When asked what kinds of books we like to read, few people can say “books like my own.” If you ask ELMS sixth grader Nadia Lira, that is her immediate response.
“The first product is not always the final one, so just having the patience to write it, read it, change it if you need, and just patiently go through it. Publishing takes some iterations, and a lot of back and forth,” Nadia’s mother, Tasneem Lira said.
Nadia’s passion for writing began in kindergarten when she started to write small stories in class.
“My teacher kept all of mine to show them to the next grades,” Lira said.
Nadia’s parents often reminded her that “There is no perfect book. It’s your book, you can change the story as you want. It’s your imagination,” Mr. Lira said.
When Nadia entered fourth grade, her teacher gave the class the opportunity to work on writing a story when they finished their work early. Most students gave up and started different stories after a few days, but Nadia worked tirelessly on the same one.
“It was something fun we could do. And when the school year ended, I wasn’t done with mine, so I decided to continue it,” Nadia said.
Nadia’s final product: a 141-page fantasy book entitled “The Crystal Quest.” The book tells the story of a group of young girls and wolves in search of seven crystals on a quest to save the world from evil. Nadia and her parents self-published the book through the company “BookBaby.”
The wolf characters in Nadia’s story sprouted from Nadia’s love of animals, especially dogs. Nadia hopes to be a veterinarian when she grows up.
“As a writer who started this book at the age of 10, I am highly impressed with Nadia’s voice as an author. Each character’s personality shines through her words. She has excellent use of dialogue as well. Her vocabulary is very mature,” Nadia’s language arts teacher Giselle Bagley said.
Nadia showed perseverance throughout the writing process, never giving up when she got stuck.
“I didn’t write it every day. I wrote it for long periods of time, a couple times a week. A lot of times I had no idea what to add with the book, so I took a while to figure it out,” Lira said.
When Nadia isn’t writing, she’s not resting either.
“I love to read. I have a lot of favorite books, but my favorite book series is ‘Keeper of the Lost Cities’,” Lira said.
Lira is also passionate about gymnastics
and takes modern and acrobatic dance classes every week. Nadia added that she wishes she could join the writing club at ELMS, but Nadia’s father, Ricardo Lira commented that like most high schoolers, Nadia’s packed schedule makes it “tough to fit everything in.”
Nadia plans to make her story a trilogy and added, with a smile, that she hopes to continue to write for fun in the future, because “It makes me happy,” Lira said.
