How to Train Your Dragon #6: A Hero's Guide to Deadly Dragons Award-winning author by Cressida Cowell (author)

Author/Illustrator

Cressida Cowell

Cressida grew up in London and on a small, uninhabited island off the west coast of Scotland. The island had no roads, houses or electricity. For the first four years, the family would be dropped off like castaways on the island by a local boatman and picked up again two weeks later. Imagine being like Robinson Crusoe and having a whole island to yourself to explore…

By the time Cressida was eight, the family had built a small stone house on the island, so they no longer had to camp out in tents, which made life much drier. Her father got a boat, so they could fish for enough food to feed the family for the whole summer.

Every year, Cressida spent the long summer holiday, and some of the spring, on the island. The house was lit by candle-light, and there was no electricity, telephone or television, so Cressida and the family lived like people in the olden days. In the evening, Cressida’s father told the children old Scottish tales about the people who lived on the islands round about, who were always fighting and tricking each other, and about dragons living in caves in the cliffs.

Cressida spent her time writing stories, fishing for things to eat, and exploring the island looking for these dragons. These childhood experiences (quite apart from her fluency in Old Norse, of course), made her delighted to be approached to translate the Hiccup memoirs…

After leaving school Cressida studied English at university, and then got degrees in graphic design and illustration at art college. For her final project at art school she created a childrens’ book called Little Bo Peep’s Library Book and was lucky enough to have that book published in 1998. She has gone on to write ten more picture books, including the popular Emily Brown stories, which won the Nestle Childrens’ Book Prize in 2006.

In 2002 she began to write a book for older children. Remembering the stories she had written on the island as a child, these ideas became the book How to Train Your Dragon. There are now nine books in the Hiccup series, and a DreamWorks Animation film of How to Train Y0ur Dragon came out in 2010!

Cressida lives in London with her husband, three children and a hamster.

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What kids think

1. Tigs04
   on 26 October 2017

   it’s brilliant but you can get better books

   4 out of 5

2. moomin2001
   on 22 March 2014

   Best book I have read out of the series. I also love the fact file at the back too.

   5 out of 5

3. bookaholic202
   on 8 March 2014

   Hiccup really wants books to be available for everyone for his birthday. But his dad thinks books are for wimps. This is amazing you should really read it.

4. AngelofDeath
   on 7 March 2014

   Amazing book. Wonderful movie and series. I loved it although it is a bit childish.

   5 out of 5

5. maithany
   on 5 March 2014

   I saw the movie

6. missmickeymouse11
   on 27 September 2011

   I’m reading this book right now and i can’t put it down !!! , i got this book from my school library and they don’t have the best book there but since i started reading this i have changed my mind my school library lol

7. dede1
   on 25 April 2011

   i look goood

8. ducky45
   on 13 April 2011

   this looks cool. i have read all of the others by cressida cowell!