Herman’s Letter was my first book published with Bloomsbury and his adventures have travelled all over the world getting published in lots of different languages, and with a few different names, one of them was 'Bruno' which I quite like! It was the story of the friendship between a big brown bear called Herman and a small pink racoon called Henry. Unlikely friends perhaps, but for whatever reason it works!
The initial story idea came about after a friend of mine moved schools when I was young and I felt very sad at being left behind (as I saw it!) My friend wasn’t a racoon though, and I’m not a big brown bear, those parts of the book I made up. I also made up the bit about the incredibly taxing journey, and the hibernation bit. I guess I made most of it up when you think about it...