Elliot D’Souza loves to read and build with LEGO and recently published a book that combined his two passions.
The 11-year-old Midhurst resident recently published his very first book, Eggy Adventures: The Journey to Egg-ville, which follows an eggy named Eggie, who decides to move after an invention he made makes him too popular.
“He sets off on an adventure to Egg-ville, where he just wants to live a normal life. He encounters some foes and friends and challenges along the way,” explained the local Grade 6 student.
D’Souza initially wrote the story as part of a homeschooling assignment during the pandemic, telling BarrieToday after reading it, his parents thought it was good enough to share.
“My parents thought that it was good and that others might want to read it so we made it into a book,” he said.
“I told him to just be creative and that I wanted to see what he could do,” added mom Tara D’Souza.
“He’d work on the story, and you know kids have all sorts of great ideas, but they also have a tendency to get brain-drain. I thought he wasn’t in a classroom so (told him to) take advantage of being at home and go play for a bit and come back to it. He’d use those breaks to build with his LEGO and bricks … and it just kind of evolved from there,” she said.
When she read Elliot’s completed story for the first time, she was impressed, she admitted.
“He’d built up this entire little empire just out of his imagination. I could picture all of the different things he was imagining and trying to explain.”
Elliot said it took him just shy of two years to complete the book, which also includes photographs he took using his brick character Eggie out on his adventures.
“I wanted to wait until the trees were green and all of the trees had their leaves and flowers to take the pictures,” he said, adding he and his mom did that part together.
“It was fun and kind of challenging, mainly because there weren't any LEGO studs … on the ground, so we had to stick him in there and balance some things.”
Elliot recently sold his book at a local market, and said it was exciting getting to be there to share his book publicly.
“I was like 'Wow, I made it so far,'” he admitted when asked what was going through his head when he sold the first copy of his book.
Seeing her son’s creativity come to life this way, as well as the positive feedback he’s already received from kids who have read it, has been “amazing,” said Tara.
“I am relieved that he still has his imagination after all of the outside influences. He always has his own little world to retreat to when builds on it. It makes me feel good that he’s come so far, especially at his young age,” she said.
Elliot is currently in the midst of writing a followup to Eggie’s adventures, which he hopes to release by the end of the summer. Although he would love to continue to be an author, his ultimate dream is to become a professional designer for Lego.
Eggy Adventures: The Journey to Egg-ville is available to purchase here as well as on loan at both the Springwater and Barrie public libraries.
