Q & A – Tom Scatterhorn

I have always loved creepy old museums, and particularly collections of strange objects. And I have always wanted to be a time-traveller, go to an ice fair, take part in a tiger hunt, collect rare insects, meet extraordinary people…a whole heap of things inspired me to write these books.

The first book to four months to write, the third book took three times as long. I did a lot of planning and thinking with all of them, not only working out the story but also imagining the characters and the places they went. I wanted it to be as unexpected and visual as possible. I made a lot of sketches which you can see here.

I have lists of names from all over the place and I lose them constantly. I use old dictionaries, shop signs: maps are also good as some villages have very peculiar names. I also like names that are two words put together, like Rainbird…Scatterhorn, even. I was wracking my brains to find an appropriate name for Sir Henry, a famous big game hunter, and I imagined a herd of gazelles bolting towards the horizon the moment they saw him. Scatter…horn- it seemed appropriate. I was just about to congratulate myself on how brilliant this was I discovered Scatterhorn is actually name already. And very good name it is too, I think.

Of course I love them all, which is no kind of answer. If pressed, I would say I have always been very fond of August and Sir Henry, who are the lynchpins of the series, and the Australian eagle. But then there’s Tom, and Lotus, and Pearl Smoot, Arlo, Ern Rainbird, the mice, the dodo, the mammoth…not to mention Don Gervase Askary: how could you not love a man who can turn into a beetle?