The Evening Standard has credited Andy Stanton, author of You’re a Bad Man, Mr Gum!, with “inspiring pupils to write their own tales.” Speaking to pupils of St Mary’s primary school in Battersea, he revealed that he had the idea for one of his much loved characters in a dream. Andy visited the pupils after reading about the Evening Standard’s Get London Reading campaign, and urged them to…

…write down their ideas for stories.

Andy commented, “The Standard’s literacy campaign is absolutely fantastic. If you are a reader you know what a solace, and an escape books are and how inspiring they can be. They really do open up whole new worlds. You can get a lot out of films and TV but books are a really personal dialogue between the reader and what’s on the page.”

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