A series of travel guides has been published for young people. Author Mio Debnam and illustrator Tania Willis tell Matt Fleming what makes their Hong Kong book unique

The kidsGo! series is proving to be a hit with children and adults alike. The new books, which cover Bali, New York, London, Phuket, Sydney and Hong Kong, are aimed at seven to 14-year-olds who want to find out about a destination – and then have a say in where they visit, with or without mum and dad.

The kidsGo! books seem pretty handy. What are they about?
Mio: They’re about fun! They look fun, thanks to the funky illustrations, and I did tons of research to make sure that every suggestion will be appealing to kids – and also enjoyable for the whole family. Dania the publisher, Tania and I are parents, as are many of the on-the-ground experts I consulted, so we’re all aware of what works, and what doesn’t.
Tania: The books are travel guides designed to be read by children, not parents, so illustrations would tempt the children inside the covers and get them planning. As style is increasingly important to the tween demographic, we worked with that in mind to create visually appealing books for that age group.

What does the Hong Kong guide offer young people?
Mio: All the old favourites and a few surprises too, I hope! I’ve lived in Hong Kong for decades and thought I knew it all, but I was happy to discover some great new things while I was doing research, which I hope our readers will also enjoy. As with all the books, there are also some fun facts, bits of folklore and useful info scattered in the text, which I hope help to add a bit of extra ‘local colour’ – and provoke a ‘hey cool, I didn’t know that!’ response.
Tania: It can come as a surprise but there are lots of great outdoors activities in the New Territories and on Lantau. These are quite hard for parents to research as many of the places are quite new or remote, so we’ve included all the info to get you there with the least trouble.

Is it for young Hongkongers or kids on holiday here?
Mio: Both! You know how, when you live somewhere, you don’t tend to explore much? Well, I hope that this will inspire both visitors and the people who live here to get out and discover new things during their holidays, or even to rediscover places which they had forgotten about. We also have an interactive website – www.kidsgotravelguides.com – on which we encourage all kids to share their experiences, and show off their writing, art and photography skills.

What does it offer that other travel guides don’t?
Tania: Illustrated travel guides are quite unusual anyway, let alone guides specifically for children. With kidsGo! we really wanted to fire up children’s imaginations and get them dreaming about their travel plans. With illustrations children can picture themselves doing things that perhaps a photo can’t show with quite the same oomph! Also, if the kids get to choose, it means they’ve invested time and it will avoid all that eye-rolling that comes with dragging them to their parents’ ‘lame’ places. That’s usually a temple, in our family.
Mio: Yeah, it’s a chance for kids to take part in planning their own holidays – so they’ll be enthusiastic participants, not just grumpy lumps who are being dragged around by their parents!

How’s it selling?
Mio: Judging from the buzz we’re generating – we’ve been featured in The Telegraph and on a TV show, and, of course, in Time Out – people are hearing about us, so hopefully the sales will follow!
Tania: We’ve only just launched, so it’s very early days, but feedback has been incredibly enthusiastic. We’ve had a lot of global press and a great response from all of the mummy bloggers.

kidsGo! Hong Kong is published by Haven Books, priced $80.