Alastair Chisholm

About Author

Alastair Chisholm introduces his new science fiction novel, I Am Raven, the follow-up to his acclaimed novel, I Am Wolf (Nosy Crow).

When Alastair Chisholm was a kid, he wanted to be a computer programmer, an author, and an astronaut. So far he's achieved two out of three and still hoping NASA will call... In the meantime, he writes picture books, chapter books about dragons, and science fiction for older kids.

He lives in Edinburgh with his wife and family, and his hobbies include writing and playing games on his phone when he should be writing.

You can find Alastair on Instagram @alastairchisholm and on X @alastair_ch

Interview

I Am Raven (Nosy Crow)

April 2025

I Am Raven is the follow-up to Alastair Chisholm's critically acclaimed I Am Wolf and in this installment, we travel with Col, Brann and their friends to discover new areas in this world of Constructs, conflicts and chaos as new creatures threaten the established order.

Find out from author Alastair Chisholm what inspired the Constructs and this setting, what themes Alastair looks to explore through his science-fiction writing, and what kind of Construct would he be with in this world?

Read a Chapter from I Am Wolf Read a Chapter from I Am Raven

Q&A with Alastair Chisholm

"I'm always trying to work out a good twist, and to keep the plot pulling you forward. But the stories that you remember forever
are the ones where you care about the people."

1. Thank you for joining us again on ReadingZone. Can you tell us three things about yourself, and how you got started writing for children and young people?

Three things… One: I'm Scottish, and I live in Leith, which is a very cool part of Edinburgh. Two: When I was a kid I wanted to be a writer, a computer programmer, and an astronaut (I'm two out of three so far!). Three: I like biscuits.

I've always loved writing stories, but my first books were actually puzzle books. I love logic puzzles (Sudoku, Kakuro and others) and got really into them, until I got a chance to create puzzle books. So then I was published, which felt AMAZING, and I thought: why not try to publish some of my stories? It took a long time, but eventually my picture books found a home at Walker Books. Then Nosy Crow picked up my first sci-fi book, Orion Lost - and since then it's been a bit of a whirl.

I've been lucky, and have had lots of highlights, but when my eldest daughter told me she liked the first draft of my first novel, that was amazing. It was the moment I thought this could actually work…

2. What happens in your series, I am Wolf and now I Am Raven? And congratulations on the Carnegie Longlisting for I Am Wolf!

Thank you! I Am Wolf takes place in a world full of giant mechanical creatures, called Constructs, fighting each other for resources. Coll, a crew-member aboard Wolf, gets stranded and is forced to form a group with folk from other Constructs, Boar and Raven, to try to get back. It's an action adventure, with lots of excitement and danger, but at heart it's about belonging, and tribalism, and finding your own crew.

Now, in I Am Raven, we're following Brann from the Raven crew. Raven is lost, and its crew are gone. Brann is desperate to find them. But the fearsome Dragon Construct still roams the land, and something sinister is happening in the north. And Brann herself is hiding a secret…

3. These books are described as science fiction, but what does that mean and what science fiction characteristics do your stories have?

Science fiction covers a lot! But my favourite kind is the Star Wars, Guardians of the Galaxy style, or Troofriend by Kirsty Applebaum, where the technology and world exists to tell human stories.

In Wolf and Raven, the Constructs are powered by a material called Anthryl that responds to human thought. Literally, the more you believe in your Construct, the more powerful it becomes. Survival depends on believing that only your Construct is good, and everyone else is the Enemy.

So in Wolf I used that to talk about tribalism and belonging. In Raven, it's more about the cultures that develop on these Constructs. Raven's crew have a very different view of the world, and it's one that still affects Brann…

4. What was your initial inspiration for this world of Constructs, and how did you go about creating it?

Usually I have some ideas, start to feel out a story, and maybe imagine a title. In this case, it came the other way around! The title of book one - I Am Wolf - popped into my head. I didn't know what it meant, but I had an image of a young man, very intense. Who was he? What was Wolf? Whatever it was, I knew he really believed in Wolf - and that was the spark.

Then, I remembered a long time ago I'd read an article about self-assembling machines - little robots that could form into shapes. The people working on it didn't have the technology yet, but they were trying to work out the software. I thought: what if they got it working? How would you send the instructions? And the two halves came together. Wolf was made of these machines. The instructions were psychic. And the more you believed, the more powerful they became…

After that, I had to write it!

