This week on The Penguin Podcast we jump into the exciting world of children's books and chat to Greg James and Chris Smith about their new book The Kid Who Fell Through Time. Plus we explore why there is a reading for pleasure crisis and the ways we can encourage kids to read, and we provide plenty of recommendations for children, whatever their age.
Penguin and Puffin Initiatives
On this episode we heard from Social Impact manager, Lucy Anderson who discussed Penguin and Puffin and initiatives which you can find detailed below.
The Puffin Virtual Visits programme continues this summer with an amazing line up of authors including disabled writer, Cathy Reay, debut middle-grade author, Brogen Murphy, and author and primary school teacher, Farhana Islam: https://www.puffinschools.co.uk/meet-an-author/
Entries for the Puffin Graphic Novel competition are opening in May. We’re looking for creators from under-represented backgrounds or communities to share their work and be in with the chance of landing a publishing deal: https://www.penguin.co.uk/discover/childrens-articles/graphic-novel-competition
Puffin will be publishing a beautiful collection of eight clothbound books on 7th August to mark the 85th anniversary, including Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney and Pig-Heart Boy by Malorie Blackman: https://www.penguin.co.uk/series/PUFCLANI/puffin-85th-anniversary-clothbound-collection
We’re installing 90 Little Book Stops across the country this year, which work on a “give a book, share a book” concept in order to promote community-led book sharing. Applications are open until 1 May, apply for one now! https://www.penguin.co.uk/discover/campaigns/90-little-book-stops
Click the button below to listen to this episode or continue scrolling to explore the books discussed.
Alongside the Penguin titles you can explore below, Greg, Chris, Lucy and Rhianna also mentioned:
Explore the books discussed in this episode
Episode 1 transcript
Rhianna Dhillon:
Hello and welcome back to a brand new series of the Penguin podcast and Ask Penguin. I'm Rhianna Dhillon, and I am so thrilled to be back in our book-filled studio right at the heart of Penguin's offices in London. Now, lots of you listening will have hopefully heard an episode or two before, but for anyone joining us for the first time, we're so pleased to have you. Thank you for coming along. This podcast is the place for anyone who really loves books and reading and wants to find out more about all sorts of different authors and the people who work with them, all while picking up a book recommendation or two or twenty.
Across the next few weeks, we'll be covering everything from the best summer reads for balmy days in the sun to the best books to read at book clubs. But today, we're diving into the subgenre that I've been desperate to dig into since we first started the podcast, the fantastical world of children's books.
Penguin has always been a home to some of the most loved children's authors and their creations. Through their dedicated children's publishing imprints, Puffin, and Ladybird, they've sparked the imaginations of millions of young readers worldwide and helped children understand the world around them. And this year is extra special as Puffin turns 85, but more on that later. From The Very Hungry Caterpillar to literature's favourite bookworm, Matilda, to Mallory Blackman's groundbreaking series Noughts and Crosses, to the laugh out loud adventures of Jeff Kinney's Wimpy Kid. The chances are that there's a little puffin or ladybird adorning the cover of your favourite childhood books. I fell in love with Enid Blyton when I was tiny. I was always pivoting between wanting to be George and Timmy the dog. And even now as an adult, there are books from my childhood that I return to time and again. If you've listened to the podcast before, you might remember my Just William obsession, which will never fade, and I'm not alone in this love for children's books.
Joining me in the studio today are a pair of writers who are absolutely passionate about getting children reading. Greg James and Chris Smith are the multi award-winning and bestselling authors of the Great Dream Robbery, Super Ghost, and the Kid Normal series. They've been shortlisted for the Waterstones Children's Book Prize and the Laugh Out Loud Award. They were official World Book Day authors in 2020, and they’re author ambassadors for Libraries for Primaries, a campaign co-founded by Penguin Random House and the National Literacy Trust, to address the lack of investment in UK primary school libraries. For their brilliant work promoting reading in schools, Greg and Chris were awarded the Ruth Rendell Literacy Award in 2024. Their latest book, The Kid Who Fell Through Time, is an epic and hilarious time travelling adventure, and I can't wait for you to find out more about it. Greg, Chris, it's so lovely to have you both in the studio.
Chris Smith:
Thanks for having us. Thanks for that lovely introduction.
Rhianna Dhillon:
You're so welcome.
Greg James:
Thank you for having us on the Penguin Podcast.
Rhianna Dhillon:
So, I have given our listeners a very brief summary, but tell us a little bit more about the book.
