Getting up to date...

In the last couple of weeks I've had two little books published - 'Farmer Finn's Silly Sheep' - a very short story (only about 200 words) for young readers, and 'The Disastrous Dentist' a longer story with chapter (about 2000 words) for those that are Racing Ahead with their reading. Both books have been beautifully illustrated - one by Steve Brown and the other by Ben Scruton. A web page for both of these will be added to my website in the next few days...

The last few weeks and months seem to have flown by. I've been busy writing, visiting schools and doing lots of other things... In the weeks before Christmas I hope to tell you about what's been going on and next year I aim to write at least one diary entry every week so that I can keep things up to date. I know that one diary entry might not sound a lot but it can be really difficult fitting everything in... Lets see how it goes shall we?

New Books

I'm very excited to be able to tell you a bit about three new books that are going to be published later this year with Franklin Watts...

The first book, "The Awful Astronaut" is published on 22nd September, illustrated by Davide Ortu, and is about two thousand words in length (five little chapters). The book tells the story of Sam Jones - probably the worst astronaut in the world and soon to be the worst astronaut in space. Ever since he was a little boy, Sam has wanted to be an astronaut. But when he finally gets the chance he discovers that being an astronaut isn't as easy as he had imagined.

The 10th November sees the publication of the second book. "The Disastrous Dentist" is in the same series as The Awful Astronaut and is all about (you've guessed it!) a dentist. Oliver Payne isn't a normal dentist though - Oliver wants to be a dentist for people and their beloved pets. If you think that things are bound to go wrong - you're right again. This is a very silly story and I loved writing it. This book is being illustrated by Ben Scruton and it's looking really good.

"Farmer Finns' Silly Sheep", a short story illustrated by the excellent Steve Brown is also going to be published on the 10th November. This is the second book that I've done with Steve but he's used a different style of illustration for this and I think it's great. (Steve also illustrated Meerkat's Marathon).

It's a wet and windy day on the farm and Farmer Finn would like nothing better than to sit by the fire; but there's work to be done. He feeds the hens and milks the cows but when it comes to feeding the sheep there's a problem... there's no sign of the sheep anywhere. Where could have gone?

I will be adding a web page for each of these three books very soon so keep coming back to take a look. Each page will include information about the books as well as fun things to do; word searches, mazes and more...