My daughter Martha interviews children's picture book writer and illustrator Tom Percival about his latest book, A Home for Mr Tipps
MP: What inspired you to write the book?
TP: The idea for the book came from a few different places. Firstly, I like cats - I always have done so wanted to make a cat based book. Secondly, I was keen to explore what makes people (or cats) not fit into society and how difficult it can be if you have to live with a debilitating personality trait (like fear, as in the case of poor Mr Tipps).
He's a lonely cat who's scared of everything, but only because he's had some bad experiences - deep down he wants to have fun and be brave like all the other cats, but he can't quite find it in himself until he becomes friends with the boy. When that does happen, he realises that the world isn't quite as dark and scary as he once thought it was. I suppose in summary I was wanting to explore how positive things, like friendship and trust can help people overcome all manner of obstacles in their lives.
MP: How did you think of the name of the cat?
TP: Mr Tipps was called Egwade up until pretty much the final draft when my editor took me aside and gently explained that no-one would know how to pronounce it (by the way, it's pronounced 'Egg-wade', but that's by-the-by!) Egwade was one of the first cats we had when I was little which was why I had wanted to use that name. Anyway, we decided that Egwade wasn't the best name for this character and Mr Tipps just popped suddenly into my head - my friend has a dog called Mr Chin and I thought that if my cat had little white socks on the tips of his feet and his tail then 'Mr Tipps' would work nicely!
MP: Is the boy in the story named after your son?
TP: Yes, Ethan in the book is definitely named after Ethan, my son. At one point in the book he's sticking up posters to help find Mr Tipps and the telephone number on the posters is his birthdate! It's nice to be able to slip little details like that in.
MP: How long did it take you to write the book?
TP: To be absolutely honest I can't remember how long it took to write. It's quite a sculptural process for me working up a picture book. You have the initial idea quite quickly, but then honing it and refining it so that the pictures and the text work together as well as they possibly can, takes A LONG TIME (Well, it does for me anyway!)
On average though I'd say each single page of artwork takes about a day to work up, so that's 32 days just drawing up the final art!
MP: Do you have any cats of your own?
TP: When I was growing up, we had at least one cat around all the time. I think the most we ever had in one go was three. I don't have any cats now, my girlfriend is terribly allergic to them, so I just have to admire other people's cats from afar and occasionally nod in greeting to any that I see wandering around the streets of Bristol.
MP: Why did you make the cat blue?
TP: I tried a few different colours for Mr Tipps, but I liked the idea that underneath his scruffiness he was actually a really rare and expensive breed so I though that blue would be good.
MP: And why did you make the boy's hair blue?
TP: When I was a teenager I was really into skating and often used to dye my hair different colours, red, blue, pink, tiger stripes etc. So I never feel that my characters need to have 'normal' hair colours and I liked the idea that Ethan and Mr Tipps have that connection already.
Thanks for taking the time to think up the questions, I hope that I've answered them satisfactorily!
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is out now and both Martha and her dad thought it was great. Tom's previous picture book, Tobias and the Super Spooky Ghost Book
, is also well worth checking out. Tom's illustration work can be found all over the place including the covers of the bestselling Skullduggery Pleasant series as well as the cover and insides of The Tiny Wife by Andrew Kaufman. Oh, and he can be found online at tom-percival.com and on Twitter as @TomPercivalSays.
Fabulous interview Martha (and Tom, of course!). And happy birthday Martha. I do believe that 10 is a perfect age x
Posted by: Caroline | August 10, 2011 at 03:16 PM