A Sheepish Sequel

This story originally appeared in Children's Bookshelf on Apr. 20, 2006 Sign up now!

by Joy Bean, Children's Bookshelf -- Publishers Weekly, 4/20/2006

Rob Scotton's picture book debut, Russell the Sheep (HarperCollins), about a fluffy, playful sheep who can't sleep, was a bona fide hit last year, selling more than 120,000 copies. The author and illustrator is well-known in the U.K. as a greeting card illustrator and creator of a collectible line of ceramics featuring his art. But when Scotton decided to branch out, new opportunities began to emerge.

"I'd gotten comfortable in my job creating greeting cards, and I wanted to do something different," Scotton says. "My first thought was to get into licensing." With that thought, Scotton went to the licensing show in London in 2002 and sold a number of his character properties. "I had such a good response," he says, "that I set up shop and just worked on all my licensing work. I was thinking about going to the U.S. licensing show in early 2003 but realized I had too much on my plate."

Scotton.

Fate intervened when, six weeks before the start of that show, Scotton received a call from the owner of a company who was unable to attend, offering his stand for a discounted price. "I thought that if I didn't go I'd wonder forever if something could have happened from it," he says. "It was too tempting, so I decided to go."

It's a good thing he did attend, because his career path took a dramatic turn. "On the first day of the show, Sue Miller from Mixed Media Group [who is now Scotton's New York-based agent] came by and asked about my sheep character," Scotton says. "I told her the backstory I had come up with for Russell, and 20 minutes later she introduced me to Maria Modugno from HarperCollins. I spoke with Maria at length about my ideas and within 10 days of returning to the U.K., HarperCollins offered me a three-book contract."

Russell the Sheep, the first book to come from that contract, was released last April with a 50,000-copy first printing, and HarperCollins has doubled that number for the second book featuring the expressive sheep, Russell and the Lost Treasure, which will be released next week.

Scotton says the idea for Lost Treasure took shape at the 2004 summer Olympics in Athens, which he attended with a few friends. "I started thinking how all the athletes are all looking for their own gold—or treasure, if you would. I sat in a café in Athens and was able to send an almost finished copy of the story to Maria right from Athens."

Scotton will embark on an eight-city tour on May 8 to promote his new book, including a stop in Washington D.C., where he will attend BEA to sign copies of Lost Treasure as well as pick up the Borders Original Voices Award that he won for Russell the Sheep.

A third Russell book is in the works, with a Christmas theme, and more may be on the way, because, as Scotton says, "I don't feel that I'm Russell'ed out yet."