We had come together to celebrate the launch of their first published books – not bad for a bunch of kids from Victoria’s Central Highlands.

It’s become a right of passage for grade four students at Trentham District Primary School, where “Young Authors Camp” has been a vital part of the school curriculum for well over a decade – celebrating literacy, but also the power of books and reading and the obvious links to self-esteem, creativity and life-long learning.

At Trentham the kids are discovering early, as Maya Angelou famously said, that “the world is made of stories, not atoms”.

They spend a week away from the school – removed from their familiar surroundings – and on day one, with the guidance of award-winning children’s author, Justin D’Ath, explore a simple question to unlock their creativity: “What if?”

The rest of the week is spent honing, editing, illustrating and finally creating covers for their unique publications.

Every year the student’s “what ifs” are varied and wonderful.

What if all the water in the world disappeared?

What if you were fishing and caught a box of treasure?

What if a nugget of gold came to life?

What if you lived on a farm and all your animals went missing?

What if an alien from Jupiter tried to steal all your warm clothing?

What if your dad was a mad scientist?

And that all important question – what if your elephants got stuck in quicksand?

At the launch we talk about why books matter.

Why any book for children is a good book, if it connects a young person to a story.

Why the books of our childhood can still move us whether we are 20, 40 or 80.

Why holding a book in our hands can feel like the most comforting thing in the world.

Most importantly, the young authors learn that with 26 letters and a handful of punctuation marks, you, and you alone, can use your imagination to create a world, fill it with people, and look at it through their eyes.

You can feel things and visit places far removed from a sleepy central Victorian town. You learn that everyone else out there is a me, as well.

That you can experience being someone else, and when you return to your own world, you're always going to be slightly different.

As the author Neil Gaiman says: “By reading and writing stories you're finding out something vitally important for making your way through life: The world doesn't have to be like this. Things can be different.”

That’s the essence of escapism, a word I heard several times over supper.

The belief that stories can open a door, let some sunlight in, offer us a place of refuge.

Yes, books are real places. Make no mistake.