Andrew Mc

Hello Reader,

Although Prestin and the Booger Oath is a funny, mischievous and deliberately gross children’s adventure, the story behind the book means a great deal to me.

My children Conor, Darragh and Carla died on 24 January 2020. Conor was nine, Darragh was seven and Carla was three.

Among the precious things they left behind was a homemade comic created by Conor and Darragh, and influenced by Carla. Its central character was a boy called Prestin, and even then their story contained the wonderfully childish humour that would eventually inspire Prestin and the Booger Oath.

Over the past number of months, I have taken the character they created and built a much larger adventure around him. In the new story, Prestin and his best friend Dara discover an extraordinary civilisation living inside the human nose, the Snotiverse, complete with boogers, A flying snot airforce, the Majestic Mucus and an impending battle between the Snotiverse and the Humanverse.

It is unapologetically silly and imaginative. Most importantly, it is intended to make children laugh.

Writing the book has also done something I did not anticipate. Spending so much time immersed in the imagination and humour that inspired the original Prestin has been enormously positive for me personally. Rather than being a project defined by the circumstances in which I lost Conor, Darragh and Carla, it has become a celebration of who they were, three wonderfully creative children with ideas, humour and imaginations of their own.

That is what I want the launch to celebrate.

I hope that when children pick up Prestin and the Booger Oath, they will not need to know the sadness behind its journey. They will simply meet Prestin, laugh at the hilarious things he and Dara get up to, discover the Snotiverse and hopefully become completely absorbed in the adventure. But for me, every child who laughs at Prestin will also be enjoying something that began with Conor, Darragh and Carla.

Enjoy the Snotiverse… and pick this book, not your nose.

Andrew Mc