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Soon after discovering he could not be a duck James Campbell decided to make children laugh for a living. He now travels around primary schools and literary festivals, telling funny stories and encouraging children to write their own stuff.
James has been on the BBC1 show, Child of Our Time, and CBBC's Blue Peter, where he taught children how to craft their own jokes. Kids love him so much that he has his own Comedy4Kids show called The Funny Thing About... where he talks about this hilarious new book.
Written by a top comic for kids and the author of The Funny Life of Pets, James Campbell’s Write Your Own Funny Stories is a stimulating how-to guide to writing your own “sizzlingly stupendous stories”. Packed with dozens of fun suggestions for generating ideas, from drawing on the Inspiration Elf, to acting out characters, this is an interactive feast of inspiration and encouragement, with guided activities and space to write alongside longer accounts of the likes of boredom (and how to banish it), the shape of stories, and the “story rainbow”, a fun, fresh way to frame the interplay between plot, characters, setting and style. The summaries of things that are funny and how to make them funnier are both (ahem) funny and useful, and Rob Jones’s illustrations bring plenty to the party too - cool, comic, and cleverly integrated with the animated text.
You’d expect a book by top comic-for-kids James Campbell to make them laugh a lot, and this certainly will. Over 240 illustrated pages he explores the life of pets, in ways that range from the anecdotal to the surreal. Though it’s definitely not an information book, there are some truths slipped in – e.g. Byron took his pet bear to Cambridge University with him – but mostly it’s sheer stream-of-consciousness what-if musings and if it’s unlikely to make readers laugh so much that their knees will fall off, as the cover claims, it will at the very least shake them loose! Illustrator Rob Jones deserves a shout out too for his inventive and varied cartoons.
Written by a top comic for kids and the author of The Funny Life of Pets, James Campbell’s Write Your Own Funny Stories is a stimulating how-to guide to writing your own “sizzlingly stupendous stories”. Packed with dozens of fun suggestions for generating ideas, from drawing on the Inspiration Elf, to acting out characters, this is an interactive feast of inspiration and encouragement, with guided activities and space to write alongside longer accounts of the likes of boredom (and how to banish it), the shape of stories, and the “story rainbow”, a fun, fresh way to frame the interplay between plot, characters, setting and style. The summaries of things that are funny and how to make them funnier are both (ahem) funny and useful, and Rob Jones’s illustrations bring plenty to the party too - cool, comic, and cleverly integrated with the animated text.
James Baldwin was born into the squalor of a Harlem tenement and transcended an early life of setbacks and racism. A storefront preacher at the age of fourteen, he supported his entire family - mother and eight siblings - before he began writing for prestigious journals such as The Partisan Review. Troubled by his fame, his sexuality and his colour, he was a great drinker and socialiser with wild periods of gregariousness and monastic retreats during which he wrote feverishly. By the time he died in 1987, his books such as The Fire Next Time, Go Tell It on the Mountain and Nobody Knows My Name had become modern classics. James Campbell knew Baldwin for ten years. For this book, he interviewed many of Baldwin's friends and examined several hundred pages of correspondence. He quotes from the vast, disturbing file that the FBI compiled on Baldwin and discusses the writer's turbulent relationships with Norman Mailer, Richard Wright and Marlon Brando, as well as his friendship with Martin Luther King. Elegantly written, candid and original, Talking at the Gates is a comprehensive account of the life and work of a writer who believed that 'the unexamined life is not worth living'.
Ever wondered why sharks have such a bad reputation? Are they dangerous, human-munching monsters? Or have we got it all wrong? In fact, only SIX people get attacked by sharks every year across the WHOLE WORLD. And how many sharks are eaten by humans every year? ONE HUNDRED MILLION! So maybe sharks are more afraid of us ... Take a deep dive into the ridiculously funny life of sharks (and some things that have nothing to do with sharks but are still splendidly funny) according to James Campbell, comedian extraordinaire. This face-achingly funny book will also teach you about great white sharks, tiger sharks and hammerhead sharks, just how incredibly old sharks are, and why sharks are SO important for the environment and how to look after them. So, whether you're seriously afraid of sharks or love them so much you want to invite a shark to your next birthday party, this HILARIOUS book is for you. Prepare to roll around the floor laughing with the snot-inducingly brilliant The Funny Life of Sharks, with side-splittingly funny illustrations from Rob Jones.
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