Drandar the Dragon Knight by Terrie Hellard-Brown

 

 

About the Book

Book: Drandar the Dragon Knight

Author: Terrie Hellard-Brown

Illustrator: Rachelle Brown

Genre: Chapter book for Middle Grade Readers

Release Date: February 12, 2025

Drandar is the dragon that has been prophesied. He will help the king build a strong, safe kingdom as one of his faithful knights. But Drandar doesn’t seem to fit what a knight should be or even what a real dragon should look like. He’s what Seraphina calls a “late bloomer.” Drandar is droopy, discouraged, and doubting. Will he ever become the knight he’s supposed to be?

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I received a complimentary copy of this book and all opinions given are my own and not an endorsement of all author’s opinions. 

Author Interview

● How do you weave Biblical truths into your writing? 

Drandar the Dragon Knight is an allegory for living the Christian life. It is also just a fun dragon story. Weaving Biblical truth was just natural in this story. As Drandar would face a challenge, it was natural to have him learning a lesson that connected with Scripture even if I didn’t put the actual Scripture in the book. The truths are there, and they are the truths we all need to learn about life, especially a life that follows Jesus. In fact, I took the themes from the book and wrote a kids’ Bible study to go along with it. It’s called Discovering the Knight’s Code. The lessons drive home all the Biblical truths from the story to apply them to our lives. 

 

● Are any of your characters based off of yourself or those close to you?

Drandar is based on my daughter who illustrated the book. She has autism, but she’s such an amazing person, and I could see God had a plan for her life even when she couldn’t. She loves dragons and draws them all the time. I originally wrote Drandar’s story for her sixteen years ago! It was just a short picture book story then that I wrote to encourage Rachelle. 

 

● Was your writing process spontaneous as it came to you or very planned and organized? Why? 

I mostly write in a spontaneous way. I get the story down on paper first, and it’s usually a pretty terrible story at that point. But I need to get the ideas down. Then, I can let it sit a bit and come back to it. That’s when the story begins to come to life. I add in the details and humor. I make sure I’m showing the story unfold instead of telling the story. Then, I let it sit again for a while. After that I come back and edit, and edit, and edit some more. I edited Drandar over 20 times over the years more than any other story I’ve ever written. I take it to my critique group once I think I have the story ready. They give their ideas, and I edit again. After that, I send it to my editor, and we edit it again. But soon, the story is where it should be. There is a point at which we have to say it’s done. Otherwise, we can get stuck in editing to just change things without making the story better. 

So, mostly it’s spontaneous, but the overall process is somewhat organized into steps.

 

● Do you have a  favorite time of day you are most productive in your writing? 

I love to write in the wee hours of the morning whether that means I woke up early or stayed up late. I like the quiet when everyone else is asleep, and I can just write to my heart’s content. 

 

● Why did you pick this genre for your book? 

That’s actually a crazy thing. I originally wrote Drandar as a picture book for my daughter, as I mentioned. I wrote several picture book stories featuring Drandar over the years, but when I started pitching the book to be published, I kept getting the same response: This should be a chapter book. So, I learned how to write chapter books and wrote Drandar the Dragon Knight. It’s taken a lot of time, but I’m so glad it’s here, and I really enjoyed writing my first chapter book! In fact, I’m working on more chapter books now, and the second Drandar story will be available next year.

 

● How many books do you personally own? 

Oh my goodness! That is a hard question to answer. I was a teacher for over 30 years, and most of that time I taught literature. Plus, I’m a pastor’s wife and missionary. On my podcast that has been going for over five years, I mostly talk about books, especially picture books. I have thousands of books. I have over 1300 ebooks in my Kindle reader. I have bookshelves in almost every room in our house. Some are my kids’ and husband’s books, but I would guess I have probably 2000 books besides ebooks, and our family probably has 4000-5000 books altogether. I think we could open our own library!

About the Author

Empowering families to disciple the next generation every day and everywhere is Terrie Hellard-Brown’s mission. Sparking Everyday Discipleship, the podcast hosted by Terrie Hellard-Brown focuses on discipleship in the 21st Century, great books, and sparking important conversations with our children. Terrie is a writer, speaker, missionary, and mom with a BA in sociology and psychology, an MA in education, and is currently working on her DMin.

Her books include:

• Up, Down, and All Around: A Handbook for Discipling Our Children Based on Deuteronomy 6
• Building Character Through Picture Books: 25 Family Devotions Based on Favorite Picture Books
• A World of Pancakes (a picture book on flexibility and culture and including recipes from around the world)
• Izzy’s Notebook (a picture book about forgiveness, Harper and Izzy, Best Friends Forever Series: Living the One Anothers)
• Drandar the Dragon Knight (chapter book about being who God created us to be).

Terrie creates jewelry, bookmarks, and mini books (décor) with biblical and literature themes.

Her writing has appeared in Starlight Magazine, Upper Room, and Inspire Christian Writers Anthologies and blog.

Blog Stops

Debbie’s Dusty Deliberations, September 12

Simple Harvest Reads, September 13 (Author Interview)

Texas Book-aholic, September 13

Happily Managing a Household of Boys, September 14

For Him and My Family, September 15

Library Lady’s Kid Lit, September 16

Fiction Book Lover, September 17 (Author Interview)

Artistic Nobody, September 18

Stories By Gina, September 19 (Author Interview)

Jodie Wolfe – Stories Where Hope and Quirky Meet, September 20 (Author Interview)

A Reader’s Brain , September 21 (Author Interview)

Guild Master, September 22

A Modern Day Fairy Tale, September 23 (Author Interview)

Vicky Sluiter, September 24 (Author Interview)

Mary Hake, September 24

For the Love of Literature, September 25 (Author Interview)

Giveaway

To celebrate her tour, Terrie is giving away the grand prize of a $50 Amazon Gift Card, signed copy of the book and Bible study that accompanies the book, three stickers, a dragon velvet bookmark, and an armor of God necklace!!

Be sure to comment on the blog stops for extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/00adcf54297