Hello friends, I hope you have had a happy Easter weekend.
My friend Hattie Crisell is a wonderful journalist, writer and interviewer - she has a podcast that would be one of my favourites even if it wasn’t hers, In Writing - and a great newsletter on the same subject. Last year she asked me to be a guest on her podcast, and we recorded an episode in October 2022 - it is now available to hear, here!
Hattie and I have spent many hours over our friendship discussing the things we talk about in the episode, and it was interesting to do so more formally - I loved talking with her, and I hope you’ll give it a listen!
One of my personal projects I’ve been working on lately is a book idea, Dr Hoparound’s Complete Book of Frogs. Since writing How to Make Good Choices, I’ve been wanting to make more “fictional non-fiction” titles. I posted a couple of pages from Frogs on Instagram, and Andrew Guy commented that as a child he’d had Colin and Jacqui Hawkins’ Witches and Vampires - there seems to be a series of these books, and I’ve ordered them as they look great. But of course it is easier to draw a line between fiction and non- when the subject matter is more obviously fantastical - how do I show that this book about frogs, purporting to be science, is actually nonsense…
A big influence behind this idea is The Little Worm Book by the unparalleled-ly brilliant Janet and Alan Ahlberg. I was fascinated by this book as a child, and still have my copy. It has no narrative, but is a homage to worms, giving a faux-factual account of their different attributes.
**COMICS CORNER**
I had a comic story idea while I was walking Rusty the other day, and it seemed to come fully-formed which is usually a good sign. It centres around a therapist’s office, again - I’m wondering if I could get enough of them together to make a therapy-comic anthology…?
Thank you for reading and see you soon!
I can’t wait to see both the frog book and the therapy book! Zut alors! We want more! X
The worm that swallowed a key!! I really enjoyed your interview on In Writing, especially the bit about improv and drawing.