‘No tech, no texts, just childhood’: author Liz Pichon on the secrets behind her multi-million selling Tom Gates series

As her long-running children’s book series turns 15, Liz Pichon talks about overcoming dyslexia to become a bestselling author

If you ever find yourself in an airport newsagent, it might be worth peering inside one of Liz Pichon’s books. “I do guerrilla signings,” she tells me conspiratorially. “They let me go in and I sign all the books, just in case. I love the idea of kids buying a book, going on holiday and seeing that I’ve signed it. Sometimes I write ‘surprise!’”

It’s a wonder that she hasn’t got sore hands. Pichon is one of the UK’s foremost children’s authors, and this is a big year for her. Not only has she just published the 25th book in her Tom Gates series, Tom Gates Is Not Famous (Yet), but this is the 15th anniversary of the first instalment. She has, at last count, sold 16.5m books in 47 languages, and her work has been adapted for both stage and screen.

“I can’t believe it’s 15 years since the first one came out,” she says on a video call from her home. “Now I get 19- and 20-year-olds that grew up with my books. They’ll turn up at an event with a big stack of them and go ‘these were my favourites’, which makes me feel very old.”

Although by no means Pichon’s only project – her comic book series The Mubbles is going from strength to strength – Tom Gates seems more and more like her life’s work. A decade and a half is a long time to maintain any series, let alone one in which the main character has been at the same school all along. But the magic of Tom Gates is that the books never feel as if they’re covering old ground. The stories (usually about Tom’s scrapes with his best friend, Derek, older sister Delia and irritating classmate Marcus Meldrew) remain fresh, while the presentation – scrappy, handmade, packed with bonus content and extra features – is just as endearing as ever.

“There’s always that moment of slight panic when you first start, where you think: ‘What am I going to write about this time? What haven’t I covered?’” she says. “But I write about small details of family life, things that might happen at home and school, with friends and pets. There’s always something that comes up.”

The newest book is based on something that once happened to her husband, songwriter and producer Mark Flannery, who spent his early career as a studio runner for U2. “He told me a story about how he was trying to go to a Simple Minds concert with a friend and they couldn’t get in,” she says. “All of a sudden this big limo pulls up, and U2 get out. The drummer goes, ‘Mark come with us, we’ll get you in.’ I always thought that would be a fun plot for a book.”

Pichon enjoys a weird kind of success. Unlike those who write for adults, whose readers might stay with them for a lifetime, children’s authors only have their followers for a short stretch before they grow up and move on. As such, Tom Gates has managed to entertain a rolling caravan of new fans, which is astoundingly hard to maintain. Pichon puts this down to her refusal to cater to modern tastes.

“There’s not much technology,” she explains. “You won’t get much text messaging or anything like that. There are some things in childhood that just don’t change. Sibling rivalries, stuff like that. Children in different territories enjoy reading these books, and I think maybe one reason is because I’m not very specific, so they can really put themselves into the setting.”

Now 63, Pichon grew up in London and lives in Brighton. She didn’t start writing until she was in her mid-40s, having previously worked designing album covers for Jive Records and a range of greetings cards, and then illustrating picture books for other writers. The late start is something she puts down to insecurity over her dyslexia as a child. “I came from a generation where people just thought I wasn’t academic,” she says. “Of all the things I was good at, none of them were considered to be things you could actually make a living from. So you grow up with that in the background, a lack of expectation. I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to do.”

Tom Gates came from what she describes as a desire to start making things she was genuinely proud of. The first was created in an exercise book, full of handwritten diary-style text and visuals. “I took all the things I’d learned in picture books, like grabby page turns, and used them for a slightly older audience,” she says. The result was her signature style with ideas tumbling out in sketches, sight gags and bonus content. (The latest contains a short script that readers can act out with their friends, and songs she has written for the book can be found on streaming platforms.) “Kids get into the stories really quickly because the presentation is so accessible,” she says.

“I’m passionate about this,” Pichon continues. “When I do school visits, we talk about things that are happening in the kids’ lives, and how they can get those stories out of their heads. I show them how I tell stories with drawings and doodles and things. Hopefully when they leave, they’re not only excited about reading the books, but actually going on to be creative themselves. We all tell stories in different ways. Some kids will feel like they can’t draw, or can’t write, or aren’t very good at spelling, and this gives them a way to feel like they’re being seen and heard and celebrated.”

A core part of Pichon’s audience is what some would dub “reluctant readers”, although she prefers the term “unconfident”; youngsters who need a visual element to suck them into a story. “They just need a book that gets them in,” she says. “Once they’re in, they’re readers.” The visuals of Pichon’s books – plus the fact that they’re incredibly funny, and can be read for pure enjoyment – have meant that she has amassed something of a rarity in these times; an audience largely composed of boys.

“Honestly, it wasn’t something I set out to do,” she says. “I created Tom Gates because I just kept on drawing that little character’s face. When I started, boys would be quite surprised, because there weren’t that many women writing in that genre. But I’m not writing for boys or girls. I’m just writing stuff that I think I would enjoy. I write about relationships where everyone generally gets on. There’s a bit of snarkiness, but they’re not mean to each other. I hope the books are just a nice place to be.”

Given the milestones, and the enormous sales, you might expect that Pichon would be tempted to rest on her laurels a little, but not a bit of it. As well as forging ahead with The Mubbles, it seems as though there is no end in sight for Tom Gates. “I’m still learning, all the time,” Pichon says. “Do you remember being a kid and really liking a series of books? You could tell if they started dialling it in, don’t you think? So at this stage, although I’ve got a new batch of readers, I still feel like, you’re only as good as your last book. You just can’t take your readers for granted.”