Cruise Ship Kid: 'I spent my childhood on board cruise ships and my adventures have inspired a detective children's book'

It’s fair to say a young Emma wasn’t overly impressed then by one of the world’s most active volcanoes. But when you spend each day sailing around the globe, remarkable sights soon become somewhat ordinary.

Emma spent a large part of her childhood on board cruise ships, where her parents worked as entertainment directors. Waking up in the likes of the Bahamas, or Iceland, was a perfectly normal occurrence. But having a friend her own age was not.

Much of Emma’s conversation each day was with octogenarians, and though children would, in the school holidays especially, clamber aboard the ship for a break at sea, Emma soon found herself bidding farewell when it was time for them to leave again just a week or two later.

The only real constant was the staff – and Emma saw herself as a mini crew member. “But you’re still a kid,” she says. “You might have seen a wonder of the world, but you actually just want mates. You just want normal things.”

Emma draws on her experiences for her debut book Cruise Ship Kid: Thief at Sea, the first title in a new detective series aimed at children aged eight and above. The series follows the adventures of Silver, a child who lives on a cruise ship and sails around the world solving crimes with her over 80s pals – known as the Gang.

Two of the members, Tommy and Sylvia, are based on Emma’s grandparents. “I had a lot of older people pals that really inspired me as a kid,” she says. “I learnt all sorts of things from them.”

Emma spent her early years living full-time in a cabin among crewmates, and being boat-schooled by her mum. Even once they’d settled on dry land in Yorkshire and Emma was attending school in Rotherham, with every holiday, they were back on board.

For Emma, many hours were spent exploring, even some of the out-of-bounds places, and, though the cruises became less frequent into her teens and older, still to this day, she has an insider knowledge of every part of a cruise ship.

Last year, she sailed to the Caribbean on a research trip for book number two, keeping a diary of life on board. “It was amazing. I had such strong memories,” Emma says. “It wasn’t a cruise ship I’d ever been on before but I kind of felt I knew my way round. It felt like going back home."

Emma’s debut book is a celebration of that life at sea, a story about class, friendship and the importance of intergenerational relationships. She hopes her young readers will be inspired to interact with older people “because I think those two generations can really learn from each other - and hilarious things can ensue as well,” she says.

She hopes too that children will feel inspired to start writing themselves. Her readers are encouraged from the outset to interact with the story by filling in quizzes and adding their own doodles and words to the interactive pages.

“The idea is that as they are reading, they have a pen or pencil and get involved in the story,” Emma explains. “Reading is the place where (writing) starts for most authors,” she adds.

She wrote Cruise Ship Kid from the flat where she now lives in London, having moved to the capital for drama school after an English Literature and Spanish degree at the University of St Andrews in Scotland.

As an actor, Emma is passionate about children's entertainment and now works frequently with Horrible Histories. She’s soon to be on stage for Barmy Britain - The Best Bits in the West End this summer. She also narrates audiobooks, recording from a makeshift home sound studio devised from the classic combination of sofa cushions and a duvet.

“In a way, Horrible Histories has inspired my writing because you have these amazing audiences full of kids,” reflects Emma, who joined a writing group during the Covid-19 pandemic. “They tell you if they think something is hilarious and they will certainly tell you if they don’t. Hearing what goes down well with them on stage, I’ve tried to bring that humour into my writing.”

Just as her time at sea has inspired her written work, it has also influenced her career in acting too, Emma believes. “I think it was really inspired by seeing performers on board as a kid.

"I’ve got a lot of childhood memories of hiding backstage and seeing so many amazing things. I was backstage a lot, making friends with the theatre company - I’ve got pictures of me dressed up in feathers. These people were my role models.”

One of her biggest childhood memories of life on board was the food, Emma says. “There’s so many restaurants and there would sometimes be a chocolate buffet theme – once a cruise it happened.

"Every 10 to 14 days, I was helping myself to this whole buffet full of chocolate, tables and tables full. The chefs, are like artists and they’d make these huge chocolate sculptures of animals and buildings. I remember saying please mum can I have a couple of things this cruise."

"I saw all these amazing things on cruise ships through a child’s eyes,” Emma adds, “Hopefully that (innocent) humour comes into the book. It was a very unusual upbringing at sea.”

- Cruise Ship Kid: Thief at Sea, written by Emma Swan and illustrated by Katie Saunders, is published by Usborne and available now.