ICW: Jordan Stephens and Beth Suzanna

Last month I was kindly invited to Bloomsbury Publishing House in London to interview Jordan Stephens - who you may know from being one half of Rizzle Kicks, or from his solo music - and Beth Suzanna about their debut kids book: The Missing Piece. Although, as you’ll see when you read on, I think adults should get buying and reading kids books to remind ourselves what’s important. We talk the books creation, Beth’s ridiculously stunning illustrations, diversity in storytelling, what’s next for both of them and what being Black means to them. Enjoy!

Brianna (TBP)
Hi! So how did the book sort of come to be? How long has it been in the pipeline? What's the story?

Jordan
I came up with the idea for the book about six years ago. And it was just an idea for a story that I had, I wasn't particularly sure that it was going to be a kid's book. But then I was reading a kid's book called The Fox and The Star - which I keep shouting out, they should give me some fucking money!

All
(laughs)

Jordan
But it just, I read it to my friend's daughter, and I was kind of taken aback by how much I loved it as an adult. And so remembered this idea I had, and then, you know, I literally I think just tweeted it, I just tweeted out going “does anyone know any kids book agents.” I met a wonderful woman called Julia Churchill. And she was very patient with me, it took me - I had this idea. I told her it on the phone, I wrote it down, it was not what I said on the phone. She said I should a give it another go to try to get what I’d said in person. And it took me three years to redraft it and then I did and then- maybe it was five years ago, yeah. And then, you know, then I've got kids book deal because I redrafted the story. And then that happened. And then it took me about a year to find Beth, during the pandemic.

Beth
Yeah 2020 was when I joined the project. So we were working on most of the project through lockdown and zoom.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah I was going to say so you didn't even get to really do much in person then?

Jordan
It was almost done by the time I met her,

Beth
Yeah, when we met we finished it- we were doing the cover I think. Or we'd, yeah, we'd have been doing all of it on zoom, which is kind of nice, because I think it's such a positive story that kind of makes you think about the little things, which I think everyone was doing at that time.

Jordan
It's a nice story to be engaging with over the course of lockdown. Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
So why did you decide then once you'd had the idea and had read that book, that children's books was the way to go for this? I know you're big into mental health, you’ve spoken about it a lot. Why not like a self help book or advice for teenagers book or something?

Jordan
I don't, I don't think I'm in a space right now to be necessarily prescribing ideas. Or if I am, I'd rather it be through a different lens. I do like self help books, but I think there's quite a lot of them at the moment.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Jordan
And I am writing other things. But I just, I mean, like, I just, I just saw it as such a privilege to be able to engage with two different generations at the same time, you're engaging with the child and the parent at the same time, that's quite powerful. And the idea is really, that the book is actually for the parent, kind of, the story is a story of, you know, it's me having a conflict with myself, you know, this perpetual desire to complete things, move the goalposts. That's me, that's what I experienced. But this is obvious, obviously, something that a child can find themselves in a shrunk down version of, you know. A puzzle for that child is literal, but I think for a lot of people, it's figurative and yeah, so the idea is that a parent reads that and they're like, oh, shit. So I am kind of, you know, addressing the idea about, you know, our obsessive tendencies and our addictive tendencies, but through the lens of what's just a wonderful story that also highlights the importance of grandparents.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, you both dedicated it to your grandma's and right? I thought that was really cute.

Jordan
Yeah. Yeah. So that's, I think that's it's still me expressing a feeling surrounding you know, sanity, but just through that lens. I don't really mind what lens it’s through.

Brianna (TBP)
I was gonna ask, “do you think it's important that lowkey adult should go back and read kids books”, but you kind of already answered it, because I was reading it and I was like, Oh my God.

Jordan
Did you actually?

Brianna (TBP)
I literally read it and was like, I should just read kids books.

Jordan
I did consider writing - I did consider, like, just being like, this is for adults. Yeah. I just wondered if, I wondered what that would be. Like if it was just exactly the same, but it's just an adult. Like Sunny as an adult. An adults kids book for adults.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah! because it makes so much sense

Jordan
That still could be a possibility, yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
We've gotta go back to basics, I feel like we get so caught up in our heads and like what society tells us we should be doing like, just go back to what we teach children. Like the basics.

Beth
In a way children are more like we were saying earlier, like grandparents and children have a very similar way of doing stuff. They have a similar mindset. They have similar energy. It's kind of I don't know, I think they have,

Jordan
They have more presence. Yeah, exactly.

Brianna (TBP)
I feel like a sense of freedom as well.

