Pablo and Splash all began at the start of the first lockdown in March 2020. I’d been wanting to make my own diary webcomic for some time and this new reality seemed like the perfect opportunity. Quite randomly - and because humans are so much harder to draw - I chose to represent my husband and I as penguins. I called it Isolation Penguin. Through these observational diary comics, I chronicled what life was like in our house as we navigated the pandemic together. The complete series is available to view on Instagram. Look for the hashtags #IsolationPenguin and #PenguinChronicles

As the pandemic ended and the comics became more general, I was left feeling that there was something in those two characters that was worth bringing further. I took the two penguin characters (sadly the tortoise who I had added in to represent our dog didn’t make the cut) and put a lot of work into developing them into a lovable odd couple who are polar opposites but best friends for life. Before long, the webcomic Isolation Penguin had grown into a time travel adventure series of graphic novels for children aged 6+ called Pablo and Splash. It was rejected at first by a publisher I was working with, but when my agent Sallyanne Sweeney sent it out on submission to 12 publishers a few months later, within a week or two we had 7 offers. It’s a good thing I didn’t choose warthogs or giraffes instead of penguins as the animal for the webcomic or I would have a very different series on my hands that I don’t think would have worked quite as well.