Bridge Street Books

I had a wonderful day yesterday at the fabulous Bridge Street Books.

Thanks to the hard work of Hilary and Joanna who made it such a memorable day. Hilary and Joanna were wearing Hugglewug and Mavis and Marge T-shirts that they made. And Maisy Mouse was there all day too. I loved getting a cuddly Maisy hug. I never knew that she has a spiky tickly nose!

The bookstore was packed full of so many little people we had to do two sessions. They were super and did amazing drawings of little aliens, cows and chickens! Mavis and Marge loved coming to Wicklow. Thank you for such a lovely warm welcome Bridge Street Books!

Irish Book Awards shortlist announcement

Here's some photos from the shortlist announcements for the Bord Gáis Irish Book Awards from last Thursday.

My fellow Walker Books author and friend Sarah Webb is nominated in the Senior category. Here's Sarah and myself with Conor Hackett, 'the best rep in the world!'

It was so great to meet Derek Landy at the shortlist announcement. He just lives down the road from me in Rush, but we hadn't meet before. Megan, my daughter loves the Skulduggery Pleasant series. She is reading book 2 at the moment and loving it. Derek signed a photo for her and she was totally thrilled!

And so lovely to meet Cecelia Ahern too, she lives near my folks in Malahide.

Go, go the northsiders!

However, Paul Howard aka Ross O'Carroll Kelly wasn't so sure about all this northside competition!

Click here to vote.

Bookfest Fever!

What a week, Wednesday was Laundry at FilmBase. Here's me with my little devil, I mean my little brother Fergus at the opening night.

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Then it was off for the last of my Bookfest events, I travelled to so many places this month and thanks to all you doodlers out there, now hundreds of Mavis and Marge's are now free to wander.

Here's me in action doing my step-by-step how to draw Marge the chicken...

Here's are a few we did earlier...

Wowsers!

Brillo!

Fantastic!

People of Ireland I have to tell you to go visit your local Library, they are so brilliant. I had a mobile library in Swords that came once a week when I was a kid, and I thought that library was awesome.

But check out Abbeyleix Library,

they have a Gallery (which we took over...)

and a dedicated Children's floor. How amazing is that!

It was so wonderful to meet such dedicated teachers and librarians over the past couple of weeks. It makes a huge difference to an author when you arrive to be met with a friendly face and kids who are genuinely excited to meet you. Everyone gets so much more out of the event.

The children made the festival for me. I loved the way they take ownership of the author who visits, they truely make it into their Book Festival.

Hope to see you again next year!

BT2

I'll be doing a free event in BT2 tomorrow to celebrate the publication of my new book, ON THE ROAD with Mavis and Marge.

Come along for storytelling and doodling. You'll even get to make your own Mavis and Marge! It's at 1pm at their store in Grafton Street.

See you there!

Thelma and Moo-ise

My new Book has been set free it is now truly ON THE ROAD….

I’m like a big kid when I have a new book out, ooh spotty endpapers! Ooh lovely paper…ooh look at this…It’s in a shop!

The team at Walker Books have done a wonderful job on the book. Especially my designer, Deirdre McDermott, my editors Penny and David. Thanks guys!

This idea was hatched in Skerries; I had been painting some giant murals in my daughter’s school. They were based around two characters Rocket dog and Space Chicken.

Above is a photo of one of the murals, when I painted the two characters on the moon, silhouetted against the night sky it really struck a chord with me.

At the time I had also been watching Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall Chicken Run campaign on TV. Hugh was on a mission to convert the chicken eating public to a free-range future. Good idea Hugh.

I thought what if I had two characters a cow and a chicken whom take the idea of Free Range to its very limits.When I started to doodle Mavis and Marge turned up on the page. Marge is named after my Dad’s sister who is ‘smarter than the average chicken.’

Mavis is well…just Mavis.

And two years after painting the mural, Mavis and Marge get their debut in the real world. I threw in bit of Huck Finn and a dash of Kerouac for the under fours. It’s my homage to Thelma and Moo-ise…