Greg James:
Oh. Well, it's our first time travel adventure
Chris Smith:
but we resisted doing it because time travel adventures are so hard.
Greg James:
They are, they are really difficult. That was, I'm really pleased we did it because it's really fun and we had such a good time researching, brainstorming and actually coming up with the characters and obviously going back and then forward into time
Chris Smith:
and filling lots of notebook pages with timelines, which work, by the way.
Greg James:
It does work.
Rhianna Dhillon:
What do you mean?
Greg James:
It all works. So we had many conversations with our wonderful editor Carmen where she would go, right, so where's the trolley now? So hang on, and how many trolleys are there? And we had, I remember vividly we sat in the pub like we do for a lot of the lot of the brainstorm sessions and actually some of the writing sessions and we sat there and went, right Chris. I think this works. Let's just count. Let's count the trolleys, count the years, let's just, and it is watertight.
Rhianna Dhillon:
But what's so funny is that you actually, sort of, reference that in the book. You're like, we've checked this by the way.
Chris Smith:
Well we like breaking the 4th. Is there a 4th wall in a book?
Rhianna Dhillon:
I feel like there are 8 walls in this.
Chris Smith:
We like breaking the 8th wall. I don't think we actually said what the book's about, did we? So, it is about, it's about a time travelling shopping trolley. It's about a boy called Angus who doesn't like history, and he's doing his history homework and he ends up falling in, literally, with Marge, who works at the local supermarket, who has a time travelling shopping trolley which she uses to go back into history to look for interesting cheese to sell at her cheese counter and
Greg James:
and her cheese, Marge's Fromages is so popular, no one knows why, but obviously Marge knows why - she can get stuff that you cannot get anywhere else.
Chris Smith:
Everyone's like, oh, have you got any of that fantastic ricotta Marge? And she's like, oh, yes, well it's from a very hard to reach piece of Italy, and they're like, well, what's a hard to reach piece of Italy? And she’s like, well, the late 17th century…
Greg James:
But we had a few trips to the museum,
Rhianna Dhillon:
Which museum?
Greg James:
We went to an ancient hieroglyphics exhibition at the British Museum, which was really fun. We had a, we just had a school trip, didn't we?
Chris Smith:
We had an artist date or a school trip if you'd like to get a school trip.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I can see which one of you is a professional in this
Chris Smith:
Neither…
Greg James:
We just loved messing around with characters from ancient Rome, from Egypt, some Vikings, Shakespeare turns up in the book
Rhianna Dhillon:
He does!
Greg James:
And the long suffering Anne Hathaway turns up.
Rhianna Dhillon:
OK, can we talk about Anne Hathaway? Anne Hathaway is such a brilliant…whenever she's characterised in books, I love her so much because she is so long suffering, and especially in this, Shakespeare doesn't do any housework.
Greg James:
Well, you sort of pick up on that, and we are gonna, I'm gonna drop a literary bomb here.
Chris Smith:
Go on then
Greg James:
In Hamnet. Yeah. So you get a bit of that there
Rhianna Dhillon:
I was thinking about Hamnet.
Chris Smith:
This is, this is like the middle grade Hamnet, isn't it? That's what we've done.
Greg James:
Yeah, we've written the middle grade Hamnet where we thought this, this poor woman is having to just keep the whole thing going while he's flouncing off in London
Chris Smith:
like with a load of red-tighted show offs.
Greg James:
When we did the audiobook, she “sounds like this. You're going over there prancing around in London with red-tighted show offs. Get back here.” That's so that's how we characterised her in this.
Rhianna Dhillon:
But what is so brilliant about it is that my introduction to Anne Hathaway was at school with Carol Ann Duffy's poem, and she talked in it. I remember this very clearly in my GCSEs. About the second-best bed. And so as soon as you mentioned it, as soon as you mentioned I have, I was like, immediately back to that. And then you bring up that poem in the book. Is that still on the curriculum?
Chris Smith:
You've just brought home to me actually that this will be a lot of children's first exposure to Anne Hathaway now, won't it, and Shakespeare and indeed Emmeline Pankhurst.
Greg James:
Emmeline Pankhurst appears. And also, we've given Shakespeare a new origin story. In terms of his hairline.
Rhianna Dhillon:
So you, you talked about going to museums and obviously Shakespeare is already in there, I feel like. But how much actual historical research did you have to do?
