Richard has written over forty books for children and began his writingcareer as an in-house author, working on non-fiction, first at UsbornePublishing, and later at Ladybird Books. Since going freelance, he hascreated original stories to support a wide range of exciting licensedproperties such as Doctor Who; Wallace and Gromit; Transformers; MI High;Captain Scarlet and The Incredibles. Richard lives in Leicestershire with hiswife and two young children. Richard's rather unfortunate surname comesfrom a village in South Yorkshire, where his ancestors lived. It means 'adwelling with dried cow pats for roofing'. Lovely.