Monster Bites
The first new story I have written in many a year. A lot of what I work on now is stories that I wrote years ago that I was not happy with at the time. I put them aside, move on and hope that one day I can improve them.
Monster Bites is very new, very different (although a slight spin on Sing A Song of Sixpence), has a fart and a burp, makes me laugh (and hopefully you and your children too) and was inspired by my Dad. Find out more about the inspiration here.
I have said that this is a very new story, but I did have the idea years ago. And unusually for me, I didn’t even make a note of the idea, so unformed as it was. Just an inkling of an idea “wonky cheese”.
I couldn’t find a way in to the story, but over the years it would pop back into my mind and taunt me. Until one day this year, when I was thinking about the characters in the story (not just the cheese) and realised that Sing A Song of Sixpence had a royal family, and my story has a Prince and the meter of the rhyme and the story flowed from there.
Choosing an Illustrator
Having completed the story, I was excited to discover that a friend of mine, Sandy Pison of Little Deer Designs has long-harboured a dream to become an illustrator. I have known Sandy a couple of years, and she knew I was a writer, but had never mentioned her dream to me. I only discovered this by chance when Nick Butterworth was giving a talk in Colchester. Sandy mentioned that she had been to a few talks by Nick previously and he was a great inspiration to her.
I asked Sandy if she would be interested in working with me. And she said yes! So I shared my Monster Bites story. It is always daunting to share a story I’ve written, but Sandy laughed in all the right places and agreed to create a sample illustration. She created the most adorable monster and I fell in love with him!
We’re going to make a book together! Publication date of Spring 2027 – sign up to my newsletter to keep updated on our progress.
As with working on Brave Brian, it is fantastic to work with another illustrator who I already know. For a shy person, it is so much easier for me to express my ideas with someone who I already feel comfortable around.
This one is not just an impossible thing for me, but for Sandy too. Maybe she’ll join me at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe!
Come back next week for the 5th impossible thing that I’ve achieved in 2026.