Chris Smith:
I, I suppose like Angus, I don't know about you, I wasn't particularly history-minded as a kid. I found it a bit dry, probably the way it was taught, but I've become much more interested in history as I've, as I've grown very slightly, infinitesimally older. And we just thought, what's everyone's favourite eras of history? So, like ancient Egypt is everyone's favourite, right, and Roman Britain is everyone's favourite, and Shakespeare is everyone's favourite, so you know, and we basically just wanted to restage the chariot race from Ben-Hur with shopping trolleys, which is exactly what we've done.
Greg James:
But also we did want it to be accurate, to a certain extent. I mean, as accurate as you can, you know…
Rhianna Dhillon:
The individual timelines are accurate.
Greg James:
The things that, you know, the setting and some of the place names and some of the ideas and the names and the, we wanted that to be, so we were careful about that sort of thing. But also we love all of our books we mess with tropes and we mess, we like to spoof things. It's fun to transport someone from ancient Egypt to the to a modern day supermarket. That's just that it's just funny, and also an evil emperor from the from the ninety-ninth century. Suddenly appears
Chris Smith:
wrestling with the self checkout.
Greg James:
Yeah, he's back in the in the current, the modern era with the self-service checkout where no one respects him.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I mean, it's the most relatable bit in the book.
Greg James:
Yes, that is actually, yeah, we're all Emperor Crag in a way, yeah.
Chris Smith:
What we're saying is we're, we're walking a fine tightrope between accuracy and fun, I think.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yeah, and you also bring in Fact Pig. Tell us about Fact Pig because I feel like I feel a huge amount of empathy with fact. And you're very, very mean to him.
Chris Smith: We are kind of mean to him, yeah. So Fact Pig is a pig, obviously, and he is the character that will break into the narrative and he feels that we're writing an educational book. So he will sort of come in and go, “Oh wow, ancient Egypt is really fascinating, guys. I can tell you some facts about ancient Egypt”, and we're like, shut up fact pig, we're trying to, you know, we're trying to write an exciting adventure story here. Have you found a section of facts
Greg James:
Here we go on page 81. Fact Pig says, and, and the voice I did during the audiobook and actually made Chris's head ache.
Chris Smith:
It really did. Are you gonna do it now?
Greg James:
“Hi kids, it's the Fact Pig here with some fun facts for you. That's right guys, history is super exciting.”
Rhianna Dhillon:
I hate him much more on audio than I do on the page.
Chris Smith:
No, you felt sorry for him until you heard him. I guess it's just a, it's a silly way of inserting a few actual historical facts in there.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Did Shakespeare really invent the word lonely?
Chris Smith:
Yes, he did. See, all those things are real.
Greg James:
Yeah, no, no, none of the facts are made up. We're not, we don't lie to the, to our readers, but it's also just another reminder to kids to just use their imaginations and go, OK, let's talk about Thonis, the place, and what does it look like in your head? And that's what it looks like in our head and that's what we'd imagine, we imagine those sort of market stores, we imagine, you know, the river and everything,
Chris Smith:
I find the whole idea of Thonis quite moving. Thonis is the Egyptian city that we visit which is now beneath the sea,
Greg James:
and we did actually look, we read up on that quite a bit because it's, the people have gone to look for things and all the rest of it, and that is amazing. So hopefully it will spark a little something.
Rhianna Dhillon:
It actually made me cry.
Chris Smith:
Yeah, did it?
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yeah, really, at the end it actually made me cry, which I was not expecting.
Greg James:
Well, we do like to do that.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yeah, you really like pulled the rug out
Greg James:
We’re a couple of silly billies but we're also incredibly sappy.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Angus is such a, like, lovely guide, I guess, through all of this. Tell us about what it takes to make like a really good kids' protagonist, and what a, you know, great protagonist needs of that sort of age.
Chris Smith:
Well, it's someone that takes us on the journey with them, isn't it? So in a way, I guess you're, we like our heroes to be sort of every kid,
Greg James:
but yeah, the, the ‘every kid’ thing is probably right, and that goes through I'd say all of our books, including The Twits, where we wanted to put some normal-ish people into that mad world.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I like that he's like a middling student like he kind of, he gets along, he can kind of go under the radar. His headmaster doesn't know his name, but his teacher's like really rooting for him.
Chris Smith:
And then he suddenly pokes his head up above the parapet, you know, when he, because he does this incredible piece of history homework because he's because he's been to Roman Britain and asked one of the people in Roman Britain how they feel about the Roman occupation. So he suddenly does this incredible piece of homework and has this experience where, oh, the head teacher gets me up on stage now and my and my teacher's really excited and my parents are excited about it and then obviously once more.
