The Creation of Penny
Gillian’s mother was a self-proclaimed feminist before it was considered on-trend. She knew that if she were to raise strong, independent women, she needed to start while her girls were young. She scoured the shelves at her local library for stories with strong female leads. Unfortunately, back in the early 90’s, there were only a handful of stories that were suitable and as you can imagine, her young girls grew quite tired of the same four books.
But Gillian’s mother was no quitter, she was always up for a challenge. One night at bedtime, Gillian’s mother didn’t pick a book off the shelf to read, instead creating herself a story about a fierce and somewhat naughty girl named Penny. Night after night, Gillian and her sister sat in anticipation and clung to their mother’s every word about Penny’s adventures. Twenty-five years later when Gillian wrote her first book, she didn’t have to think twice about what to name the lead character. A strong, independent and somewhat naughty girl, could only be “Penny”.