Beth
A sense of freedom. Exactly.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, definitely,

Jordan
I think. Yeah, yeah. I think that's the dream scenario is to provide a bit of relief for parents you know, in some ways,

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah. I think I think it'll do that. I mean, I'm not a parent, but it gave me a sense of relief as a 25 year old so I can imagine that for other adults it will do the same thing.

Jordan
Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
So a bit that I really enjoyed - I was a Rizzle Kicks fan growing up and lived in Hastings. So like anyone from the south coast -

Jordan
No way, Sussex vibes yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah. So, anyone from Sussex doing well I was like, big it up. No one from here does well, so I was like this is mad. But the Stephen’s house smelling like the ocean breeze. Was that a little nod to growing up in Brighton?

Jordan
No,

Brianna (TBP)
No? Not at all?

All
(laughs)

Jordan
No, no. I feel weird still about the Stephens thing I did it like, I just kind of just, I just did it at the time, because I was just, I was more concerned with finishing the story.

Brianna (TBP)
Okay,

Jordan
And my little brother had just been born, my first little brother. I've got two now, half brothers. So I was like ah let me just put Gabriel in there. Actually, there's an old version of him. I also have my dog in there. I had a dog in the story, but it was just too complicated.

Brianna (TBP)
“I can't make this work.”

All

(Laughs)

Jordan
He actually speaks and everything yeah yeah yeah.

Beth
I never saw that version!

Jordan
She goes to the Stephens family house and then asked, and then a dog is at the door, and she asked the dog if -

All
(Laughs)

Brianna (TBP)
No that's brilliant.

Jordan
Yeah but we had to cut the pages down so we had to cut him out. But there was just, it was just an extension. Beth's taken those drawings somewhere else. They're not effectively my family. Like, that kid doesn't look like my little brother. But its an ode to you know, and the water- I think it was just an interesting - again, I just think Beth just nailed it with that. I think, actually, it was Beth who took that.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, I was gonna come on to your illustrations in just a second.

Jordan
I don't know if I maybe was thinking about the Caribbean or something.

Brianna (TBP)
That's literally my question. I was gonna say because you both dedicated to your grandparents. And I know yours Jordan is from Guyana. I was gonna say did the colours of the Caribbean and South America influence the colours of the pages and the pictures.

Beth
Yeah definitely. Yeah, so my grandma's from Jamaica, Afro Caribbean heritage. So I think that was definitely in the book and in the spreads. And I think it's funny because diversity isn't something that we even kind of had to discuss. I think it was just that we both knew that that's kind of

Jordan
Yeah, the vibe

Beth
That, that was important. And it was kind of like a no brainer that it would I guess come through in I guess your own experience to come through into it being something important that you want to illustrate. But yeah, I think the colours-

Jordan
And you based Sunny on your sister?

Beth
Yeah Sunny's really heavily based on what my sister looked like when she was younger. So even just the way, how much energy she has, how much she kind of took up space as a child. But yeah, I think all of those influences of your own experiences, It's really nice to be able to put that all into a children's book, because it's really important.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah it came across so clearly. I was like, I feel like I'm there. I'm looking at the colours. I'm like get me to a beach, not Hastings.

Beth
Yeah. They all feel warm and I think, yeah, the whole, I guess each spread that all of Jordan’s writing was so sensory, there's so many different things I could pull from, and just creating each spread, it was a whole immersive experience and kind of thinking about as a child, how you would view that. So the spread you were saying, in particular, it's kind of a whole scene also, there's washing flying everywhere.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Beth
And that's really immersive, like the smell of clean washing is such a like,

Brianna (TBP)

It's visceral, like, you know it, yeah.

Beth
Such like a homey smell as well.

Brianna (TBP)
Definitely. So, other than maybe, comics, probably children's books are kind of the only literature where the words and the pictures come so balanced in importance to the reader. How closely did you work? Like, was it Jordan? Did you just say, Beth, go ahead. Do what you want.

Jordan
Yeah.

All
(Laughs)

Jordan
So yeah, I had, I had a few key, you know, a few key ideas about things that were important to me. Actually, to be honest, it only really came down to one which was that it's in the countryside. That was - there is something that, I didn't say this in an interview I did earlier, but there is something about blackness in the countryside, which I thought was quite important because I am just obsessed with the idea of there being some kind of mass exodus of black people from cities and them just reclaiming land.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Beth
I guess it's also another representation that you don't always see.

Jordan
No, never.

Beth
Yeah, you don't.

