One day, many years ago, when I was teaching drama at a girl’s school, I came across many notices pinned up on walls, advertising an upcoming School Pet Show. It promised to be an extravaganza! Pony and bucking bull rides, face painting, baby animal farms, pet raffles and animal obedience demonstrations!

Standing in the hallway, I began to imagine the day itself: a jumble of excited girls, with their beloved pets, parading in fancy dress, competing for all sorts of different prizes! Prizes for best dressed dog and dog with the waggiest tail. Prizes for the best dry food eater and ‘like pet, like owner’ events. Prizes for pets with the brightest eyes, the twitchiest nose, the longest whiskers and even the most unusual pet!

There would be the predictable assortment of animals at the show, dogs, cats, rabbits, mice and guinea pigs. Secretly, I hoped there would be some highly outrageous pets too—perhaps a llama or a lamb or a duck or a ferret!

Suddenly, I began to imagine the potential chaos; hyperactive dogs slipping off their leads, silky, lithe cats hunting unsuspecting mice, llamas leaping, lambs baaing, ferrets escaping their cardboard boxes, ducks quacking mournfully for their ponds, rabbits bounding up the walls and small palomino ponies pooing at inappropriate times and places. I imagined the frenzied teachers running about madly, trying to bring a little order and control.
Just as I was being carried away by all that promise of slapstick comedy, a thought came—quick, bright and flaring. What it would be like to go to a Pet Show though, if you didn’t own a pet? What would it be like to arrive pet-less on a Pet day and to be the only one in your class?

Something about that thought wrung my heart out.

I couldn’t stop thinking about it for days. How would it be to turn up when everyone else was shivery with excitement and anticipation? What would it feel like? And what could possibly make it better?

Not long after, I began to daydream about a small, slightly awkward girl called Lily, with the most unusual pet of all—a shy, song-loving, joke-telling dragon—someone as vivid and real to her, as any dog or cat. And because I am a long-time believer in the enchantment, the consolations and the power of imagination, I cheekily began to wonder how Lily’s pet could go on to win the big one, the best pet prize overall, overshadowing every ordinary, real life pet!

It was a great deal of fun to dream up Lily’s class and all her classmates. There was so much joy to be had in creating rascally Glen, roguish Caleb and prickly, disbelieving Courtney. It was so lovely to think up Mrs Dalton, who even on the edge of disarray is brimming with love and understanding. Funnily enough, I realize now I named this character after a teacher from my own childhood, who because of her warmth and tenderness, made a great difference to my life when I arrived at a new school, at the age of seven, feeling alone and anxious.

As a writer, I am not always aware from the outset of the ways in which a text might be difficult for an illustrator. I knew early on though with ‘Big Pet Day’ that it would be a challenge. I am incredibly grateful to Gus Gordon for his amazing work. I love the way he has captured every character, both human and animal, so perfectly and vividly, giving them such individuality and vulnerability! I am astounded at the way Gus has been able to blend the physical action and comedy of the story, whilst simultaneously extending and deepening the emotional subtext. On every page, there is such fantastic whimsy and fine attention to detail!

All those years ago, my heart panged for a child that might turn up pet-less to a pet day. Perhaps, in some ways, I wrote ‘Big Pet Day’ for them—as a comfort, as an encouragement, as a funny talisman even—that sometimes out of the pain of difference, comes the path to incredible strength, creativity and joy!