My New Co-Favourite Book

I’ve previously written about the book I’ve gained the most satisfaction from writing. That feeling has not changed, though now it has an equal. After my son, Michael, and I received our book, my daughter, Rachel, went into jealousy mode and decided she wanted to write a book with me too! (There were plenty of mental high-fives to myself at the time.) So we soon found ourselves spending an afternoon working out a story. There was to be a pyramid, lion, fire-breathing tiger, dragon, monkey, eagle and … a unicorn. Rachel decided the unicorn had been kidnapped by the lion and would need rescuing by the monkey and eagle. Thus Unicorn’s Egyptian Rescue was born. The monkey became a baboon to fit in the Egyptian theme and the eagle became a Steppe eagle which are found in northern Africa. The lion became a lioness in the guise of an Egyptian goddess. We added in traps, tricks and magic spells, and soon our outline was complete.

My wife/Rachel’s Mum, helped with the storyboard and gave lots of feedback on the design of the images our wonderful illustrator, Magdalena Almero Nocea, created. (NB: The same illustrator we used for Michael’s book). Even Michael had things to say about the story and pictures which helped the final product. So this was a real family project.

We received our first printed copy of the book today. Needless to say Rachel was very, very excited. The book will be released later this year.

The process for writing and producing a children’s book is pretty straightforward. Here’s my step by step guide.