An Awfully Beastly Buiness: Jungle Vampire

About Beastly Boys

The Beastly Boys are Matthew Morgan, David Sinden and Guy Macdonald, best friends from childhood. All have worked in publishing, Matthew Morgan and David Sinden are Matt and Dave, the authors of the hugely successful YUCK series. All three live in Kent.

The authors, all in their early 30’s, who were at the same primary schools together in Kent, have given up full-time employment to write the books. They spent months hiding away at a remote location in Cornwall to finish the books.

“We wanted to write a series of children’s books that were extremely visual and with a cast of fantastic lead characters that wouldn’t normally be found together – a werewolf, a giant, a ghost, a fairy, a gargoyle, a masked villain and a vet who flies a helicopter. Our goal was to write a story that never lets up from the first to the last page, so that the reader’s attention is constantly being engaged by something unexpected. As children we had short attention spans and always wanted to do the most fun thing, which wasn’t always reading. So we knew we’d have to write a series of books that competes with modern media – DVDs and computer games. On top if this it was important that we wrote something that as well as being fun, had positive meaning. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Beasts, the RSPCB, reflects our own concerns for rare and endangered animals and the environment in an imaginative way.

Dave originally came up with title An Awfully Beastly Business then we all hit upon the idea fir The Royal society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Beasts, RSPCB, while we were living together in a house in London.

We chose to write together because we all found it much more fun than writing on our own. We’ve been to school together, lived together and worked on many different projects, and this friendship has given us an honest appreciation of our individual and team strengths. We know each other inside out, and we all shared a common vision from the start. We find the books benefit from needing to please all three of us all the time, so the stories are full of ideas.” - Beastly Boy