Jordan
I remember feeling like that. So weirdly, my grandmother, my Caribbean grandmother, that's the basis of, that's who I was loosely basing the character the grandmother on, but the location that I was wanting Beth to pick up on being just the countryside place. Those come from memories of my British gran. She lived in a place called Firle, which is this tiny village outside Lewes. And it was just so mythical. And actually some trivia is that Ken, the neighbour who fixes watches and makes jam is legitimate, legitimately was my grans neighbour.

Brianna (TBP)
Oh really?

Jordan
Yeah I remember vividly as a child being told like, why don't you ask Ken something, he fixes watches and makes jam. It's just stayed in my brain ever since I must have been about 11/12. And I just remember what a bizarre way to introduce a person.

Brianna (TBP)
Those are the key things about him. He lives next door, he fixes watches and he makes jam.

Beth
And the two together.

Jordan
So that was all - we wanted it to have a kind of natural feel. But other than that, I really was excited to see what would come back. Yeah. I was just like, let's just do what you want. Definitely. And my main thing with Beth was, don't limit yourself, like be as trippy as you want.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Jordan
Be as abstract as you want. Because the book isn't written - I haven't read loads of other kids books. But there's some kids that I've seen that are very, like movement orientated so like constantly going somewhere new, or there's a sound, or there's- do you know what I mean?

Brianna (TBP)
Like a going on an adventure kind of thing.

Jordan
But it's like the adventure is like, bang, boom. Whereas this story, actually, some of the pages like 3/4/5/6 of the pages are describing how someone's feeling. Do you know what I mean? So I was like, I needed Beth to be- for it to be her interpretation. And then I just get back these spreads. And just be like, wow, like, the spread of of, of Ken fixes watches, makes jam. Like, that's crazy that.

Brianna (TBP)
It's gorgeous.

Jordan
Not one part of that did I- There's not one suggestion to Beth about that. You know what I mean? I just had the page.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Jordan
It was just the spread, “family smelled of warm bread, looked like milky tea”, and then bang this thing and I'm like yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
(To Beth) I'd love to exist in your head for a day.

All
(Laughs)

Jordan
Do you know what I mean? Because I haven't said I haven't said like, it's- do you know what I'm trying to say?

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, you haven't given her anything other than that sentence. And she's come up with that.

Beth
It's quite nice because the words had so much agency in themselves, that we kind of we had an initial chat. And I said, I remember I said to Jordan, I said, What's one thing that you want kids to take away from this book? Just so I kind of know that- I think it's mainly that we're on the same page because we're working together.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Beth
And he just said, I think you said, wonder,

Jordan
Yeah,

Beth
Yeah, you said wonder just completely amazed.

Jordan
I want kids to just be like "woah!"

Beth
And I was like okay I can run with that, and I think it was nice that I kind of maybe went about in a less conventional way doing full spreads. The kind of rhythm of it I think is a bit different to usual kids books. And yeah, I think it was nice to be able to be really playful with the process. And then yeah, going back to Jordan, in getting the feedback, it was kind of just a really nice process.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah. I feel like literally each double double page could be a piece of art on its own, like, even like, your words are amazing. And I think they really convey a really beautiful message that like I say, adults should go back to and read -

Jordan
But that (Beth’s art) is just crazy right.

Brianna (TBP)
But that's just insane. It's beautiful. It's gorgeous. Like, I would get that framed on my wall. It's so nice.

Jordan
Right! That's what I'm trying to say! The colours are crazy!

Beth
I remember reading kids books when I was younger. And yeah, I think that so much of the you know, your par- it's such an intimate moment. You and your parents or your grandparents are sat together. Reading, you're taking in all the words, but also you're just sat with this - when you're small, the book seems huge, and you're just sat in this big world and it just kind of, you just feel like you're in it, which is really nice.

Brianna (TBP)
I really do like that even without talking about it, diversity has come through because I remember being little. There wasn't really children's books that looked like or looked like my sister. So my dad would just make up stories for us.

Jordan
Really!

Beth
Oh that’s so nice.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, he wouldn't read a book because he'd be like this is nonsense, I’ll make something up.

Beth
I remember gran, she found it really hard to find a character, like a black grandma,

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Beth
There were loads of grandparent books but not many of them were people of colour at the time.

Jordan
Yeah

Brianna (TBP)
Definitely.

Jordan
I just remember like leaning into animals

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, that was me. I was like,

Jordan
Fantastic Mr. Fox.

Brianna (TBP)
Fantastic Mr. Fox, yeah. James and the Giant Peach was a big one for me. Like things that weren't real.

Jordan
I would've loved a black Roald Dahl character that would have been great.

Brianna (TBP)
That would've been wicked. But I like that your book then opens that up for a new generation of kids to have those experiences and grow up and be like, "ah you remember when mum used to read to me or dad used to read to me" like, because I didn't get that and I think, as much as I loved reading it would have been nice, but I did I love my dad making up stories.