Rhianna Dhillon:
It's very tactile, your books, you know, you kind of really, you can like you do describe smells and you do describe the look of places in such detail and it feels really cinematic as well. So how much does film play - of course I'm asking this question - how much does film play a part? Like, you know, because there are cinematic references in this as well.
Chris Smith:
Well, I think, you know, when you, we, we do imagine it, I think, and it's like watching a film and you're right, and thank you for noticing, that it's, it's lots of different ways, because people will read in different ways and I have always loved the fact that, you know, in Kid Normal, we find out how the amazing flying car, the banshee, like what it smelled like, what would it smell like inside, it would smell a bit of oil and it would smell of paint, and what would the ancient city of Thonis smell like? It would smell like sort of, you know, like stagnant canals, but it would also smell of like incredible spices that Angus has never smelled before. So yeah, we do, we do try and sort of immerse ourselves in the in the places and the settings we're writing. And it does feel. Quite cinematic, doesn't it? I feel like, I feel like we're sort of watching it on a little internal screen, definitely.
Rhianna Dhillon:
And there's like Back to the Future references, and Jurassic Park references.
Chris Smith:
Well, that's another thing we love to do is stick a few things in for the grown-ups.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I was gonna ask is that for the adults?
Chris Smith:
We’re aware that people will, will read together cos that's one of the things I really always enjoy doing with my son is reading a book together, so our sort of holy grail is to get kids and parents reading together. Yeah.
Greg James:
Speaking of the holy grail, Python. There's a huge sort of cinematic influence on all the books, mainly just for the spoofing because the, the Viking guards in this are very much
Chris Smith:
They're basically played by Eric Idle and Michael Palin aren’t they in our heads
Greg James:
But the idea of spoofing all these things comes from those sorts of films, the Python things. We run it through the Python filter, or something like Airplane or those sorts of things which just send up the genre. I've always loved those so much.
Rhianna Dhillon:
So you mentioned The Twits and you've written The Twits Next Door, which we have next to us here, next door to you and me. What is it like to kind of create characters in a pre-existing, somebody else's preexisting imagination?
Chris Smith:
Hard.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Is it like a completely different way of working to when you're creating something?
Chris Smith:
Yes.
Greg James:
It is hard, but the great thing is that the two main ones are already there.
Chris Smith:
Yeah, they exist, so you know you've got two big hits and you don't want to change them because they're incredible and everybody loves them. Yeah. So we were, we, we sort of had Mr. and Mrs. Twit, and we, we all know why we love and hate Mr. and Mrs. Twit at the same time. So that's just a joy, that part of it. The hard bit I suppose is bringing other, bringing other characters into their world, but you know, we actually sort of hit an idea that we, that we really loved, which was simply we'll just write their exact opposites living next door to them. So next door to Mr. and Mrs. Twit, of course live Mr. and Mrs. Lovely, and their two lovely children, Rough and Tumble.
Greg James:
And it's a great, it's a great lesson in extremes. Actually, the, the perfect person is somewhere in between the Twits and the Lovelies because the Twits are invariably because they're horrible, unbearable because they're horrible, and the Lovelies are unbearable because they're just a bit too lovely, a bit too saccharine. So some of the truth is somewhere in the middle and that's where and that's where Rough and Tumble came in, the kids like that.
Chris Smith:
And Greg is very fond of saying, well, quite rightly, always do the scary thing, do the thing that feels scary, and it did feel scary because they are very loved and iconic. Yeah, yeah, the whole project is is sort of…my goodness, you know, it, it felt, you know, too big to comprehend, really, like these incredible sort of loved characters,
Greg James:
But it's also the fun thing
Chris Smith:
Just get on and do it
Greg James:
Yeah, it's definitely the most fun thing when you get a call from the Roald Dahl Story Company and they say we haven't let anyone do a full-length adaptation extension of any of the stories. Do you want to give it a go? Well, yeah, sure, OK.
Rhianna Dhillon:
So yeah, so the Twits, as you said, everyone, everyone knows that everyone loves them. So who were like your, you know, intrinsic favourite book characters?
Greg James:
Oh right, I thought you were going to say who are your real-life Twits! Yeah, a couple of PE teachers I can name. Yeah, definitely.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I've already mentioned George from the Famous Five.
Chris Smith:
Yes indeed.
Rhianna Dhillon:
You didn't want to be George?
