Guy Parker-Rees

Character of the week #2 Littlebob.

Here’s Littlebob, he’s the rabbit and, along with the purple penguin, Plum, the star of “Partytime with Littlebob and Plum” and “Playtime with Littlebob and Plum”.

He started life as a chimp,

I wanted to write some stories based on my two eldest boys and the way they played together. The older one would often be bossed about by his younger brother. They would fall out sometimes but the older one would always be there for his little brother if needs be . I drew lots of little sketches of the sorts of things they would get up to.

So, although they would squabble,

they would share quiet times when they got on together, too.

Then Littlebob turned into a rabbit all of a sudden.

This is the image I used for the cover of the first book.

Because these books were to be for younger children I wanted to use a softer, warmer pencil line. The publishers thought it would be best for this age group to make the books into lift the flap books rather than straight picture books. It means that the stories had to be much simpler and the characters' personalities had to come across more through the drawing than through the words, but it makes them more fun and interactive. I loved the excitement of lift the flap books when I was little.

It meant I could do fun things like this, check it out on Youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXPAzIIXqJo&feature=plcp (from Partytime with Littlebob and Plum) where the flaps become mini animations. As you can see Littlebob’s dance moves are quite punk rock.