5. Did you enjoy returning to the world and setting of I Am Wolf with I Am Raven? Why did you decide to focus on separate characters in each book?

I loved returning to this world! There was so much I wanted to explore, plus it gave me a chance to set up a bigger overall story than usual. And although I love Coll, I always knew book two would be Brann's. She's cool, she's ferocious, and she's trying desperately to contain her demons. I Am Wolf was about belonging. I Am Raven is about fear…

6. Do the characters' developments - exploring their sense of belonging or learning about fear - drive the story, or is plot just as important?

I think they go hand in hand. I'm always trying to work out a good twist, and to keep the plot pulling you forward. But the stories that you remember forever are the ones where you care about the people, and in the end it's always the people that carry me along.

Brann is brilliant. She's constantly brave, even when terrified. I hope the readers find that the things she learns are useful to anyone who's been scared. I also hope they think Brann is as amazing as I do!

7. Do you have a favourite Construct? Which of the Constructs do you think you would have found yourself in - or would you want to create your own?

One of the joys of writing these books has been imagining the Constructs out there - Wolf, Boar, Hyena, Puma, Lion, Bear and more. But I'd have to say my favourite is Beetle! I think it would be such fun scurrying about and I loved that they got to introduce themselves as: "Hello - we're the Beetles"!

For me, I think if I were on a Construct it would probably be a dog. Not a fierce dog - one of those rather goofy ones that think everything is BRILLIANT.

8. I Am Raven ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. What kinds of adventures can we expect in the next book, and whose story do you plan to explore next?

I'm working on book three right now! I can't give away too much, but this one is all about Rieka, who is brilliant with tech but terrible with humans. In Raven we meet the major villain, and in book three everything collides - deadly missions, hidden secrets, huge battles! And a theme, of course. If Wolf was belonging, and Raven is fear, then book three is about freedom - and what that means…

9. I Am Wolf would make a great film - have there been any discussions or film interest?

I would love to see I Am Wolf as a film! When I'm writing, I often try to 'see' the scene as if I'm watching it in a cinema. Where is the camera, what can the audience see and hear, where's the action, what's the focus? I think that seeing Wolf Construct on screen would be amazing.

10. What kinds of things do you do to escape your writing desk? Have any of your real world adventures helped inspire specific novels?

I try to go for walks every day, and I love a good museum (I'm the Museum Dad, you know, the one who spends aaaages at every exhibit and calls you back to show you stuff long after the point where you just want to find the shop and the café). And in my other life I'm a computer programmer, so I've always had a geeky side, which often feeds into my stories. I know the technobabble and I love finding out about the latest tech!

Creative Challenge: How do you suggest young writers go about creating their own Construct and world setting?

I'd say the first thing is to choose your Construct animal. What do you love? Are you a cat or dog person? Or would you like to fly, like Raven? Or swim - perhaps Dolphin or Great White Shark?
Then find some pictures of it, get a feel for its hands/feet/teeth/paws/tail/fur/whatever. And then … think BIG. It's got to be large enough to hold a crew. Scale it up! When I started out, I looked up sailing ships that carried crews. How big were they? How big would my Construct have to be to hold a crew?
Finally, remember it's a MACHINE. Swap the fur for strands of fibre cable. Teeth could be steel - or diamond? Ears or Radar dishes? How does the tail move? Are there pistons in the legs? Have a look at the materials and machinery used to make planes, or ships, or giant wind farms, or the enormous machines that bore tunnels through the earth. How do you think they look? How do you think they sound?

School events: I love doing school events, both in person and virtual. I love chatting about amazing inventions that have changed the world (and terrible inventions that really didn't), about what science fiction can tell us about our world, about stories and how they can help us, and about empathy (a human superpower!). If you'd like to find out more, head over to my website!

Alastair Chisholm introduces I Am Wolf (Nosy Crow)

The first book in Alastair Chisholm's spectacular science fiction trilogy, I Am Wolf, introduces a world where giant animal Constructs range across the landscape; living things powered by their crew, fighting other Constructs for territory and survival. Here is Alastair Chisholm to tell us more.

Read a Chapter from I Am Wolf

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