5 minutes with...PAUL JENNINGS

The master storyteller returns with his most heartfelt novel yet - and it will strike a chord with all readers...

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For generations, Aussie children have escaped into the zany worlds created by Paul Jennings.

His classics such as The Gizmo and the Wicked! series have sold millions of copies, while his short story collection inspired the cult TV series Round The Twist.

Decades later, and the English-born author, now 79, is still writing, and his latest, The Lorikeet Tree, is his most "complex" tale to date.

This is your first novel in more than a decade. How did this story come about?

Forty years ago, I tried to write a story about a boy who mistakenly thought his grandfather would die when the tree growing outside his window reached the roof of their house. Over the years I returned to this idea but couldn't think of a way of resolving the dilemma. In the end, I gave up. And then, at the beginning of the first COVID Lockdown, my partner adopted a kitten. One day it brought a tiny, still alive, baby lorikeet home in its mouth. Straight away I knew how to tell this tale.