Simon was born in Chichester in 1988 and has lived there ever since, although he occasionally leaves to buy milk. After gaining a 1st class degree in History at Exeter University, he immediately put his skills to good use working as a barman at a local pub. He soon grew tired of the owner calling him Andy, and so, naturally, decided to become a primary school teacher.

Teaching rekindled his love of children’s literature, particularly picture books, so much so that he had a go at writing his own. Deciding he was better at writing stories for children than he would ever be at teaching them, he made a swift exit from education to live the cliché of the writer who works in a bar. He hopes that one day he’ll be able to give up writing stories and become a barman full-time.

From a young age Ian always knew he wanted to be an artist (or a dinosaur). A box of crayons would occupy him happily for hours, in fact some of his best work was in crayon on his mum's walls! When he got a bit older, and the house had run out of walls to scribble on, he studied illustration at the University of the West of England.

Since then Ian has continued to draw and write funny stories, creating characters like the ones that had fired his imagination as a child. He now happily works as an illustrator (and not a dinosaur after all).