It was published in America where one review lavishly praised the work of ‘Australian humorist Taylor’. An American academic journal identified the piece as ‘a fine springboard for the study of irony and satire’. It journeyed on to the United Kingom. It had two different editions in England with different covers: one depicts a wild, white, yellow-eyed sheep; the other, a rather demure blackfaced beast! The up-market American dust jacket, on the other hand, shows the old animal with a splendidly full head of teeth despite the story describing her as toothless! Mind you, nothing can compare with the Italian jacket design—the Italian Agnes is completely lunatic and almost unrecognizable as a sheep. It must have done the trick, though, because Agnes won one of their main children’s book awards in 1998: the Premio Andersen.

Graham Beattie, then publisher at Scholastic New Zealand, secured a splendid deal from some affiliate of Disney for a three-year option on the film rights to the book. It was around the time of the success of the movie Babe, so there was a rush to buy up the rights to any current title that, when filmed, could conceivably be seen as a successor. It was certainly a pre-emptive action that was to my benefit. They took an option for three years and were required to significantly increase what they had to pay in both the second and third years…I held absolutely no hope whatsoever that it would be filmed. It wasn’t. Sadly, the studio did not renew the option for a further three years! Eight of my books have had film, television or stage options taken out, but only in three instances have they been taken up.

Agnes the Sheep was not my first funny novel. Three of the four Worst Soccer Team series and I Hate My Brother Maxwell Potter came earlier. With regard to the series, I have sometimes said that I wish they had come later in my writing career. That is not to diminish them as comedies. They were successful here and overseas, and I received hundreds of letters from kids who loved the antics of Tom, Lavender and the rest. But, had they arrived on the scene later, I would have spotted their major flaw: they are too wordy. I would have kept the stories as they are, but would have worked rather more diligently to fine down my glorious prose! Quite simply, far too many words.

This is most certainly not the case with Agnes. The story is very tight. There is hardly an unnecessary word on any page. I don’t put this down to a suddenly developed sense of how to write the comedic. Quite simply I ascribe it to the way I was feeling when I wrote the thing. I was feeling far too wretched to write any word that didn’t have a job to do!

Above all else, comic writing requires rhythm and pace. Things have to move along at speed—you don’t meander. Indeed, if you catch yourself dawdling, pull yourself up and cut to the next scene. Keep your scenes brief. Paint the picture in broad brush-strokes. All of my funny books for older children contain a goodly quota of conflict, competition, opposing views and values. I also do my best to people the tales with off-beat and often eccentric characters who believe absolutely in the courses they set for themselves as they work towards the goals they hope, often against hope, to achieve. This is certainly true in Agnes. But, believe me, zany romp though it may well be, there is certainly a moral to be had from this tale.

Joe and Belinda are no better than they should be. They fully represent very many of the eleven- and twelve-year-old kids I have taught.