Whenever working in publishing feels like less than the dream come true it is and the memes read a little too biographical, I like to remind myself of three things:
- I was once paid to read all six of Jane Austen’s novels.
- I was once paid to read all eight Anne of Green Gable’s novels.
- I was once paid to read TEN Dick King-Smith novels.
In early 2020 (a.k.a. the Before Times), an agent sent me Daggie Dogfoot (a.k.a. Pigs Might Fly). Cue nostalgia. I wanted to acquire it immediately, not just because the Dick King-Smith centenary is coming up in 2022, but because he ranks up there with Colin Dann, Roald Dahl and Barbara Sleigh as one the children’s writers I loved most when I was a child myself.
To give myself the best chance of success at pitch, I set about trying to find another nine titles to create a boxset – no easy feat considering Dick King-Smith authored over a hundred books! I had to mine his backlist, crosscheck with the agent over what already had a publisher, was OOP or due to revert.
As you can see, I got there in the end.
The Dick King-Smith 10-Book Collection publishes 18 December 2021.
