Beaver Lake student writes his first novel

June 17, 2009

By Lauren McLaughlin

In eighth grade, Beaver Lake Middle School student Karan Sunil has already accomplished something most people can only dream of. He is a published author.

“It feels really good,” Sunil said. “Practically the whole school knows. I feel kind of like a celebrity.”

Sunil began writing his story last year. The book started from a short story writing assignment that he continued to work on.

“I was writing a short story for class and I thought it was a neat idea so I just continued writing it,” Sunil said.

“I get most of my ideas for stories right before bed, which is kind of inconvenient,” Sunil said.

Aside from writing, Sunil likes to draw, play basketball and hang out with his friends. Surprisingly Sunil’s dream is not to be a writer, but instead an animator.

“I really like drawing a lot more than writing,” Sunil said. “My dream is to have my own animated show on TV.”

Sunil’s book was published by KidPub. KidPub is a publishing company that allows children ages 8-15 to publish their stories.

“I had to get my parent’s permission to publish the book,” Sunil said. “They thought I could do it and were very supportive.”

Sunil’s mother, Anita Sunil was not surprised to learn her son published a book.

“He’s always been very creative,” she said.

“It was unbelievable seeing the cover of the book,” Anita Sunil said. “He drew the cover as well.”

According to KidPub, the company that published Sunil’s 194-page book, “The 8th Piece” is the story of a teen that must go on a quest of a lifetime to save his father. To do so the main character must travel to every continent and many countries.

Sunil’s favorite class is humanities. He said he enjoys learning about other cultures. His humanities teachers helped him research the continents for his story.

“They did a lot of research on their own time to help me,” Sunil said.

Sunil’s language arts teacher Laura Matheny was very proud of him.

“For an 8th grader to do a sustained piece of writing is unprecedented,” Matheny said. “I think he did a great job.”

Whenever Karan had a question about the settings or facts about the countries the teacher helped a little but he wrote the whole thing by himself, Matheny said.

“I think he will continue to write,” Matheny said. “He seemed to really enjoy the experience.”

Sunil’s social studies teacher Emily Ellis is also proud of his accomplishment.

“He’s very talented,” Ellis said. “I think he could do anything he wants to.”

Ellis is proud of Sunil for the amount of detail, time, and dedication that he put into his book.

After it was published Sunil came to class and read a chapter to his peers.

“I thought it was great role-modeling,” Ellis said. “It showed the rest of the class that they could do anything they wanted to no matter their age.”

He is currently working on a second book which is not intended to be a sequel to “The 8th Piece.”

Intern Lauren McLaughlin can be reached at 392-6434, ext. 244 or samrev@isspress.com. To comment on this story visit www.sammamishreview.com

In eighth grade, Beaver Lake Middle School student Karan Sunil has already accomplished something most people can only dream of. He is a published author.

“It feels really good,” Sunil said. “Practically the whole school knows. I feel kind of like a celebrity.”

Sunil began writing his story last year. The book started from a short story writing assignment that he continued to work on.

Karan Sunil’s book follows a childs adventure to save his father.