Wee Nasties and More...

As part of the first Inverclyde Festival of Heritage, Magic Torch will be launching a childrens book supported by Heritage Lottery Fund Scotland. It's a poem intended to introduce younger readers to some of the myths and legends of Inverclyde.

You can get Wee Nasties, written by myself and illustrated by Mhairi Robertson at The Dutch Gable House on Thursday 16 May. It will also be available for free download via amazon later in the month.

Here's a recording of Wee Nasties and some other silly childrens poems...



Here's a few draft chapters from Tin Jimmy, the other locally based childrens book I'm working on.

And here's some of Mhairi's wonderful sketches for the project, which will be on display with other original artwork from the book at The Dutch Gable House from 16 - 19 May and again later in the month...

could this be the infamous gourock monster?

Greenock's most controversial son...the pirate Captain Kidd...

Have your fortune told by the Port Glasgow Mermaid...

Trolltown

Scary Troll by Andy Lee
(probably slightly scarier than the Trolls in this poem,
but pretty cool all the same)

Calabrig’s a sad wee town,
It always seems to rain.
But even on a sunny day
There’s folk there who complain.
It’s not that they’re bad people,
It’s just they’ve lost control,
Because the whole of Calabrig
Is full of grumpy trolls.

There’s trolls on every corner,
There’s trolls in swimming pools,
They stand in queues at bus stops,
Or glaring outside schools.
If sunshine ever happens,
If it’s a bluesky day.
They grumble trollish mumbles
To turn the sky to grey.
“No fun today.” the trolls all say
“So don’t you even try.
Nothing good can happen here.”
And I think we all know why.

Wee Molly lived in Calabrig,
She’d had enough of moans,
She’d had enough of monsters,
And all their grumps and groans.
Molly went on troll patrol
And watched the trolls all day.
She came up with a brilliant plan
To make them go away.
She got all her friends to help her
And they dug some big dark holes.
Big enough, and dark enough,
To push down lots of trolls.

Then (this was the clever bit)
They put up a big tent
And invited all the trolls in town
To a Monster Truck event.
Now trolls love Monster Truck stunts
So they all came down to see,
And everyone got tickets,
Then complained that they were free.

Molly opened up the tent
And in stomped all the trolls,
They moaned about the seating
Then all fell down the holes.

“Help us out!” they grumpled,
“We’ve got completely stuck.”
Molly smiled and laughed and said,
“Oh dear. What rotten luck.”
All the people in the town
Came down to see the trap,
And everyone was happy
And gave Molly a big clap.
Big walls got built around the holes,
A sign said “Do not feed.”
But they threw in lots of homework
And magazines to read.

It does still rain in Calabrig,
You don’t often see the sun
But on the whole, without the trolls
The town is much more fun.