David Walliams tells Graham Norton about his new children's book The World’s Worst Monsters

Virgin Radio

9 Jul 2023, 14:01

David Walliams joined The Graham Norton Radio Show with Waitrose to talk about his latest book and his future plans to work with comedy partner, Matt Lucas.

Over the last 15 years, David Walliams has become one of the best-selling children’s authors in the UK with his surreal stories and wild imagination.

And his success shows no sign of slowing down thanks to his new book, The World’s Worst Monsters.

It contains 10 funny stories that are inspired by some of the classic monsters we grew up with, such as Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Loch Ness monster.

Speaking to Graham Norton about his passion for writing, Walliams stated: “There are kids who like to read and there are kids who are reluctant readers and I want to write books for kids who are reluctant readers.

"I grew up on the Beano, that’s what got me into reading,” he explained. “So I wanted to write a book that was really funny, really visual, really silly humour, [a] bit surreal, and maybe a little bit scary at times.

“This one was great because I could really let my imagination run riot because we were in sort of a magical surreal world.”

The 51-year-old then thanked his “genius” design team for creating illustrations for each page.

He said: “I say to them, ‘I don’t want any pages where nothing is happening other than text’, cause I know what it’s like, you know having being a kid, you flick through a book, and if it doesn’t have illustrations and it’s just text, text, text, often it just puts you off, cause you think where are the rewards?

“I have driven the illustrators mad by saying, ‘Can I have a picture on every single page?’

“They’re contracted to do like 25 and then they end up doing 525, but I just want the books to be accessible as possible and encourage kids to read,” the comedian added.

The Little Britain star also told Norton that once Matt Lucas has finished working on Ridley Scott’s Gladiator sequel, the pair will focus on writing together again.

Walliams revealed: “We are just writing, we’ve got lots of characters and situations we think are funny, but we want to do it in our own time, we don’t want to rush.

“We want to get it right and we want to create something really special.”

The World’s Worst Monsters is available to buy in bookshops now.

Listen to The Graham Norton Radio Show every Saturday AND Sunday from 9.30 am on Virgin Radio or catch up on-demand here.