As Custodian of Charlie Small’s Journals, I was lucky enough to be able to speak directly to the lost boy adventurer on his crackling, hissing mobile. I put Tilda’s questions directly to him, and here are his answers:

Describe the place where you write/draw.
I write up my journals wherever and whenever I can. I might be a prisoner of the great apes of Gorilla City; I could be on a mission with Snipe and his rodent-like, pickpocketing gang in Fortune City, but if I get a moment I’ll scribble down all my latest adventures.

What is your most treasured possession?

My rucksack! It contains my explorer’s kit – all the things that might come in useful on my amazing adventures. I’ve got a tube of instant super-glue, the skull of a Barbarous Bat, the bony finger from an animated skeleton, a penknife, the glass eye from a steam-powered rhinoceros, the tooth from a monstrous megashark, and loads of other stuff!

What times of the day do you work?
I’m on the go 24/7, unless I’ve been taken prisoner of course – like the time I was turned into a performing marionette. I spent ages trapped in my own skin, which had been petrified by the dastardly Puppet Master!

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I love the sea! The sound of the swell amongst the rocks and the dank smell of seaweed in sunless caves filled my childhood holidays in Cornwall. Some of my favourite memories are of getting up early in the morning with my brother, and paying a fisherman to take the two of us across the bay in a little dinghy, to Looe Island.

It’s amazing that we were allowed to go! There were no life jackets, no mobile phones to contact our totally unconcerned parents, and no way to get back to the mainland until the same fisherman picked us up in the afternoon. The island was owned by two eccentric sisters, and was a haven for sea birds. The feel of the place has stayed with me ever since, and perhaps influenced the sort of books I loved: Treasure Island, Moonfleet, and The Island Of Adventure.

But, as someone who was brought up and continues to live just about as far from the sea as possible in the UK, my opportunities for sailing and sea adventures have been somewhat limited. My adventures when young more often involved trekking across fields with a bow, arrows and a sheath knife, climbing haystacks and finding rusty gin traps left by ancient, gnarly-knuckled poachers. Read the rest of this entry »