Chris Smith:
Yeah, she didn't want to be Georgina. She was always George. I love Snufkin from the Moomins who is the sort of the tramp who, while the Moomins hibernate, he goes off and has adventures all the wintertime and then comes back on the first day of Spring, he'll be sitting on the bridge with his mouth organ playing his song “All small beasts should have bows in their tails”, and his enemy is the park keeper because he doesn't think nature should be tamed. And he's just awesome. Snufkin for president.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Very cool. Greg?
Greg James:
Do you know what, I was, before we sat down, I spotted, well, literally spotted this guy.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Oh Spot!
Greg James:
and I felt so nostalgic, I had, I hadn't really thought about him or seen him for such a long time.
Will you read to me?
Chris Smith:
I think, I think you're like Spot.
Greg James:
I think I am like Spot.
Chris Smith:
It says “In the rain, or in the sun. Greg is all” - I'm substituting Greg for Spot – “in the rain or in the sun, Greg is always happy and having fun. Greg loves to run. He loves to play. Your friend Greg is with you every day. Monday to Friday on BBC Radio One.
Greg James:
I'm Spot. It's the greatest compliment you can pay anyone.
Chris Smith:
Je suis Spot.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Slightly less nuanced, I will say, than Snufkin maybe. So what is next?
Greg James:
I, well, actually we'd, we would love, and I'm just gonna say it, we loved hanging out with the Twits, and we would like to maybe do some more Twit stories if that even, I don't even know if that's a thing that the Roald Dahl Company want to do, but we loved doing that. I thought that was great fun.
Chris Smith:
I think you've just made your pitch quite firmly there.
Greg James:
We've got loads of ideas.
Chris Smith:
Yeah, we've got lots of ideas. We've got nothing like immediately in the pipeline actually, but we're gonna do something, we're just, we're just waiting for someone to ask us. If anyone's listening to this from a publishing company, then…
Rhianna Dhillon:
Please stick around, you're gonna be answering some Ask Penguin questions from our listeners, right?
So joining Greg and Chris now is Lucy Anderson, Social Impact Manager at Penguin, who can tell us a little bit more about the work that's been done to support children and young people to enjoy reading. Can you explain a little bit about your role here at Penguin and how it relates to addressing the reading for pleasure crisis in the UK?
Lucy Anderson:
Yeah, so I work in our social impact team here at Penguin, and one of our key priorities is creating the readers of the future. So we know that books are really important and can transform lives, but unfortunately, rates of reading for pleasure are currently at the lowest they've been for almost 20 years. And when we talk about reading for pleasure, we're talking about reading that children do voluntarily and willingly in the anticipation of that satisfaction you get when you read a good book. But the National Literacy Trust found that only 1 in 3 children now enjoy this. So, a lot of my role is working with partners and amazing authors like Greg and Chris to connect children to more books and ensure that teachers have the tools to really support children with their reading.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Amazing. So Lucy, why is reading so important? I mean, obviously for all of us, but especially for children.
Lucy Anderson:
Yeah, it's really impossible to overstate the benefits that reading has for children, and I think these some of these are benefits you would expect, right? So, children who read are more likely to do better at school. It really helps with their development of their creativity, their imagination, their empathy. It supports their mental wellbeing, including building their self-esteem. But it's incredible that the benefits of reading really stretch beyond their education. So reading is actually the single biggest indicator of a child's future success and that's beyond and despite of parents' income and background. So, we like to talk about reading, transforming lives, and we mean that quite literally.
Rhianna Dhillon:
And what are some of the ways that listeners can help the kids in their lives enjoy reading?
Lucy Anderson:
Yeah, well, first, I think there are a lot of reasons why children aren't reading as much at the moment, and that includes, you know, what books they have access to and if they see themselves reflected in the books that they're reading. I love the expression that books are like mirrors and windows, you know, you need to see yourself reflected in the pages of what you're reading, as well as have an insight into other people's lives. But regardless, there are so many ways that people can support children with their reading. We know reading role models are so important, and that can be anyone from authors like Greg and Chris, peers, parents, aunts and uncles. So if you can read with a child and show them that you enjoy reading, that can really help them.
Rhianna Dhillon:
And Lucy there have been some really interesting initiatives that Penguin and Puffin are working on also with the National Literacy Trust to help address reading for pleasure. So what are you most proud of?
Lucy Anderson:
Oh, definitely Libraries for Primaries and Greg and Chris know all about this.
Greg James and Chris Smith:
Yeah!
Lucy Anderson:
Yeah, it's an amazing initiative. We found that actually 1 in 7 primary schools in the UK doesn't have a library, and it's actually a legal requirement for a prison to have a library, but not a primary school in the UK, which is crazy. So, we co-founded the libraries primaries campaign with the National Literacy Trust with the aim of putting a library in every primary school by 2028. And we're on our way. We're shortly going to be transforming our 1,500th primary library which will be reaching a total of half a million children, which is very cool.
