Lisa Joy Lawrence returned to her high school in Stettler, William E. Hay Stettler Secondary Campus to read out to Doug Gregory's Grade 10 English class, the same teacher who had taught her, from her published novel Rodent.
Although the storyline of Lawrence's book takes place in an unnamed city, her life in Stettler influenced some parts of the plot.
"My life in the town certainly crept into certain parts," said Lawrence. "For example, my protagonist, Isabelle, develops a rapport with her English teacher, Mr. Drummond, well, some of the literature I was first exposed to in my English classes at William E. Hay with Mr. Gregory appears in Isabelle's English class."
Lawrence recalled, "That was a time in my life when I was becoming more engaged in reading and writing, and those stories stuck with me and although Mr. Drummond isn't Mr. Gregory, it only seemed fitting to me that he has a mustache too."
According to Lawrence, the physical layout of William E. Hay was often the template for her fictional school, and though a lot of the school is different now, there used to be a drama wing with a great prop room.
"We used to plan our skits and scenes in there, and it was full of fantastic vintage clothing," said Lawrence. "Those rooms in William E. Hay were the inspiration for the drama and prop rooms in Rodent, which become important places in the novel. Also, there's a chase scene in Rodent, where Isabelle and another character race through the school, and I could tell you exactly where that happens in William E. Hay."
Lawrence said that the spark for Rodent came one night, a few years ago, when she was putting her youngest daughter to bed.
"I had gone through the whole bedtime routine and was tucking her in when I thought, 'What would it be like for a child to have to do all of this?" added Lawrence. "I started thinking about circumstances in which children care for other children and the story took shape in my mind as a teenage girl – Isabelle – who looks after her younger brother and sister because of her mother's alcoholism."
On the surface, the novel does not tie much into Lawrence's personal background. "This certainly wasn't my family life growing up, and although I come from a big family, I didn't have to care excessively for my younger siblings," continued Lawrence. "Bullying is also one of the themes in Rodent, and I didn't suffer a lot from bullying as a child, but I know people who did, and that has impacted them even into adulthood."
Rodent is about a 16-year-old girl, Isabelle, who is the caregiver for her two younger siblings because of her mother's alcoholism.
She takes on all of the day-to-day responsibilities that a parent normally would, like getting her siblings to school, cooking, cleaning wet beds and even using her money to buy groceries.
While she's dealing with her mother's struggle toward sobriety, she starts Grade 11 at a new school and that involves a lot of ups and downs and new relationships.
"Some characters came very naturally to me, like they were already real people and I always knew what Isabelle would say and do in each circumstance," added Lawrence. "Other characters took me longer to shape in my head, but I knew Isabelle's mother wasn't very functional as a parent, yet I didn't want to make her a terrible human being either, so in a way some characters are ready to go from the outset, while others take some thought, trial and error, and rewriting before they feel real to me."
Lawrence's novel Rodent was published in March 2016, and the formal book launch took place in Edmonton in May.
"I've been fortunate, to this point, that most reviewers and friends who have read it have been overwhelmingly positive, but it's also interesting how perspectives differ," said Lawrence. "I've heard it called 'gritty' and 'heartbreaking," while another review I read recently called it 'an upbeat story' ... hopefully it is all of those things."
Lawrence came to the school in Grade 5 and graduated in 1993.
Now based out of Edmonton, pursuing a teaching career, she has nearly finished a new manuscript about a 14-year-old girl with Turner syndrome.
But she has two other stories in mind.
"I have two other stories in my head after that one is finished, both young adolescent novels, but I'm only a few pages in so far," added Lawrence. "One of those stories takes place in a small town, so I might have to come back to Stettler to do some research."