Author hide-outs

Nick Sharratt

Nick Sharratt sits in a bright, cheerful American diner in Brighton. Light spills in through the wide windows on the far side of the room. Through them are a few pot plants on a balcony and a blurred view of the town beyond. The floor is covered in pale green and grey tiles and the ceiling is pale blue with tiny lights sunk into it. The chairs are metal with red leather backs and seats, and the round pedestal tables are metal too. Nick leans back in his chair facing to the right with his legs crossed, looking down. On his knee is a large pad. He is finishing a black and white drawing of a girl with a frizz of hair. She is Tracy Beaker. Nick's bald head catches the light and his short-sleeved shirt is covered in big blue spludgy flowers. He has light brown trousers and brown suede shoes. On his table stand a white mug, a menu and a red squashy bottle of tomato ketchup.

All around Nick are the characters he draws, so you find a mixture of the real and cartoons. At his feet is a dozy white rabbit, pricking up its ears. On the left a little girl bounces forward. She has short brown hair and pink dungarees. Over her head a bunch of purple grapes hangs from the tip of a very snaky-looking tail. Flying through the air above Nick's table are two cheerful looking Super-Boys in tights, one chubby, with a blue cloak and boots, the other skinny with a wasp-striped sweater and a red cloak. And outside the window, floating along through the air with a menacing grin, is a big grey shark with a bit of a squint, its mouth just open enough to show its pointy teeth.

Find the first Hotspot here. Nick speaks to you in the first Hotspot, looking out with a friendly grin. He is in front of the rails of staircase coming down against an orange wall from left to right. At the end of the Hotspot he makes a face with a horrible frown, drawing back his lips to show his teeth rather like a shark himself.

Move on across the room and down a couple of short steps with a chrome hand-rail into a part of the diner where there are ordinary tables with pink Formica tops lined up one behind the other away from you. There are big metal spotlights on the ceiling throwing a soft orange light on to the far white wall, but most important are Nick's characters having a good time. On the left a huge green jelly wobbles on a table. Further back a yellowy-green alligator smiles an affable smile, but don't be fooled. He holds a little pink-haired doll in either claw. His wicked little eyes glitter and the tip of his very pink tongue sticks out, licking his lips in anticipation. Two parrots and a whole flock of little green jellies with yellow and black striped bottoms zoom about happily overhead. Here you will find two Hotspots fairly close together.

In the first of these Hotspots, Nick speaks to you in front of the Pavilion, a famous royal palace in Brighton. He is wearing a brown overcoat with a striped scarf round his neck and he holds a large picture of crowds of people in a busy street.

Find the second Hotspot very near. Nick is back in front of the orange wall for this Hotspot and he draws cartoons of a cat and another alligator, its big jaws open in a fiendish grin.

Move along past Nick's monkey scratching its head and two cartoon boys holding their stomachs, their cheeks blown out and looking very red and full up. You will find Nick in an orange shirt sitting at another round table. He laughs out at you, squeezing ketchup on to a fairy cake. Overhead flaps a cartoon stork looking mighty pleased with itself, carrying a pair of checked underpants in its beak.

Look about for another Hotspot. In this Hotspot, Nick's hands turns the pages of one of his own schoolbooks. One of the pictures he shows you is of two Victorian children holding a hoop.

Move on, squeezing past the spindly girl balancing a hot dog on a fork on her nose and a huge plate of spaghetti in one hand. Dodge the sausages and the butterflies till you reach Nick sitting on a bar stool in a jazzy shirt, reaching up to put his spoon into an enormous cartoon knickerbocker glory that stands on the bar. Along the front of the bar hangs a line of striped boxer shorts and polka-dot pants with lace frills.

You will find a Hotspot hereabouts. In this Hotspot, Nick is by the orange wall, cuddling a huge plaster model of an ice-cream cone almost as tall as himself, vanilla with a flake.

Very close to Nick is another bar stool with one of Nick's jolly looking crabs sitting on it waving a pincer. Behind the bar is a boy with ginger hair, glasses and a cheerful grin. He balances a soda with a curly straw on his head, and a ring donut and an iced bun on his fingers. Next to the crab is a laughing leopard, dotted with black spots, its pink tongue showing under spruce black whiskers.

Can you find a Hotspot near here? Nick sits on the pebble beach in his overcoat in this Hotspot. Brighton Pier and the sea are in the background as he makes a crowded picture with brilliant colours.

Move along just a little further past the leopard and you will find Nick again, this time in a white shirt dotted with purple stars. He stands next to a small chrome jukebox fixed to the wall. Nick is holding a black tray on which capers a purple cartoon spider with all its legs spread out, its fierce little white eyes and two white fangs looking as if they mean business. The spider wears a yellow cone-shaped hat decorated with pictures of tomatoes cut in half. At Nick's side, one of his monkeys peeps round the wall, just his great big eyes and the corner of a smile showing.

Look for a Hotspot here. The books Nick shows you in this Hotspot have all the pages divided in three from top to bottom. You can turn over each section separately making lots of different silly pictures. The first drawing is an outline of a hand held upright with a slice of mushroom in the palm.

You may like to know that the exploding Granny had a volcano on her head and very startled eyes behind big wire rimmed spectacles. Leave Nick and move on past the monkey till you reach him again sitting in the diner, drawing Tracy Beaker and ready for more fun if you want to start again.