CR spoke with author and illustrator Andy Robb

Emily: Moving on from the book side of things, one thing I'm more aware of is Derek The Cleric.

Andy: For grown-ups.

Emily: Yes. Where did Derek The Cleric come from and who is Derek The Cleric?

Andy: I've always enjoyed writing humour. Many years ago there used to be a Christian newspaper called the Christian Herald and for a number of years I drew the back page cartoon. It's a little panel cartoon and it was called Derek The Cleric. About three years ago I decided I would like to recreate Derek The Cleric in a brand on the internet using social media and then get a book and merchandise through that. I started Derek The Cleric blog; I started to bring his whole world alive. He's got this church called St Cliffs and all the characters writing about it and I added cartoons to it and loads of little creatures as well. After a year I got a publisher, which is CWR and the book is called A Year At St Cliffs. Derek is a nice affable character; he's not wishy-washy though. I was very keen that he's not wishy-washy, but he's an ordinary person. He's fallible, but he's definitely not wishy-washy. His congregation might be, but he's not one of these like the ones you might get on the BBC. These are a vehicle for my humour and we now have a Derek The Cleric .com website, Facebook, Twitter, blogs, greeting cards and merchandise.

Emily: If Derek The Cleric could sit down and have a cup of coffee with you, what would you talk about?

Andy: I would ask him why his name seems to be usurping mine and people don't know that it's me behind it.

Emily: When did you first get the idea of Derek?

Andy: I was asked to do a panel; a back page cartoon. I've got quite a fertile imagination, so I ran lots of things through my mind and I guess word play. I'm an artist and a writer, so give me a clean sheet of paper or a metaphoric clean canvas and I love that. You start to play with ideas and gradually something forms. It's a bit like a craft with a lump of stone, or a sculpture. It's that process of running ideas around and then something takes a life of its own. I think a lot of writers would say that; they say their characters start to write the text. You think that sounds a little bit spooky and strange, but I guess there's a little bit of that; they do actually become real, but then that's the power of creativity I guess.

Emily: What do you hope that people get from all of these?

Andy: Derek The Cleric it's just to bring a smile and a light-hearted look at life. For the kids stuff, all the books that I've produced are seed to sow the things of God; the truth of God's word and the life of God into kids hearts. We pray over it and believe that God will work different things through the inherent truth and things of God that are in those books into children's lives. One of my books, The 50 Weirdest Bible Stories, one copy of each was placed into every one of the 4,500 libraries in this country last year. That means they're there and kids can pick them up and the things of God are accessible to children. That's my prayer, that kids get hold of these, not for the book sales, but that seed can be sown. We want to see that multiplied.

Emily: If people want to find out more about Derek The Cleric how can they find out more?

Andy: Derek The Cleric has his own website and its www.derekthecleric.com and then you can join him at the Facebook page and join his on-line congregation and loads of other stuff.

You can buy Andy Robb's books from Cross Rhythms Direct.