While in an art gallery shop yesterday a delightful retro-looking book cover struck my eye, with a rather familar looking title:

Timmy the Tug

Of course it instantly reminded me of Jeremy Moray's Timmy the Tug-Boat series, but the two have nothing to do with each other.

The first is a recently re-discovered collaboration between the designer Jim Downer and poet Ted Hughes. The published book is a beautiful facsimile of the old 1950s manuscript, colours still bright on mildewed pages. It is original and poignant as artificially aged books, which regularly crop up on bookshelves today, can never be. The story and pictures are delightful, the afterword by Jim Downer is rather touching: Hughes had taken the manuscript with the intention of writing some verses, and had never got round to giving it back - it wasn't until last year the book was found among Hughes' estate, returned to Downer who only then saw that Hughes had indeed written the verses and finished the book. [link]

Regarding the West Coat tugboat Timmy, of course I had to search online. I remember these books from my childhood, but I can't really remember the stories, only the bright pictures which I found slightly scary. Looking at them online of course I recognise Vancouver and I must see if my parents still have the books. I also discovered the title "Timmy Ties Up" - is this the last book in the series? Does this mean that Timmy has retired?

P.S. I wish I could link to sites other than book-selling sites, but these seem to be the only ones with images. Sigh.

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In other news, Ladyfest was a success and I got nice feedback for my posters! The Artist's Book fair at the Scottish Poetry Library also had a good turn-out, though I'd have liked to sell more... this was my first fair so I don't know what's normal, but everyone else seemed to think it went well so maybe it is. I shall upload images of the new book soon.
Our artist book group's website is now live! [link] - do go and have a look, there are beautiful books there.