Jonathan Meres is a former merchant seaman, ice-cream van driver and Perrier Award-nominated stand-up comedian. As an actor, he’s appeared on TV and in movies. As a writer, he’s written for TV and radio, but is best known for being the author of over 30 books for children. His best-selling, award-winning series, The World Of Norm has so far been translated into 15 languages worldwide, and sold almost a million copies in the UK alone.
How does the seed of a novel emerge? My very first book, published in 1998, was a picture book called Somewhere Out There, and the central character Hamish was based on my nephew, also called Hamish. We had a really brilliant relationship when he was small. So it seemed the most natural thing in the world to make him the central character of that story.
What about for The World of Norm? I wish I could say there was a lightbulb moment, but there really wasn't. When I came up with the idea for Norm, it was the time of the credit crunch [around 2008], and I was doing loads of voice-overs and all of a sudden a lot of them were pulled. The seeds of the idea of the first Norm book, with Norm's dad losing his job, and downsizing, must've come about then. I wanted to write about a normal family. Whatever that is.
How did you become a writer? There never was a master plan. The only thing I ever wanted to do, as a kid, was to join the merchant navy. And it's the only thing that I wanted to do that I actually did. The rest of the stuff, from 22 onwards just happened. But I've always had a love of children's books and always liked children. When I was living in the Vale of Belvoir, in Leicestershire, when I was 16 or 17, I used to love mucking about with them and making them laugh – I was like a big brother to some of them. So I guess I've always had quite an affinity for younger children and been able to relate to them. But I don't ever remember sitting down and thinking: I really want to be a children's author.
What's so special about writing for you personally? Now if I was at a school event and a 10-year-old pupil had asked me that – or what I most like about my job – I'd have said: 'Making stuff up'. I go down to my office at the bottom of my garden (children's authors are contractually obliged to have an office at the bottom of the garden) and I make stuff up. If I'm having a little struggle with the writing, I'll go for a walk along the canal or up on the Pentland Hills, being my own boss... all that's great. Using your imagination... not everyone can say that in their job. I mean, if you're a bus driver, you can't make a route up. A story's a journey. I know where it's going to start. And if I'm lucky, I'll know where it's going to end. The question is: How am I going to get there? How far can I deviate?
What are you most proud of as a writer? I get very irked when my stories are just dismissed as 'silly fart gags for boys' books. That really isn't true. There's quite a serious underlying theme in the first book. But you can still use humour to tackle serious subjects. One of these little comedy diversions is that Grandpa's got a bit of a betting habit. So there's a little bit of gentle finger wagging: don't get into online betting. We eventually get to the bottom of why Norm's dad was made redundant. He got addicted to online gambling at his work.
Now for the comedy answer. What am I most proud of? I needed the name of a horse that Grandpa had a little flutter on at the 2.30 at Kempton. So I made up a horse called 'Touching Cloth'. And that's what I'm most proud of!
And you sneaked it in? That must've been a lovely moment... Yes, I sneaked it in! (laughs) My Mum, bless her, she'd be so proud. My middle son and I do bond over very puerile stuff. But the slightly more serious answer is all the things that have happened to Norm: six years or so since the first one came out, two a year, World Book Day author, and going off all over the place, published in 15 different countries, festivals, and lots of sales. The fact that a character I created has been in The Beano comic twice, I am so proud of. I was given the artwork and it's hanging in pride of place in my office. If you'd have asked me when I was I kid: What would I aspire to? Being first man on the moon, or having a story in The Beano? [Here Jonathan rambles on for several minutes...] Yes, I think I've kind of answered that question. First time for everything.
What's the most difficult thing you have to do as a writer? The structure. The bits between the dialogue. I'm at my happiest writing dialogue. With Norm, I almost breathe a sigh of relief when I get to the speech bit. Yesterday I was asked about it being very dialogue heavy. I don't think it is, it's probably about 50:50. Any tips about writing great dialogue? Keep your ears open and get yourself a notebook. But you also have to move the story forward. The whole thing can't be in dialogue, otherwise it's a play. The narrative parts allow me to have a little rant sometimes, on behalf of Norm, when his frustrations and irritations come to the fore – and these are thinly-veiled versions of me having a little rant, using Norm as a mouthpiece...
I'd never have guessed! Oh really! (laughs) Oh dear. I think that's probably so in the early days of Norm, mouthing off his frustrations... But I do enjoy writing the whole thing.
Do you know what you're going to write, or do you discover as you write? Mainly the latter. It's kind of organic. Sometimes I will have a very good idea about what the scene or chapter is going to be about. If I'm lucky I'm thinking about the next chapter. I'm very much a 'pantser' [a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants writer]. I'll launch into it and see what happens.
You can always fix it later, then? Exactly. I like the sense of if I don't know quite what's going to happen the next page, or the next day, or the next chapter, then hopefully neither will the reader. I don't want to be too formulaic (although the Norm books are to a degree, because I've created this little world and this ensemble of characters).
