What if completely bonkers things happened? - Nosy Crow Skip to content
Posted by Kate, March 17, 2010

What if completely bonkers things happened?

So here’s what happened: Kate worked with Nikalas Catlow at Scholastic a while ago, and when he heard about Nosy Crow he and Tim Wesson, with whom he’s set up a partnership, came in to chat about books. We liked their irrepressible and anarchic humour, and one idea in particular really stood out, and we asked them to develop it. A week or so later they came in with something we thought was brilliant: the shortest possible chapter book/young novel with space for kids to complete the picture.

What’s more, they’d created crazy – but completely compelling – combinations of two subjects that would appeal to a 6 to 9 year olds with a location that would appeal to the same reader. Those of you who did our survey on what boys really love (see the results in our post The future’s bright, the future’s boys) fed into the process and inspired some great combinations. The first title is Mega Mash-Up: Dinosaurs v Romans.

In short, as Scotty would say, “It’s fiction, Jim, but not as we know it!”

Camilla and Kate looked at each other, and Kate said, “I think we should go out into the corridor,” (you should know we have a completely open plan office/meeting room). So they did, and they came back five minutes later with an offer. Nikalas and Tim thought they might want to consider it for a while… so they went out into the corridor and then came back in five minutes later and accepted.

You can read about the books and have a look at a couple of draft spreads. And you can read about Nikalas and Tim too.

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