The HSC year is stressful enough without adding in the publication of a novel.
But St Columba’s Catholic College student Oliver Smuhar has taken it all in his stride.
His first novel, The Gifts of Life, was published recently, the result of almost a year’s work.
Every night after finishing his homework, Oliver would write for two hours.
“I’d be writing instead of wasting time on YouTube,” the 18-year-old from Blaxland, said.
“The more I write, the better I get at it.”
One might assume coffee would be the drink of choice to keep him going late at night, but not so, with Oliver opting to drink lots of water instead.
Breaking the head stuff up with some quiet time walking in the bush also helped. “It helped with the writing process,” Oliver said.
At first he kept it pretty quiet at school that he’d published a novel.
“I was a little embarrassed. It’s a bit odd – now it’s out there I have slowly learned to market it,” Oliver said.
“Some of my friends knew and thought I was joking. But then they saw the cover and knew this was real.”
Oliver has written countless stories as a child but never finished them. He stopped writing in his early teens for a few years because “I thought I was too cool. I’d always wanted to do a book but I’d not had the dedication.”
His debut young adult fantasy novel has been described as “Deltora Quest meets The Hunger Games.”
It’s about a teenager, Perry, who lives in a city where everyone has a white mark on their wrist, holding special powers. Under attack, he and his friends begin a journey to another town, and can only survive and understand their powers by working together.
“People in my year bought it and like it,” the young author said. He’s already started writing another book and there are plans for a sequel to The Gifts of Life.
He drew inspiration from a family holiday to Europe in 2015, mixing ancient architecture of Italy and Turkey, with Australia’s open space and a gothic influence thrown in for good measure.
The Chronicles of Narnia were a big influence, as was Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series, which “unlocked something in my mind,” Oliver said.
Neither of his parents are in writing professions – his mum’s a pharmacist and his dad’s in IT – but Oliver plans to make a career out of writing. He hopes to study journalism at the University of Technology Sydney.
The Gifts of Life is available online at Amazon by searching under Oliver’s name.