Chris Smith:
I love the fact it's got an end as well, you know, what's fantastic about this campaign is we're gonna do this, you know as Lucy says, 1500 just about done, it's 1300 to go
Greg James:
But that's, that is a huge thing for us. We, we've loved, we love using the platform we're lucky to have to actually try and give kids the thing that we had at school which were, was, you know, relatively well stocked classrooms full of books and the ability for teachers to sit down and go, let's pick a bit of that, let's do a chapter of this today. That's it for us feels very basic. That is, that is a basic requirement. And it's not just, yes, there's all the sort of nice flowery artsy things of like use your imaginations kids, amazing, you can go anywhere in the world. That is obviously incredible. But the very the basic thing is if you can't read and write, your life will be very, very difficult. You won't be able to apply for jobs, you won't be able to communicate on an email with somebody. You won't be able to pay a bill. It'd be difficult that that those sorts of things. Yes, of course it's great for kids to lose themselves in books and stories and worlds and learn how to write and all that sort of stuff, but actually the fundamentals of just knowing how to send off an email or work out the numbers on your bank statement or whatever it might be that that is, those are the things that we're in real danger of generations of kids not knowing how to read. Just anything, signposts, just stuff. I think that's the scary bit actually and that's one of the reasons why we wanted to get involved in it.
Chris Smith:
There were kids turning up at primary school, you know, to get ready for school now who can't recognise their own names so they need that library, you know, absolutely vital.
Rhianna Dhillon:
And Lucy, how are you kind of working with authors like Greg and Chris to promote children's reading?
Lucy Anderson:
So we work with authors in a range of ways, and I think you've both got awards for the work you've done with authors, haven't you?
Chris Smith:
Well, we weren't gonna bring it up ourselves.
Greg James:
I did bring the certificate.
Chris Smith:
Yes we did.
Greg James:
Yes, the Ruth Rendell Award, which was cool, but it was very much a, OK, we've got that far. We we're not, it's not done yet.
Rhianna Dhillon:
And also it's a bit of a, we said at the top of the podcast, it's a landmark year for Puffin celebrating 85 years of children's publishing, which is a huge landmark. So tell us about some of the events that you've got planned. I, I'm honestly so excited to hear about this.
Lucy Anderson:
There are so many, honestly, it's such a big year. Yeah, on the topic of author visits actually, the Puffin Virtual Visit series is continuing this year and they've got an amazing lineup of authors. I think Cathy Reay, Farhana Islam and Brogen Murphy are doing virtual visits soon, so definitely worth tuning into that. There's also the Summer of Stories campaign where readers can have the opportunity to rewrite some of the Puffin classic stories from the 85 years of publishing and be in with the chance to win a prize. And I know that the Graphic Novel competition is also opening soon for, yeah, the creators
Rhianna Dhillon:
There you go Chris
Lucy Anderson:
It's for creatives from underrepresented backgrounds and they can submit their work with the chance of a publishing deal, which is also very exciting. And finally, there are a selection of Puffin books going to be in our Little Bookstops. So, we are launching 90 Little Bookstops across the UK and we're looking actually for nominations of where to put them, and it's those sort of little book boxes you might have seen the sort of give a book, take a book. So if you would like one of these iconic book boxes near you, you can apply up until the first of May on the website.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Amazing! That sounds perfect.
Chris Smith:
I love those little book boxes and when we get advanced author copies of our books, I like to sneak them in to one round the corner from me, yeah.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I love that, little uncorrected proof.
Chris Smith:
A couple of weeks early, there you go. Haha, could you proofread this and send it back, yeah.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Thank you so much. All of you, really, really interesting and its hopefully given everyone listening at home a bit of insight into the current landscape of reading and its importance for children. And of course, the podcast is especially designed for helping people discover their next favourite reads. And obviously all of our questions today have been focused on finding the best books for our younger readers, so, obviously, we've picked you guys to help us with the recommendations for our Ask Penguin questions. Are you ready?
Greg James, Chris Smith and Lucy Anderson:
Ready.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Excellent. OK, so Astrid has said, I love The Swifts by Beth Lincoln which is all about a very unusual family and an intriguing murder mystery. So, do you have any similar recommendations to that?
Chris Smith:
If you like a murder mystery, then Robin Stevens is your go to, right? Absolutely. Arsenic for Tea. Good place to start, absolutely amazing. If you want a dysfunctional family, have you read I Capture the Castle yet?