Jordan
I'm also fascinated about this, like this, this. I wonder if this book will be able to transcend like some societal coding, you know, like, the idea that boys won't read books with girl protagonists,

Brianna (TBP)
Yes,

Jordan
or that maybe a non black family be less inclined to read a black story to their child. I don't know. But I would. I would love to- that- do you know what I mean? I would love it to be a shining light.

Beth
A book for everyone.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Jordan
Yeah. Where it's like, you know, there's nothing about this story that makes Sunny particularly girly.

Brianna (TBP)
No there’s not.

Jordan
It's just a story about a child.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Jordan
And I think at that age as well, children are kind of I mean, there's obviously some differences. I know that- that my girlfriend's niece and nephew are like literally, at this point about seven or nine they're like "I wanna fight, I wanna clean" I'm like what the fuck is going on? What's happened to you? I thought we were in 2022, I need to sort you guys out!

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, absorbing these gender norms.

All
(Laughs)

Jordan
I know but I'm saying that, like, you know, in this book I definitely wanted it to be open for anyone. Do you know what I mean?

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah,

Jordan
It's important to me that a boy can relate to that story.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, and I think actually, it's more the parents than the kids. It's parents going into shops and buying it. I think any kid that that book was read to, if you went into a school and read it, all those kids would get it. And if you showed him the pictures, all those kids are going to want to look at it and pick it up and flip through the pages. It's getting parents to go and pick it up.

Jordan
Yeah, true.

Brianna (TBP)
But I'm gonna put it in my book club anyway, and get people with kids to read it to them.

Jordan
I love that!

Brianna (TBP)
So you signed on for three children's books? Right?

Jordan
Yeah,

Brianna (TBP)
Have you got plans for the next two? Or?

Jordan
Yeah, I've written the second one already.

Brianna (TBP)
Are you allowed to speak about it? Do you not want to speak about it? How you feeling?

Jordan
Yeah, I actually, it's a weird feeling. Because so much of the build up to this, this has been so long, this has been such a long time coming. It would be easy to go like, Ah, this this story- Whenever I've told people this story they’ve gone oh my-, my friends "oh, my God" you know, my mates who've had kids, and I'm telling them them it in person. And now it's like a real thing is, you know, it's done. And then just along the way, randomly, about two years ago, two and a half years ago, had the second idea- it just came to my head just one- such a weird- it was a conversation I had about something I think was something to do with a new- someone had said something about they'd found something on Mars. And then I started with my- I think I was in a conversation and we started talking about the fact that we're so obsessed as a species with finding out what's outside, but not what's inside. And I wonder if that's a reflection of people. Always looking outside. We never look inside. So I just when home that night and bang! Wrote this kid's book called (redacted, sorry you don’t get to know what it is yet) It's the working title. Don't say that.

Brianna (TBP)
I won't say that. I’ll say it's got a working title, but you don't get to know what it is. (See, did exactly what I said I would.)

Jordan
But it's about a young boy this time who journeys with his dad into the middle of the sea. And he decides to go to the bottom of it.

Brianna (TBP)
Interesting.

Jordan
Yeah. And it's just it's just talking about, but I'm now excited. It's talking about emotion basically, emotional depth. And and the challenges that - it's like a kid. It's like a young boy showing an older man, what it's like to look inside. Yeah. But um, I'm well excited for that now.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Jordan
Because it's because- that it's just- Yeah, I don't know. It's like that- I feel like that's also needed. I feel like that's needed now like this- this is amazing but it's like now.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah. And there's so many layers to that that's needed. Like kids teaching adults, I think we can learn so much from them.

Beth
I think children have more emotional intelligence than adults.

Brianna (TBP)
I think so. I think we're sort of trained to switch it off a little bit, aren't we? Where they don't, they don't have that filter. They just feel things in a really beautiful way.

Beth
Yeah.

Jordan
Literally. So that's that. And then even the third one is, has its bare bones.

Brianna (TBP)
Nice.

Jordan
Yeah. I- It's weird. A couple of people said to me that it's quite difficult to write kids books, or people have found that it's difficult to write kids books or something like that. But I had, honestly can't explain how much I fluked The Missing Piece. Just in terms of when I had, what do they call them when you meet all the publishers like?

Beatrice Cross
Like pitch meetings.

Jordan
Yeah, like, you go on this little thing. And everyone's like trying to charm you. But they were breaking down the structure. And I was like, Whoa, I really did do the structure but I didn't mean to so I've been trying to just, but it feels like it comes quite naturally in my head to think.