With your history as a stand-up comedian (a.k.a. Johnny Immaterial), do you ever think of funny gags or sketches and think I've got to get that in somewhere? Even if it means shoe-horning it in? Absolutely. I'll see a gag a mile off... and I think of this line... and think:That's going in! If the gag's good enough, I'll write it down and save it for a rainy day. In the early days, maybe I did shoehorn a few in, but now I'm a little more self-critical and objective. I'm very much a writing-ideas-on-scraps-of-paper kind of writer. You can't move in my office for scraps of paper. I'll have an idea for something, whether it's a gag, a character, a scene, a scenario, whatever, and I'll write it down without really knowing what it's for...
After the first couple of Norm books, they kept saying: 'It's going alright, can we have another one?''. And I would periodically gather all these scraps of paper together and sort them out on my desk, and say: 'That's a Norm idea; that's a different series idea; that's a screenplay idea...' and I would filter all these scraps of paper, and I'd concentrate on all the ones with Norm on them. Very often I would find the same ideas cropping up, or variations on a theme, as if it was somebody trying to tell me something, and I'd think, That's going in! I'd see a theme developing: Norm having his bike nicked or whatever, and think, A-ha! that bit would work quite nicely with this bit, and while Norm's doing this, his brothers can be doing this, and mixing and matching... and all of a sudden you've got something.
What's the best piece of writing advice you've ever had? I'm not sure. I tend to be cynical about the writing advice you get on social media. I do get a little bit irritated sometimes by people who give unsolicited advice. I don't like being preached to, or pontificated at. If I want advice, I'll ask somebody. What you need to do is take what works for you. It's like a buffet of advice. You think, I'll take a little bit of salad, a bit of cheese, a bit of quiche... Unless you're like a ten-year-old kid at a buffet, and it becomes a challenge to eat all you can, and you gorge yourself... You can definitely overload on advice.
What next? The World of Norm was on a book-by-book basis. We were going to stop Norm after ten. Then, World Book Day Norm came out. It was all original material, but was a taster, like 'Norm's greatest hits'. So Book 10 was scheduled to come out at about the same time. I thought what a great way to end. But Hachette were: 'In your dreams, mate! We'll have another couple...'
But the last two weren't a chore at all: they really flowed. They're all stand-alone stories. It was a happy accident to keep Norm at the same age: nearly thirteen. He doesn't age at all. It never mentions a birthday – until the last book. As for time-frame, it's usually two or three days – it's almost like following Norm around with a camera.
The second book did pick up where the first one left off, because I genuinely didn't think there'd be more than two (so there was a bit of continuity there), but thereafter, they're stand-alone books. You can keep dipping back into them, like episodes of a sit-com. From just talking to kids, I find that's what they tend to do, and they genuinely don't need to read them in order.
What are your expectations as a writer? I might have to think about that...
(Which implies I haven't thought about any of the other answers!) My wish as a writer is to write stories that are going to entertain kids, and make them laugh. That's my default setting, but that's not to say that everything I write is or has to be funny. With the Grandpa was an Astronaut story, I wanted to be more poignant, whimsical and wistful, as opposed to belly laughs. I think I wanted to distance myself from Norm.
I suppose there's a certain expectation of me: I am Orchard's 'funny Middle Grade guy'. My natural author voice is 'slightly irreverent'. That's not to say I can't be completely straight. But my natural inclination is to be offbeat and funny. Or at least, try to be, anyway.
I took a few years to find my feet: a couple of picture books first, and I fell into 'teen writing', as it was called then. After a meeting with a publisher, I scribbled down some ideas on a scrap of paper: right at the very bottom was something like: 'Yo, Diary!: a bunch of kids at school keep a diary'. I sent these ideas off – and a couple of weeks later, they wanted 'Yo, Diary!'. It was published in ten or so countries and also got made into a TV series. 26 episodes on the BBC. Which I also wrote. And acted in. Because I'm a complete megalomaniac.
Have you ever considered your work as your legacy? A legacy? Wow. No, I actually hadn't. I'm not dismissing The World of Norm for a moment, but I'd like to think that the book I'm writing now is a little weightier. While still being funny, of course. It's not going to be His Dark Materials [Philip Pullman] – with fart gags – although thinking about it, that's not a bad idea! (laughs)... yeah, I think that would work.
Are you going to miss Norm? I really don't know. I'm not sure yet. It still hasn't really sunk in that I've written the last one. I tell you one thing I definitely won't miss. The deadlines! Two books a year! OK, so there are worse problems to have. But, yeah. Sure I'll miss him. I guess. But there are twelve books knocking around out there. And kids seem to like it still. I think he'll be around for a little while yet.
Link to Jonathan's website: jonathanmeres.com
Jonathan's agent: Lucy Juckes at Jenny Brown Associates
Publishers: Hachette & Barrington Stoke