grade eight. Time is not on their side. The love they do not share can only be made in the young, and they are growing up-and-out of their smallness. Unseen at the edges of the frame, something outside themselves is trying to bring them together. What they manage — or fail to manage — between themselves will register far past the small horizon of a Canadian childhood.
The Holding is a tender, strange, deeply felt novel about the everyday work of finding, and holding on to each other.
This book is AI Assisted
The Holding
The Holding is a literary fiction novel about two siblings who live close to each other without truly understanding each other. Nine-year-old Simon is energetic, impulsive, and absorbed in a virtual reality game, while his older sister Anna carefully manages school, friendships, family expectations, and the complicated work of being a teenager. Their contrasting perspectives make the book feel like both an intimate family drama and a contemporary coming-of-age novel. What begins with ordinary household friction slowly reveals a mysterious connection between the children, their dreams, the animals around them, and the private places where they feel most at home.
The novel’s rotating viewpoints are one of its greatest strengths. Simon’s thoughts move with playful, unpredictable momentum, while Anna’s chapters capture the constant calculations of adolescence with painful accuracy. The animal perspectives, especially those of the elderly cat Auggie, bring warmth, humor, and an unusual emotional intelligence to the story. These sections give the book its magical realism flavor without pulling it away from the everyday details of shared custody, sibling resentment, screen time, friendship problems, and family routines.
As a character-driven family drama, The Holding is especially interested in what it means to notice another person. The speculative elements aren’t treated as a puzzle to be solved so much as a language the characters are slowly learning to share. Virtual reality, horseback riding, dreams, drawings, and animal instincts all become ways of exploring connection. The writing often lingers on tiny gestures, repeated sounds, open doors, and familiar routines, allowing emotional shifts to happen gradually. That patience makes the relationship between Simon and Anna feel lived-in, and their moments of understanding carry real weight.
This coming-of-age novel has a tender, observant heart, but it also understands how cruel children can be and how easily families can miss what’s happening inside one another. Its most memorable passages find meaning in the ordinary: a cat choosing where to sit, a brother trying to stay still, a sister waiting at the corner, or a parent quietly watching something change. The Holding is a thoughtful blend of speculative fiction, magical realism, sibling story, and multigenerational family drama. It’s the kind of book that invites readers to pay closer attention to the people and animals holding their lives together.
Pages: 326 | ASIN : B0H6GRHG6H
