The Lily Quench Series The Story Behind Lily Quench Like many of my novels, the first Lily Quench book began with a single character. In fact, it started out with a picture in my head of a very pale young girl with blonde hair in a suit of armour. She was climbing a hill on her way to slay an enormous sleeping dragon, and she was extremely timid and nervous. Somehow or other, I worked out right at the beginning that her name was Lily Quench. This happened way back in 1997. What I didn’t know at the time was what I was going to do with this character. In fact, I had the idea that my young dragonslayer might make a rather nice picture book! Not long after this, however, I was down in Sydney visiting my publisher, Belinda Bolliger. We were talking about upcoming projects and Belinda told me that what she really wanted was a novel for kids in middle to upper primary school. I told her that I had an idea about a character called Lily Quench, and she said at once, “Yes, please!” So, Lily was not going to be a picture book after all! I went home and wrote a sample chapter so the publishing company could arrange a contract, and then I wrote the first Lily Quench book, Lily Quench and the Dragon of Ashby. I remember really enjoying writing it, but I didn’t think at the time that I had produced anything special. I certainly didn’t know that over the next five years I would be writing a total of seven novels, plus a companion volume! The first book was published in September, 1999, and I received my author’s copies while I was in hospital with my brand new baby daughter. The very first cover (pictured right) showed a green Queen Dragon instead of a red one. This was because the marketing people thought green was a more friendly colour, but it provoked lots of complaints from readers and reviewers, who thought it was mistake. The Lily Quench novels have had lots of different covers since then, and Queen Dragon has been a lovely bright red on every one of them, but nobody had ever complained that she looks unfriendly. If I had known there were going to be so many Lily Quench books, I would probably have written the first two novels quite differently. I would never have killed off the Black Count in the second book, for instance. However, that was the way things worked out, and by the time I had written the second and third books in the series, it was obvious that the series was really starting to take off with kids around Australia. It was also starting to sell internationally, and since then the books been translated into many languages including Japanese, French, Swedish and Italian. In some parts of the world, Lily’s name has been changed : in Poland, she is called Mila Grom, and in Germany, her name is Fanny Pflammenloscher. But people have loved her adventures all around the world, and it is great that she has never gone out of print. Lily Quench’s Adventures Click here for complete details of all the Lily Quench books.   Top Ten Lily Quench Questions Click here to read Natalie’s answers to the top ten reader questions about Lily Quench. Janine Dawson, Lily Quench Illustrator Click here to find out more about Janine Dawson, the illustrator of Lily Quench. Lily_Books.htmlTop_Ten_Lily_Questions.htmlJanine.htmlshapeimage_1_link_0shapeimage_1_link_1shapeimage_1_link_2