The Pirates Next Door!
(more news)

So, if anyone out there (in the UK) is super-keen to get hold of my next picture book, 'The Pirates next Door', the hardback has now been listed on Amazon and Waterstones! Hooray!

The hardback will feature a rather splendid fold-out dust jacket with the cover and a family tree on one side, and a large line-up of the Jolley-Rogers on the reverse. A bit like this....


This will only be available on the hardback, and 'The Pirate Cruncher' hardback sold out before the paperback arrived, so if you want to decorate your walls with a funny looking pirate family, AND have a picture book to read in the wee small hours, you'd better order yourself a hardback copy.

If you're anything like me, you can buy the lovely hardback to covet and stroke and keep spick and span, and then buy a paperback version for your kids to clumsily destroy. My children have actually destroyed one of my first edition hardcover 'Pirate Crunchers', and now I can't get anymore, but I'm not kicking myself or anything. Honest. But I'm sure someone out there is kicking themselves that they let their five-year old chew chunks out of their first edition 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone' and draw wizards in felt tip in all the margins. So build a shelf that the kids can't reach, pre-order the hardback, and when it arrives you'll know your investment is safe from grubby hands. If you're feeling particularly flush, or want to show off your limitless wealth to friends, you could buy TWO hardbacks and throw one to the little tearaways, whilst secretly stashing the other copy in a plastic envelope on your special shelf.

'The Pirates Next Door' is currently at the printers in the far away land of China, and will be available on October 1st.

Ooo-arr, and all that.

Bang Goes a Troll!

With all the mad panic in trying to finish my picture book, I missed a couple of book publications. The paperback edition of 'Bang Goes a Troll' was published on 31st March! I was quite pleased with the colours and stylization in this one, particularly on the troll.


I've been working on this series of books, called 'An Awfully Beastly Business' by 'the Beastly Boys', for a few years. The first book in the series, 'Werewolf versus Dragon', was one of the first books for which I produced digital black and white illustrations, and it's all now drawing to a close. I've just finished the interior illustrations for the sixth and final book, 'The Great Beast Show'. That'll leave paperback covers for books five and six, which I should be doing within the next month or so, and some collectors cards for inside the paperbacks. And that'll be it.

I've got a few more chapter book series on the go, the 'Will Gallows'series for Anderson Press, 'Accidental Adventures' for Penguin and 'The Archer Legacy' series for Harper Collins.

Next year, I'm hoping to write some chapter books myself. Watch this space...

Finished! Phew!

I finally finished 'The Pirates next Door' (starring the 'Jolley Rogers'). I barely slept over the bank holiday weekend and got all the files to Templar for Tuesday morning, including a nice big poster for the back of the dust jacket (see below, in progress on my messy desk) and a family tree for another part of the fold-out jacket. Luckily, the magical interweb allows me to upload files from my spare-room-office in the Welsh hills, to a friendly computer in Templar's Dorking office. Isn't technology brilliant?


I took a day off on Wednesday, to dismantle a rotten shed my dad had moved from house to house since the 1970s. With the help of my friend David, we attempted to build a new one, only to disturb a bees nest in the process, and realise that the shed floor didn't fit the wooden base. So we each had a nice big bottle of beer in the sunshine instead.

Then it was off to Hay-on Wye on Thursday for my first ever appearance at the wonderful Hay Festival. I had a lovely time and enjoyed the marvellous company of fellow children's book illustrators Adam Stower (buy 'Silly Doggy', it's lovely!) and Ed Vere ('Banana' is my one-year-old daughter's favourite book!). I dressed up as a pirate for my Friday morning event, and was not alone. Well over half of the children in the audience had dressed up too, and I had a terrific time drawing a gnarly pirate under their direction. He even ended up with some fairy wings to keep one little fairy happy. I need to wangle some photos from somewhere......

'The Pirates Next Door' is due to be published in October. More to come!

