Children's Author
Helen Laycock
Have you ever imagined what it would be like to be tiny? A puddle would look like a lake, and grass like a forest! The more I thought about it, the more I realised what the difficulties would be. I decided to create a tiny person called Mr Charlie Chumpkins and to write all about his adventures...
Here's a trailer for you to enjoy...
How it began...
‘Delightfully detailed descriptions!’
Was I imagining it? Did I really have in my hand what I thought I had? I could still feel it, soft and warm. I just had to have another peek. I slid my hand out of the covers and uncurled my fingers. I was right. I had seen it properly the first time!
For there, in my hand, was a tiny, but very real, little man. His eyes were tightly closed and his fists were clenched down by his sides. He was as stiff as anything.
‘I don’t believe it,’ I gasped.
He opened one eye and looked at me. Then he looked around. He opened the other eye and slapped his hands over his face. Slowly, his fingers spread apart and he peeped through the gaps.
‘Oh... pah! Pah! Pah! Pah!’ His little feet writhed up and down in anger as a storm of emotion began to brew. ‘I’ve been caught! I knew it! I knew it! I should have been more careful. I just knew it!’
His little face reddened and, again, he shut his eyes tight and screwed up his little face as if that would make it all go away… whatever ‘it’ was.
I examined him closely, my eyes as wide as saucers. It was just as well I’d practised my Not-Blinking-For-As-Long-As-Possible technique. He was wearing brown and green checked trousers, a green velvet waistcoat and miniature gold pocket watch, a very fetching silk cravat in gold and a sort of tweedy jacket—all very old-fashioned. He was real, though! Yet so tiny!
All I could do was stare.
‘What are you looking at? Put me down!’ he snapped.
I sat him on top of my mountainous raised knees. He clambered to his feet and, whoosh, slid straight down on to my lap. He lay on his back, rubbing his head and right knee.
‘What a fine way to treat a gentleman!’
‘ Adult and child alike will enjoy this read.’
A tiny man and a whole lot of trouble...
Here is an extract from the chapter where tiny Charlie has fallen from the supermarket trolley into one of the freezers. Sam is desperate to find him, but is stopped in his tracks by an elderly customer...
I felt my upper arm being grabbed and looked down to see a wrinkled hand attached to a bony arm of an old lady muffled up in a winter coat and woolly hat.
‘Excuse me, son,’ she warbled. ‘My eyes are not so good now. Mind you, when I was a girl they were sharp as a kestrel’s.’
She paused for a moment to have a giggle, encouraging me to join in by slapping me in a friendly manner in the same place she had a moment ago gripped me. I was starting to become quite battered.
‘Do you need glasses?’ she enquired, peering into my face, her head tilted to one side.
‘Oh, no, no,’ I replied, desperate to get away. ‘Can I help you with something?’
‘Ah, what a well-mannered boy. Isn’t he a well-mannered boy?’ she enthused to a nearby shopper who nodded obligingly.
‘I said to my Wilfred... that’s my cat... I said to him the other day, you know, Wilfred, it’s not all true what they say about these teenagers, they’re not all hooligans, you know. Are you a teenager?’
‘No, not yet,’ I hurriedly replied. ‘Now what was it you wanted help with?’
‘What about a hooligan? You don’t look like one. You haven’t got any of these piercings that are all the rage, have you?’
‘No, nothing like that. So, what was it—?’
‘What about tattoos? Now they’re all right, though probably not for a youngster like you. My Albert—that’s my late husband, bless his soul—he had tattoos. Ever so manly, they were. He was in the Navy, you know...’
The old lady sank into a daydream. I picked up a bag of carrots and touched her arm gently. ‘Ahem, was it these you were needing help with?’
‘Carrots? Oh no. They’re fine. It was this mixed veg I was wondering about. Could you just check the ingredients for me and tell me if they contain sprouts. I can’t eat sprouts, you know.’
She leaned forward and in a hushed voice confided, ‘They give me wind.’
The little friend that we'd all love to have...
‘Slightly compares to a more modernized version of the Borrowers.’