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yes, it's a classic. so good, amazing. Dysfunctional is the word. Bohemian but dysfunctional.
Chris Smith:
Yes. Long live Topaz.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Lucy, what about you?
Lucy Anderson:
Maybe Artemis Fowl might be another good one to get your teeth into there.
Chris Smith:
Oh Sharna Jackson, High Rise Mystery.
Greg James:
Oh, I love that. So good. Yeah, yeah, Sharna writes all hers on a barge in Amsterdam. She writes all her books there, yeah, yeah.
Rhianna Dhillon:
We’ve had a question from someone who has asked for recommendations for a 10 year-old who likes the Anthony Horowitz Groosham Grange series. I mean, I suppose the older Anthony Horowitz might be a bit much, but she likes mysteries and thrillers. What would you suggest?
Chris Smith:
10 is a, you get into that slightly difficult stage, I think, where you, you're not old enough for YA and you start running out of things to read. There’s a great series called The Enemy by Charlie Higson, which I think my son loved when he was about that age. I think there's quite a few of those. They're really good. It's kind of post-apocalyptic. Yeah, maybe, maybe it's more sort of 11,12, 13, but yeah, maybe for a confident reader, they were fantastic anyway.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I sort of feel like 10 is, is the age where you're looking, you're reading older than you are. So I, I think that's OK. I think that's a really good age to start going a little bit older and testing boundaries and learning a bit more about the world. Lucy?
Lucy Anderson:
Oh, it's just making me think about a book I read when I was younger by Robert Muchamore, the Cherub series. I don't know if it's popular now, but it's really fantastic, about spy kids, and if you start with that first one, which is called The Cherub, work your way through, you've got the whole series ahead of you. It's absolutely amazing.
Chris Smith:
My son read those as well. They're fantastic, yeah, yeah, highly recommend. Excellent.
Rhianna Dhillon:
So Nique from Chroniqled asks if you've got any book recommendations for neurodivergent children.
Greg James:
Mhm. Well, I mean, try some stuff out actually would be my main thing because you don't really know what your brain might like. I think that's a really, I understand what that person's asking, specifics, but actually the great thing about being a human is you can try stuff out and work out what matches with your sensibilities and your what your, you know, what you love, you can you sort of find out what you love and what works for you. There's some brilliant books that are set out in certain ways depending on how your brain works. If you've, you know, if you're dyslexic, for example, there's some great, you know, uses of font type and colour and layout and things and you know, books deliberately have lots of wonderful illustrations in just to make sure that you're still coming back to the next page and the rest of it. So yeah, I'd say really try out some things and work out the best way to get the books into your amazing brain. I guess sort of real on the nose one would be The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. It would be a really good one, which has made millions of young people feel less alone and feel part of something, I guess, yeah.
Chris Smith:
Yeah, I think absolutely, lots of good representation out there. I mean, Goldfish Boy by Lisa Thompson is a great story where, wherever you are on, on, on whatever scale, you know, yeah.
Lucy Anderson:
Hm, I agree. I would also recommend A Different Sort of Normal by Abigail Balfe, which is her personal story of growing up neurodivergent. So that could be something really nice to read as well.
Greg James:
There's lots of amazing stories which celebrate differences, which really is the key. So most protagonists have some form of difference that they're working through or trying to discover and work out their place in the world, so, there's, I mean, there's hundreds, thousands of stories that you could just pick any, pick anything out, and you'll find you'll find your hero or you
Chris Smith:
Like Murph in Kid Normal. We're all just discovering our own superpowers, right.
Rhianna Dhillon:
I don't know what age, kind of children you're thinking about, but also The Colour of Bee Larkham's Murder is a really great one in terms of it is about a murder, so maybe it's a bit old for this particular child, but about a boy who sees things in colours and that's his kind of way of, you know, getting through things, and it's the descriptions and that are brilliant, so that might be a different one.
Hazel would like some poetry suggestions for a six year-old Michael Rosen fan. Who isn't a Michael Rosen fan?
Chris Smith:
Who isn't? I saw him on the street the other day because I live quite near him. I've never been so starstruck. He's a real person.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Did you say hello?
Chris Smith:
No, of course not. No, I'd make an idiot of myself.
Greg James:
You could do Revolting Rhymes, a Roald Dahl thing which could be quite fun.
