book cover

The Pirates Next Door

by Jonny Duddle

Interest age: 3+
Reading age: 6+

Published by Templar Publishing, 2011

  • Funny
  • Picture books

About this book

In Matilda’s neatly trimmed, child-free neighbourhood on Dull-on-Sea, the house next door is for sale, and she yearns for a family to move in. Then the Jolley-Rogers arrive, and the neighbourhood is not impressed with their messy garden, scruffy clothes, and their abundance of cannons and cutlasses; there’s constant hammering from their ship repairing - and they make the postman walk the plank!

Only Matilda is delighted: in Jim she’s found a friend and she alone is sad when they leave. Then the neighbours discover what the pirates have left behind – and Jim’s not forgotten Matilda either ...

Lots of humour; generous page spreads and fold-outs; a bold, cartoon-like style packed with detail; and of course, irrepressibly rakish pirates combine in this entertaining book about looking beyond appearances, which won the Waterstones Children's Book Prize 2012.

About the author

Jonny Duddle is a bestselling author who has written and illustrated multiple picture books and chapter books for Templar Publishing - including the Waterstones Award-winning bestseller The Pirates Next Door. In fact, it was a year spent working on a square-rigger vessel, combined with his work as a concept artist on the Pirates of the Carribbean computer game, that inspired Jonny to create his highly successful debut picture book, The Pirate Cruncher.

More books like this

Share this page Twitter Facebook LinkedIn