The Dinosaur That Pooped Christmas really started out as a joke while we were on tour. We were trying to think of funny Christmas book titles like “The Dinosaur That Stole Christmas But Then Put The Whole Lot Back Before Anyone Noticed Anything Was Missing” and “All I Got For Christmas Was Diarrhoea” – this led us onto funny Christmas books that involved poop and we finally came up with “The Dinosaur That Pooped Christmas” and thought it would make a great kids’ book!
We wanted to write a book we would have loved as kids – we were obsessed by poo and fart jokes when we were young (which we haven’t really grown out of by the way!). Poo jokes are universal – all kids are born loving them. The best part of the job as a children’s author is seeing a genuine laugh from a child and their grinning parent as they get to the POO! bit for the very first time.
The Dinosaur idea came out of our shared love of the Jurassic Park movie and all things dinosaur-related, we then created themes out of other things we love, Tom is obsessed by Christmas, he even had a Christmas-themed birthday party one summer! The Dinosaur That Pooped a Planet came out of our love of space (Tom used to go to Space Camp as a kid) and we are both fascinated by history so worked that into our latest book The Dinosaur That Pooped the Past. What kid could resist a Pooping Dinosaur that eats Christmas, goes into space and time-travels?! Here are our all time top 10 poop books:
- Pirate Pete’s Potty by Andrea Pinnington
This book gets top marks for its “cheer” sound effect – kids will love this! Also great illustrations of different types of potty.
2. The Story of the Little Mole – by Werner Holzwarth
This one immediately sprang to mind when we were thinking about the best poop books. We love the original and we love even more the plop-up version which has pop ups, tabs and flaps (and that it’s called Plop-Up!)
3. Poo Bum by Stephanie Blake
This book is really funny but let’s be honest it would have made the list on that title alone! Just brilliant!
4. The Prince and the Potty by Nicholas Allan
We love how Nicholas Allan has taken the royal theme but given it a poop-tastic twist! We’re big fans of his and also love his Father Christmas Needs a Wee and Father Christmas Comes Up Trumps books too.
5. Pooh! Is That You Bertie? By David Roberts
Even though this book is technically about farts rather than poop we still think it should make the list – trumps are just as funny as poop.
6. Potty Poo-poo Wee-wee! by Colin McNaughton
Again this one could have made the list by the title alone! But we also wanted to include this as it combines two of our favourite things – poop and dinosaurs!
7. Who’s in the Loo? by Jeanne Willis
We love this book for its great rhyming text: “Who’s in the loo? There’s a very long queue. Is it an elephant having a poo?” It’s especially good for really young kids who will love the rhythm of a story.
8. Here Comes the Poo Bus by Andy Stanton
This one is gross! Andy Stanton is hilarious, how did he convince his publishers to go with this?? We thought we’d never get anyone to publish a book about a pooping dinosaur but it just goes to show kids love this subject!
9. Sir Scallywag and the Deadly Dragon Poo by Giles Andreae
Dragons and poop? A winning combination! Almost as good as dinosaurs and poop!
10. Winnie the Pooh by A A Milne
Okay so this is a bit of a cheat but who doesn’t love shouting out POOH when you read this?! It feels like you are being naughty but no-one can really tell you off!
- Tom Fletcher and Dougie Poynter’s latest book is The Dinosaur that Pooped the Past is available from the Guardian bookshop.