Brianna (TBP)
Do you have ADHD?

Jordan
Yeah,

Brianna (TBP)

Yeah, so do I, I think we can do that quite easily. I think the beauty of it is we haven't quite switched off that childlike quality. I think it's still there.

Jordan
Yeah

Brianna (TBP)
I think that's probably why you can do it easier, because I find it really easy to talk to kids.

Jordan
Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
Almost sometimes easier than talking to adults.

Jordan
Yeah,

Brianna (TBP)
Because, I don't know, I think my brain still sort of processes things in a similar way.

Jordan
Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
Do you reckon that might have played into it a little bit?

Jordan
Yeah maybe. Maybe. I feel like just there's some stories that I can tell- I can just- I just feel like it's easier to tell it as a kids book. it'll be, it'll be- I'll be fascinated to know about what your vibe will be for this other one.

Beth
I know, I'm excited

Jordan
Good! 'Cause I wanna see some crazy shit

Brianna (TBP)
And it's all set at sea, right?

Jordan
Yeah,

Brianna (TBP)
It's gonna be some nice blue tones

Beth
Yeah, I can't wait!

Jordan
Nah it's gonna be- Yeah, anyway, we'll see I'm making it right now. But yeah, but this is your- but this is also Beth's first kids book.

Brianna (TBP)
Really?

Beth
Yeah. Which I think is nice because the whole thing we were saying about trying to represent things in a really different way is nice because I'm coming into it with quite a fresh perspective.

Jordan
I want to know if Beth wants to do more kids books.

Beth
Yeah, definitely. I think I've always wanted to do kids books, it's something that I've always- my sister always used to read to me and I'm such a visual person. I think- I'm dyslexic so I always found reading quite hard. So I think children's books are kind of a really nice way for me to learn to read I guess and just- yeah, visualise stuff, but I think yeah, kids books I find, I just think they're so important because it's, it's like your first introduction to the world.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Beth
So I think making that as vibrant and exciting, but also having kind of little nudges to stuff like diversity without it being kind of a whole topic. A whole book on that. Just having it as just just to be there. Because, you know

Brianna (TBP)
Because we're here.

Beth
The book should represent how the rest of the world- how the rest of the world is. And yeah, I think that there's a really important role in that. So yeah, it's definitely something I I want to continue doing and that I love doing.

Brianna (TBP)
Brilliant. It's also very freeing as an artist, I can imagine, like you can be very creative in quite a free way.

Beth
Yeah, definitely. Yeah, exactly. I think it's nice trying to switch on that childlike part of your brain,

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Beth
I think everyone should. I think that's kind of what the book is about, just kind of thinking about your inner child, changing the way you see the world I guess.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah. Perfect. So my last question that I kind of ask everyone that does this is what does being black mean to you?

Both
(Stunned silence)

All
Everyone has this exact reaction where they're like shit I've never thought of this.

Beth
What's yours?

Brianna (TBP)
So mine, I always say is that it comes with the knowledge that I stand on the back of giants, and that I'm like living their wildest dreams. Like look at us, we're sat in Bloomsbury publishers. I carry a- like my surname that I don't really use. I use my mum’s now. Because my dad's is slave name.

Jordan
Yeah, I wanna change my last name. I hate my last name.

Brianna (TBP)
It's horrible. I don't like achieving things with the name of the person that stole my ancestors like it's horrible.

Jordan
Wait, so where's your mum from then?

Brianna (TBP)
My mum's Irish and my dad's Nigerian.

Jordan
What? But your dad should have his last name?

Brianna (TBP)
Well, so he- his family were taken to St. Kitts and then moved back to Nigeria. Yeah.

Jordan
So lost identity when they were in St. Kitts.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Jordan
That's crazy, because a lot Nigerians have their last name and I'm jealous about it.

Brianna (TBP)
Exactly, I know.

Jordan
That's dark history that because it's like, they might've actually just sold the slaves.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah, and that's even worse.

Jordan
That’s even worse!

Brianna (TBP)
The whole thing's messy.

Jordan
What does black mean to me? Um, Oh, man. That's really hard, um. I feel like it's a connection to source.

Brianna (TBP)
Short and sweet. I like it.

Beth
I think soul.

Brianna (TBP)
Yeah.

Beth
I think just that just the word soul. Yeah. I think just not necessarily soulful, but I just think kind of Yeah, I don't know. I just see. Yeah, I just see like, soul, like us.

Brianna (TBP)
Perfect. Thank you very much. We'll end it there.

Jordan
Great!

The Missing Piece is out now! Get a copy here, or enter our giveaway to win a signed copy.

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