And for anyone who wants to hear an array of silly pirate voices, the 'Pirate Cruncher' with audio CD is now available from all good book stores! Oo-Arr!

Aardman's Pirates!

For the last three and a half years, I've been working with Aardman Features on a new stop-motion movie about pirates, based on the hilarious series of books (honestly, they're brilliant, buy a copy now!) by Gideon Defoe. This has taken up a big chunk of my life since early 2008, and I've designed a load of characters for the film. It's been the best experience, and I've loved every minute.

But never mind all that soppy stuff, Aardman seem to be releasing lovely pictures for everyone to see! Here's the first official teaser as spotted on 'bleeding cool'...


Here's the Pirate Captain, designed by me and Zebe, with lots of input from Peter Lord (and the doodlers in story, and the sculptors in model-making) and based on some early sketches by Carlos Grangel. In the background you can see little bits of the Pirate with Gout, the Burly Pirate, the Pirate with an Accordion and the Pirate with a Scarf.

And click here to see lot more stuff that Peter Lord has tweeted recently...

Only a year, or so, to go until theatrical release! Oo-Arr! It seemed a long, long way away in January 2008....

Here come the Jolley-Rogers!

I've been a bit quiet online recently. I've been ignoring my inbox, showing alarming disinterest in the BBC's weather pages and resisting the lure of Facebook. And I've been neglecting my blog. I've even disconnected my broadband, for a day or two at a time. Blimey.


And that's all because I've got a book to finish. The follow up to 'The Pirate Cruncher' is on it's way. 'The Jolley-Rogers' is due to be published this autumn by Templar, and I'm working frantically to get it all coloured-in, so that Templar can do their wonderful thing and turn my computer doodlings into a real book. It's not a sequel, but it is most definitely a follow-up. It's the same number of pages (too many), it's got pirates in it (there'll be no pirates in my next book), there's some treasure, some speech bubbles, a few "ooo-ar's" and a big fold out page. But I've still got ever such a lot to do, and not that much time.

So I'm about to go into hermit mode.

I shall ignore my phone.

I shall ignore my email.

I shall barricade my door to protect me from the little monsters that terrorize my house.

And I'm going to disconnect from the magical interweb until this pesky book is finished.

So there.

The Gorilla Artbook!

For the past few years, I've been a member of a small artists' forum, called Gorilla Artfare, and this April sees the release of our first book, aptly named 'Gorilla Artbook: Volume 1'!

(click the image for more info!)

I'm very proud to be part of this book. There are hundreds of beautiful paintings (digital and 'traditional') by around 70 different artists. It's being published by CFSL, who are a French publisher producing beautiful artbooks and comics.

The Gorilla Artbook will be available soon from the CFSL website.

And for inspiring art, check out the Gorilla Artfare blog in my links....

The Pirate Cruncher Audio Book!


A few months ago I went to London and put on lots of silly voices in a recording studio (see December 17th's blog post), and Templar recently sent me an advance copy of the CD.

With a wrinkled 'Pirate Cruncher' in hand, I listened to it with my wife and daughters, and it was excruciating... Does anyone like the sound of their own voice? But they all loved it, and reassuringly, Daisy said "It doesn't sound like you, Daddy. It sounds like proper pirates!" The only downside is that Daisy says she wants a CD player in her room. But she'll just have to put up with the real 'me' reading to her, at least until her birthday.

So if anyone's interested in listening to me attempting a load of silly pirate voices... Preston meets Cornwall via North Wales... The multi-media 'Pirate Cruncher' experience is due on the 1st April, or so they say.

Ooo-arRR!

Shiver me timbers!

Splice the mainbrace!

And all that.

EDiT: Amazon got it wrong... The CD version of 'The Pirate Cruncher' is going to be available on 1st June, not 1st April! I'll post a reminder when it's published!

P.S. A big 'THANKS' to David at Heavy Entertainment, who recorded the session,and encouraged me to do the silly voices!