Growing a Dragon Idea by Andy Shepherd

Andy Shepherd’s The Boy Who Grew Dragons series is the ultimate fiction series for readers aged 7 and up.  She tells us about her inspirations for this series below as the 6th book, The Ultimate Guide to Growing Dragons is published this month.

Growing a Dragon Idea

The seed of the idea for this whole series came from our own family dragon. He had arrived in our garden when my eldest son was small. And then my youngest son started asking questions about him Where had he come from? Why did he go away sometimes? Were there any more dragons?

And so the story started growing.

Every day I would walk down the lane past the allotments and I thought about our dragon. What if he had grown in a garden like that one, all overgrown and wild? Maybe there was an egg buried under a patch of nettles. Or maybe he had grown on a special plant. It would need to be a very special plant indeed. And then something popped into my mind. ‘Hold on,’ I thought. ‘Isn’t there a dragon fruit tree?’

I rushed home and typed it into the computer just like my character Tomas does. And when I saw it, I knew it deserved to be in a story. I didn’t need to imagine an incredible-looking plant, because here in front of me was the most amazing tree and it was real!

It really does have tendrils that shoot out like a burst of flames and moon-white flowers as big as your head that only bloom for one night!

And then, of course, there are the wonderful red spiky fruit. It wasn’t hard to imagine a tiny dragon curled up inside, waiting to burst out.

And with five or six crops a year that was a LOT of little dragons to start growing!

Suddenly I had the perfect way to bring dragons into my little everyday setting.

And then I found out more and more about the dragon-fruit tree. Did you know that in the wild they are epiphytes and grow high up on other trees? Just like the dragons they like to stay hidden and secret!

I hope you have fun growing your own dragons!

With thanks to Aura Cuevas and Norberto Cuevas for the wonderful photos.

The Ultimate Guide to Growing Dragons written by Andy Shepherd, illustrated by Sara Ogilvie, published by Piccadilly Press released 15th September.

 

Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Federation.