The Clockwork Dragon

It's exciting times here at Castle Dolan because I can finally show you some images from The Clockwork Dragon. This is a book written by Jonathan Emmett and illustrated by me for Oxford University Press. I'll give you three guesses what it's about:

It's out February 2015 but you can pre-order it now.

NEWS FLASH!

Well, it's not really a flash because all the news is fairly old(ish) but I've not got round to blogging about it yet. I've been crazy busy with a good few projects which have been taking up most of my time.

News Item 1: WEASELS WON READ IT AGAIN! 

That's Cambridgeshire Libraries picturebook award. They gave me this trophy and everything.

I'm really pleased about this one because it was voted for by 10,000 children. Occasionally I'm told that Weasels is a book that children won't 'get' but I think this goes some way to proving otherwise. The kids at the Bellbird School, where the awards ceremony was held, did a brilliant Weasels display (with real wires) and made this excellent diorama.

I did a bit of live drawing for some of the kids and drew, amongst other things, a miner weasel with a pit pony guinea pig, obvo.

News Item 2: I taught a children's book illustration summer school.

Yes I've been corrupting the delicate young minds of the illustrators of tomorrow with the help of my co-tutor Elena Arevalo Melville. 20 students flew over from Singapore for a three day crash course in children's books at the Cambridge School of Art. I was slightly nervous as it was my first time teaching a short course like this but I loved it, not just because I enjoy the sound of my own voice, but because of the brilliant, hilarious students. 

Here they are working away.

Elena critting them like a pro.

It was a fairly intense few days and this is what we looks like by the end of it.