Andy Seed is an author and humorist who writes books for children and adults (but not animals or aliens). He love funny things and most of his books are a bit giggly, as you’ll find out if you read them. He writes fiction, non-fiction and poetry! Andy is a keen sportsman, loves the countryside and lives in North Yorkshire. One of the things Andy most cares about is getting people reading more, especially children.
Name three things on your Christmas list this year! A new hat (you can never have too many hats), a big pile of books to read (and I mean BIG) and unfeasible amounts of cheese. I usually end up with brown socks.
Christmas is a time of family traditions – what are your best (or worst!) family traditions? Right, well, for a start we have a kind of German Christmas (my wife’s mum is from Germany) and that means pressies are given out on Christmas Eve. We always have a real Christmas tree with real CANDLES on it (fire hazard warning!) and that looks magical when all the lights are turned off. After Christmas dinner we also like to play noisy games including a brilliant silly one called Up Jenkins which is described in my new book. The worst Christmas tradition is that I usually end up doing a mountain of washing up…
There are wonderful stories shared at Christmas time. What is your 
favourite story to read at Christmas? My very favourite (and one of the most magical stories of all time) is The Selfish Giant by Oscar Wilde. If that doesn’t bring a tear to your eye you’re probably a robot. Or an alien. Or an alien robot.
(A wonderful story! No we’re not robots thankfully!)
If you could have Christmas dinner with anyone (alive today or person from history) who would it be? This is tricky, I mean there are 50 billion to choose from… Maybe the Queen (imagine how big her turkey is!), perhaps William Shakespeare (I could get a few writing tips) or Elvis (think how many times that selfie would be retweeted). But I’ll settle for my mum because she makes the best Christmas dinner in the solar system.
(Ahhhh, that’s nice!)
The Anti-boredom Christmas Book is full of facts (as well as silliness!). How did you go about finding out all the fabulous facts in the book? I read a lot. I mean I read loads and loads and LOADS! I use my local library all the time and I also buy lots of books on the subject I’m researching. I do use the internet as well but it’s full of things which look like facts but turn out to be wrong when you check them.
If you were bored at Christmas and had to choose ONE of the activities you suggest in the book, which would it be? OK, well the game Hummit on page 28 is a good giggle but it would have to be the joke quiz on page 121. I’d choose this because it’s fun but it’s also good to try and work out the answers: for example; which film is about telling the time in Narnia? (Answer: The Lion, the Watch and the Wardrobe).
Reader’s question from students at Warden Park Academy: you write lots of funny books! What’s the funniest thing that’s ever happened to you? Right, well, you might not believe this but when I was a student (a long time ago) I actually slipped on a banana skin in a busy street in York. It’s true! To be slippery, the skin has to have the inside facing upwards. Very, very embarrassing…
Turkey or goose? Turkey. The family next door keep geese and mostly I try not to eat my neighbours.
Real or fake tree? Real!
Mince pies or Christmas pudding? Can I have them both? OK then, the pudding.
Stockings – end of the bed or over the fireplace? Bed – quicker to find them!
Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve? Christmas Eve every time. On New Year’s Eve I’m usually in the loo and miss the fireworks.
Thank for you joining in our festive fun! Merry Christmas!
Find out more about Andy Seed at www.andyseed.com and follow him on Twitter @andyseedauthor.
orst!) family traditions? We always watch ‘The Snowman’ and ‘Father Christmas’ in the run-up to Christmas – with the wood burner glowing, we snuggle up on the sofa – it’s lovely. As a child, it was my job to decorate Mam’s Christmas cake with all the bits and pieces. I loved creating a story in my mind as I was doing it and I knew the story, even if no one else could see it. The worst has to be having spent years eating my Mam’s over-boiled sprouts and pretending I liked them (I hope she doesn’t read this)!
Reader’s question from the children at 
Carys Jones loves nothing more than to write and create stories which ignite the reader’s imagination. Based in Shropshire, England, Carys lives with her husband, two guinea pigs and her adored canine companion Rollo. When she’s not writing, Carys likes to indulge her inner geek by watching science- fiction films or playing video games. She lists John Green, Jodi Picoult and Virginia Andrews as her favourite authors and draws inspiration for her own work from anything and everything. To Carys, there is no greater feeling then when you lose yourself in a great story. We couldn’t agree more! And it is that feeling of ultimate escapism which she tries to bring to her books.
worth and Lumiere Pop! Figures and Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys. Though I’m pretty sure I won’t be getting the castle even though I’ve been very good this year!!
Reader’s question from the children at 
Jamie Thomson has been a writer of books and computer games for many years. He is now the minion and slave of the Dark Lord, Dirk Lloyd. He lives in the dungeons below his Master’s Iron Tower, chained to a desk, where he spends every day writing for his overlord. Or else. The Dark Lord is a comedic fantasy about a Dark Lord trapped in the body of a human boy here in modern day earth. The first in the series, won the Roald Dahl Funny Prize, 2012 and also made the top 100 kids books of the last ten years in the Sunday Times. Jamie has also written a series of comedy adventures in space, The Wrong Side of the Galaxy and A Galaxy Too Far. Jamie does fantastic workshops in schools and at festivals. He recently took part in the inaugural 
household.
e a dragon as Evie’s magical companion? The Bone Dragon is very much about the line between truth and fiction… and there’s such a rich history of Dragons in fiction, it gave me a lot to play with: referencing other books and stories helped me keep the reader guessing about what sort of dragon Evie’s Dragon is… I purposefully wanted to keep the ground shifting, one minute making it seem like the Dragon falls under the mentor archetype, then ‘revealing’ it as more ‘shadow-like, then confusing everything so the only conclusion seems that the Dragon plays a ‘shapeshifter’ role. But I can’t lie – if I could have a magical companion, it would probably be a Dragon. The ‘able to breath fire’ thing is a major selling point.
Reader’s question from students at Warden Park Secondary Academy: what do you do if you get stuck when you’re writing? First, I try to figure out why I’m stuck. Sometimes it’s because I need a break… but usually it’s because I don’t know what happens next: maybe I know what follows plot-wise but somehow I don’t know what little steps and pieces of dialogue take the story from where it is to the ‘next big step forwards’. The answer almost always lies with the characters: maybe I’ve made someone act out of character so it all feels wrong… or maybe I’ve got an idea that just won’t work because the character would never do the thing I want him/her to do next. The solution is to go back to who the characters are and what motivates them… and then figure out how to change the context and situation so that it is not just believable but inevitable for them to carry out the plot I’ve got in mind. So when I’m struck I try to recognise that it’s my way of telling myself I need to think a bit more carefully, plan a little more, and respect who my characters are as if they were real people.
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