Peter Gray 

“My eldest grandson Ravi was living in New York and was fascinated with dinosaurs (what child isn’t?). My daughter had bought him a rubber T rex from the Natural History Museum and he used to carry it around their apartment making fierce growling noises. They’d been to visit the fantastic exhibit there of the Titanosaur, the largest dinosaur to ever walk the earth. So when I was visiting New York with my wife, we also took Ravi to see the Titanosaur, and it occurred to me it would be fun to write a story for Ravi about a Titanosaur.  A Titanosaur was a herbivore and not a fierce carnivore, so how to make a story interesting for a child?

 

Well, firstly I thought I could make all the drawings of dinosaurs realistic, and then make the lumbering Titanosaur a hero. So that resulted in the first children’s book, “Terry the Titanosaur — An Unlikely Hero”.  It also contains a subtle message about feeling good about your body image.

 

Then I thought that the T rex gets all the attention, but in fact the T rex wasn’t the biggest carnivore dinosaur, the Spinosaurus was. So that resulted in, “Simon the Spinosaurus — The Surprisingly Friendly Dinosaur”. This also contains a subtle message about not judging people by how they look.

 

Finally, many children spend a great deal of time looking at electronic devices, when they should be out playing with their friends. So I wrote, “Ignatius the Iguanodon — The Studious Dinosaur”  which contains the message that friends are important.

 

All three dinosaur books are initially intended to read by an adult to young children with appropriate ‘ROARING’ noises in the scary parts (not too scary), and then as the children get older, they can read them themselves. 

 

I hope the children in your life enjoy the dinosaur stories as much as my three grandsons, Ravi, Max and Felix do.”

 

Peter Gray