Kathy Hoopmann
Lisa and the Lacemaker
Children’s fiction
When Lisa discovers a derelict hut in her friend Ben’s backyard, she delights in exploring the remnants of an era long gone. Imagine her surprise when Great Aunt Hannah moves into a nursing home nearby, and reveals that once she was a servant in those very rooms. The old lady draws Lisa into the art of lace making and through the cross-crossing of threads, Lisa is helped to understand her own Asperger Syndrome. But Great Aunt Hannah also has a secret and now it is up to Lisa to confront the mysterious lacemaker and put the past to rest.
PEEK INSIDE
Why I wrote it…
Once I was teaching in a school and I had a student named Hannah Lace. I thought she had one of the most beautiful and evocative names I had ever heard. I asked her permission to use her name in a book one day and she graciously said yes. I had wanted to write a novel about a girl with Asperger’s for a while and the two ideas came together. Then a friend offered to teach me how to make lace. It is so complex and intricate and the result is so lovely. At last I had all the ingredients for my plot and Lisa and the Lacemaker was born. I wanted this book to be part of the Asperger Adventure series so Ben and Andy had to be involved. So I set the scene in Ben’s backyard which is a cross between the small farm I grew up on and my home in Queensland. Add an unexplained pathway and an overgrown cottage and a mystery was begging to be solved.
Awards and Recognition
2002
Lisa and the Lace Maker
Jessica Kingsley Publications, UK 2002
- Educational Publishers Council Special Needs Book Awards, UK: Shortlisted
Reviews
“Kathy Hoopman’s gentle stories are ideal for introducing a child to Asperger Syndrome through a hero or heroine. Lisa is intelligent and quirky. We are encouraged to embrace her difference not condemn it.”
Goodreads Review