Imagination Station

Not many college freshmen take time out of their first semester to dash down to NYC and discuss marketing strategy with a team from HarperCollins Publishers. But it’s just another day for Sean Fay-Wolfe, a South Kingstown, R.I. native who finished Quest for Justice, the first in a trilogy of books set in the fictional world of the video game Minecraft, when he was 16.

These days Fay-Wolfe, who’s 6-foot-4 and a double major in English and elementary education, is keeping an eye on sales of the second book in his Elementia Chronicles. He’s also finishing edits to the third, sitting on Comic-Con author panels, granting interviews to the likes of the BBC, and giving inspirational talks in schools around the country and even, via Skype, around the world. Oh yes—and he’s taking classes, making friends, and settling into dorm life at Adams Hall.

Quest for Justice, originally self-published, has now been featured on several bestseller lists, and although the target audience is 8–14 year olds, Fay-Wolfe says he’s noticed that people of all ages enjoy its action-packed tale of oppression and rebellion. No audience is more important than Faye-Wolfe’s mother and grandmother, however, and he’s proud of the fact that both loved the book even though they’ve never stacked blocks or dodged Creepers in Minecraft.

In fact, his mom Kelli Fay-Wolfe, who is also his manager, is the whole reason he finished Quest. “She read the first third and immediately asked that I finish it, because she wanted to know what happened next,” he remembers. “I had put a lot of thought into giving the story wide appeal, rather than just being a gimmick based on Minecraft. I guess it worked.” •

—Pippa Jack