Chris Smith:
Yeah, and Quentin Blake, who we know of course and loved deeply as the illustrator of Roald Dahl's stories, is also a fantastic writer in his own right. He's got some poetry collections. There's one called All Join In, which was a very, very firm favourite in our house, and it used to make my son double up with laughter. It's so good. But yeah, all join in by Quentin Blake would be my big tip. So good.
Lucy Anderson:
They’re really good suggestions. On the topic of funny ones, definitely thinking Spike Milligan because those are absolutely hilarious. And I also really love Smile Out Loud, which is Joseph Coelho's hilarious Happy Poems collection, so that was another good one.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Gina asks, I've got twin boys and often struggle to find something that suits them both. So, one is into stories with magic, and the other is into books that make him laugh. So is there anything that crosses both so bedtime goes a bit faster.
Lucy Anderson:
That's a challenge.
Rhianna Dhillon:
That sounds like a tired parent right there.
Greg James:
I don't want to tell that person how to parent, but those two people are separate individuals that need separate things that they both like.
Rhianna Dhillon:
But is there one that crosses both genres? Funny and magical.
Chris Smith:
There is an amazing, funny fantasy story called Frankie Best Hates Quests, which I wrote. Is that allowed?
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yeah, that is allowed. that's allowed.
Chris Smith:
Give it a go.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Tell us about it.
Chris Smith:
It's an undiscovered classic. It's about a girl called Frankie who hates fantasy and magic, so that would appeal to one of the twins, but then has to go on an adventure in a magical fantasy kingdom, which appeals to the second twin, and is very annoyed because she can't get a phone signal. Lots of wonderful magical adventures and then she changes her attitude somewhat, but it's got weird creatures and magic and mystery, but also a normal kid experiencing all of that. So I feel like I might be hitting the middle ground with your twins. I hope so, let me know.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yeah, we wanna know the outcome of this.
Felicity asks if there are any tips that you have for a child who wants to read Wimpy Kid on repeat, can any other books entice her away?
Chris Smith:
Read Wimpy Kid on repeat if you want to. Yeah, I'm a big re-reader. I reread my favourite books over and over again. I think it's OK.
Greg James:
Yeah, keep, keep reading.
Rhianna Dhillon:
But is there something that might kind of then go to the next level?
Chris Smith:
What else? Loki by Louie Stowell, great. The peerless Liz Pichon and her Tom Gates series.
Greg James:
Oh, Tom Gates is a good one, yeah
Rhianna Dhillon:
Tell us about that.
Chris Smith:
So Liz does her, it's the adventures of Tom Gates and his kind of annoying sister but all with Liz's incredible doodles and illustrations and stuff in there, which is great. Lottie Brooks as well, if you're getting slightly older, which I think is sitting on the table in front of you, Katie Kirby
Greg James:
Tracy Beaker. You could do Jacqueline Wilson. You could also do Adrian Mole. Why don't you go for that?
Rhianna Dhillon:
Yes, a bit of Sue Townsend. Oh my goodness.
Chris Smith:
Me and my friend used to read Adrian Mole to each other on the bus to school, taking a day at a time
Greg James:
Right, yeah, there you go.
Chris Smith:
Yeah, the child is father of the man…
Greg James:
Yeah, some, you know, read some real diaries, do Pepys. Just go diary mad or just start your own. I mean, actually start your own diary, write your own thing. If you love Wimpy Kid just start writing your own,
Chris Smith:
Write your own Wimpy Kid, yeah, 100%, yeah.
Rhianna Dhillon:
Thank you so much to everybody who submitted a question to us this episode, and I hope that some of those suggestions hit the spot for the younger readers in your life and keep an eye on Instagram for prompts for future episodes or send your questions directly to the team at Penguinpodcast@penguin randomhouse.co.uk.
Chris and Greg and Lucy, thank you so much for coming to chat to us. The Kid Who Fell Through Time, as well as The Twits Next Door, and all of Chris and Greg's other Penguin books can be found on the link in the show notes. The Penguin website has a whole heap of other resources and recommendations for young readers, including a list of the 100 best children's books of all time as chosen by you, our readers. So do go and check that out if you want some more inspiration. And as someone who loves children's books, especially rereading them as an adult, I was very excited to revisit some of my favourites growing up and learning about the new books that kids are reading today. I hope it's provided lots of reading inspiration for you to share with the young people in your lives, and that's everything from us this week. But me and Ask Penguin will be back in a fortnight with more books, authors, and expert input. If you can't wait until then, you can find lots of our older episodes on the podcast feed where we cover everything from historical fiction to award-winning novels you shouldn't miss. Thanks for listening.