Q&A: The unexpected fame of a London children's book author in Turkey

Vladimir Tumanov had no intention of becoming a beloved children's author in Turkey.

The Western University professor of comparative literature wrote a book over 20 years ago to help his son with math. The fantasy fiction math tale Jayden's Rescue is set up like a video game where a prisoner finds herself in a dungeon and has to make her way through each cell by solving math problems. She's helped along the way by three child protagonists, which becomes an adventure to a summer camp, a remote island and beyond.

Jayden's Rescue was first published by Scholastic in 2002 and was later translated into Turkish. Under the title Kraliçeyi Kurtarmak, the book became extremely popular among children in Turkey and Tumanov would go on to write six more books.

Tumanov is heading to Turkey for a book fair for the first time and stopped by CBC London to talk about his children's author journey with Travis Dolynny on London Morning.

The following has been edited for length and clarity.

Travis Dolynny: Have you ever written a children's book before?

Valdimir Tumanov: No, I was in academia. All my writings had to do with research that would never interest any child. But as a parent, I noticed that my son was struggling with math even though he was far smarter than that, and so I decided to take the edge off by adding something which he loved, which was adventure stories. And so it took off.

TD: How long did it take you to write it?

VT: It took me about a year. It was my very first book, so I was unversed in how publishing worked. It was an educational experience and it's certainly made a big difference in my life.

WATCH | London children's book author Vladimir Tumanov on London Morning:

TD: Tell me about how it made its way to being translated to Turkish.

VT: The math adventure attracted a number of publishers all over the world, and so the book was translated into different languages and came out in China and Korea and other places. It just so happened that in Turkey, teachers found it useful for use in the classroom, and so it took off. The Turkish publisher then asked me to write more books and so I wrote a series which is geography and science-based and it turned into a four-part series, the last of which came out last year.

TD: What's it like knowing that you're going to Turkey to meet all these readers who love your books, but this all started with you just wanting to help your son with his math?

VT: It's ironic because I certainly had no sense that I would ever leave the country on this basis. I knew that I wanted to write a book. I would say that it's certainly taught me a great deal about childhood and children. And even though I'm getting older, and getting farther away from my audience and age, in a way I'm closer to them because I keep thinking in terms of the child's mind, children's interests, and the concerns of children. And so in a lot of my books, for example, I deal with questions that have to do with nature and the environment and what's happening on Earth and how a child would view this in today's complex world.