I am absolutely thrilled to be hosting the final stop on the blog tour for the fantastic new picture book from Helen and Thomas Docherty, The Screen Thief published by Alison Green Books. You couldn’t ask for a better story to encourage everyone to put down their screens and discover that there’s so much more to life!
The Screen Thief by Helen and Thomas Docherty
When the Snaffle arrives in the city, she just wants to play. But nobody notices her: they’re all too busy staring at their screens. The Snaffle discovers that she likes screens, too -as a snack! She quickly chomps down every last phone, tablet and TV in the city. People are horrified -until they realise that life is much more fun when you actually play together.
A delightful, rhyming narrative and colourful, inviting illustrations combine to bring the Snaffle and her adventures to life, in this timely story about the over-use of screens in our lives. Not only does it remind us there’s more to life than what’s on screen, it also wonderfully captures the power of friendship, playtime, and being together. The Snaffle is a cute and quirky character and I love the double page spread towards the end showing the myraid of brilliant things we could be doing if we simply put down our screens. You really can’t fault this lovely picture book – in fact, I might have to buy a copy for everyone I know!
To the mark the end of The Screen Thief blog tour, I am running a giveaway – you can enter on Twitter (and then put down your screen in case you get snaffled..!)
With thanks to Harriet Dunlea and the team for inviting me to participate in this blog tour. Find out more about The Screen Thief here. Catch up with the rest of the tour here:
Today on the blog it’s a great pleasure to welcome Samuel Langley-Swain, author of the new Tooth Fairy series published by Owlet Press and created in partnership with The Royal Mint. These delightful picture books bring to life the legend of the Tooth Fairy with a brand new look and feel, representing a diverse range of wonderful characters and celebrating the magical tradition around loosing a tooth! It’s a brilliant concept, with The Royal Mint being the official provider of coins to the fairies as they collect children’s teeth. Lively illustrations by David Ortu capture the engaging narratives and young readers will no doubt be very excited when they loose a tooth after reading these stories!
Author Samuel, and also the founder of publisher Owlet Press shares some insight into the partnership with The Royal Mint and how he set about creating these lovely stories. Welcome to the blog Sam!
“When the partnership with The Royal Mint was finalised, I was not only proud to partner with such a prestigious organisation, but really keen to work on a dynamic brief, to revitalise the tradition of The Tooth Fairy with a new breed of Tooth Fairy character, who would provide a positive role model for all children.
Steeped in generations of heritage, bringing a sense of childhood wonder to The Royal Mint’s site was easy – a magical, undiscovered place where all the coins in our country are made. The move from the Tower of London to Wales (dragon country) would also be an exciting journey for children to follow in the first, introductory story (Dilwyn the Welsh Dragon) with such iconic locations. There is a natural synergy between the age-old tradition of The Tooth Fairies delivering coins and centuries of minting, which very nicely positions The Royal Mint as the ‘official supplier of coins to The Tooth Fairy’ and gave us an authentic starting point for this picture book series.
Being an author and the founder of an inclusive children’s book publisher, the idea of revisiting this classic character/tradition and bringing her/it up to date with a range of tooth fairies that represent a wider range of readers – while quite a radical reimagining – was of great appeal. We set out to challenge the archetype of the ‘blonde lady with blue eyes and a glittery dress’. Our intent was to not only inspire a range of young girls of all backgrounds to see themselves in fairies, but to also appeal to all the young boys who lose their teeth and place them under their pillow.
So, we set about creating a lead character who would be smart, witty, brave and also caring; a modern Mary Poppins who would appeal to readers of all ages and genders as a progressive and positive role model – inclusive in their appearance. We studied modern female leads from all types of children’s fiction, to find characters that were more inclusive in their appeal.
When briefing Davide Ortu, an experienced illustrator, on our character, we asked him to incorporate beauty, bravery and strength/labour into our lead’s costume (e.g. inspired by icons such as ‘Rachet Rosie’ and Merida from Disney’s ‘Brave’). I think that Davide being from Italy and living in Spain (where the tooth fairy is replaced by other creatures in their tooth-related traditions) allowed him to look with fresh eyes at creating a ‘Tooth Fairy for today’.
But we also went beyond that, and established this lead character as the Chief of the Tooth Fairies, enabling us to create an inclusive series of tooth fairies to feature within the books; all with the aesthetic traits of their leader, but different genders, skin colours and body types. We’ve also integrated ‘watch-mouse’ inspired by the mouse that takes teeth in many other countries around the world and have worked on an inclusive line up of loveable characters for our forthcoming titles.
The result is a collection of striking and recognisable fairies that are established within the first two titles in a series of six picture books. I can’t wait to see the reaction of our young readers and hope that these stories bring a new sense of wonder as their teeth are placed under pillow!”
The Tooth Fairy and the Home of the Coin Makers and The Tooth Fairy and the Magical Journey, written by Samuel Langley-Swain and illustrated by Davide Ortu, are available now, £7.99 paperback (Owlet Press/The Royal Mint).
Dilwyn the Welsh Dragon is written by Samuel Langley-Swain and illustrated by Jessica Rose, out now, £7.99 paperback (Owlet Press/The Royal Mint).
With thanks to Owlet Press for sending me these books to review.
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