The Gruffalo Julia Donaldson Lovereading - -Year 1 (age 5-6) More books from this list Book 17 of 24. View the next book in this list View the next book in this list This title is in stock Price £4.49 RRP £5.99  Saving £1.50 (%25)   Download Extract    Buy This Book

Julia Eccleshare's comment:

“A mouse took a stroll through the deep dark wood. A fox saw the mouse and the mouse looked good.”
So begins the story of how a clever little mouse outwits his big scary enemy. The tasty little mouse needs to make his way through the deep dark woods. How will he do it? By inventing the gruffalo, a fearsome creature with terrible claws, terrible tusks and terrible teeth in his terrible jaws. It’s a brilliant trick. The little mouse’s self-preservation is a witty scam that delights children time after time.

Winner of the 2007 Prima Baby and Pregnancy Reader Awards Best Buy for Toddlers Award.

About The Author

Julia Donaldson is the author of many best-selling books for children. She has also written children’s plays and songs, and runs regular storytelling workshops. Julia lives in Glasgow with her husband, Malcolm, and their family. Below are the answers to some questions we asked Julia.

Q. When did you decide to be a writer?
A. For my fifth birthday, my father gave me a very fat book called The Book of a Thousand Poems. I loved it. I read the poems, recited them, learnt them, and then started making up some of my own. Although I wanted to be a poet all those years ago, I later decided I would rather go on the stage. That didn’t quite work out, so I did other jobs – teaching and publishing. But somehow I’ve ended up doing what I wanted to do when I was five years old. I have a theory that this happens to quite a lot of people.

Q. When did you start to write books?
A. In 1993, when one of my songs, ‘A Squash and a Squeeze’ was made into a book. Before that I wrote songs for children’s television.

Q. Your book Tiddler is coming out in paperback. What gave you the idea for that story?
A. I’ve been snorkelling a few times and love the colourful underwater world of fish and coral. Also, I often used to be late for school and was quite good at making up excuses, like Tiddler.

Q. How many books have you written?
A: I’ve just counted, and I make it 152! That sounds a lot but 60 of those are very short phonic reading books for schools, called Songbirds.

Q. Have you written any longer books?
A. Yes. I’ve written three chapter books about naughty Princess Mirror-Belle, who comes out of a mirror, and a novel called The Giants and the Joneses, about three children who are captured by a girl giant.

Q. What are your hobbies?
A. Walking, cycling, playing the piano, singing. I’m also interested in wild flowers and fungi.

Q. Do you have any pets?
A. I have three cats. Campsie is female, and Gizmo and Goblin are her big tough sons. Their favourite hobby is going in the garden, getting their paws muddy and then walking all over whatever I have just been writing. (And they gave me the idea for yet another book, Tabby McTat, which will come out next year.)