Francesca simon By Liam Desa

Francesca Simon was born in the United States and attended both Yale and Oxford universities. For ten years she worked as a freelance journalist. She now writes full- time and has had many books published including the bestselling Horrid Henry series and several picture books. She lives in North London, England, with her husband, Martin, and her son, Josh. Francesca writes: 'I've always seen my Horrid Henry books as westerns for kids. Henry is an outlaw, who behaves dreadfully, yet often triumphs. Just as adults like reading about people on the edge, so kids get a thrill from a child who always acts on impulse and never worries about the consequences. 'I got the idea for the books when a friend asked me to write a book about a horrid child.

Horrid Henry was born on the spot. I immediately saw a truculent little boy, the despair of his well-meaning liberal parents. I was also interested in exploring sibling rivalry, which I know something about as the eldest of four, and families where the parents decide that one child is 'good' and the other 'bad', which is how Perfect Peter came about. Soon Henry took on a vigorous life of his own, aided by the bossy madam next door Moody Margaret, who is an amalgam of myself and how I imagine Margaret Thatcher might have been as a child. 'I started writing children's books in 1989 after the birth of my son, Josh. Suddenly all I was reading was books for children, and I started, to my surprise, to get ideas. One day we'd been reading lots of animal noises books, and he asked me what noise a caterpillar made. I thought 'wouldn't it be great to do an animal noise voice of all the unusual animals kids see in books?' That became my first book - But What Does the Hippopotamus Say?'

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