Rugby League star opens up on new venture inspired by his two young daughters
Everyone has heard of TheTiger Who Came To Tea but now a different Tiger is writing his own kids’ stories.
As a hard-hitting prop, the last thing you’d expect Castleford Tigers star George Griffin to be doing is penning a children’s book. But his published tale Harvey Hippo Finds His Talent has revealed his own hidden talents - and those of former team-mate Bureta Faraimo, 33, who’s done the illustrations!
Dad-of-two Griffin, 31, told Mirror Sport: “One night I was reading to my little one and got sick of reading all the same books. We’ve around 100 but only read about three. I don’t know why but I just thought I’d give it a go - writing my own. I came downstairs and started jotting bits down.
"An hour or two later I had some momentum. Over the next couple of days, we had a book. It was a bit weird, a spur of the moment thing!”
Described as a ‘uplifting rhyming tale of perseverance and belief’ as Harvey the Hippo struggles through sports day trying to discover his talent, Griffin said: “There’s a couple of messages within it. I heard a saying when I was young which has always resonated with me. The one along the lines of ‘don’t trust a fish for his ability to climb a tree for in the water he’s the master.’
Tiger attacks two people in five days as soldiers called in to hunt down big cat
“Just because someone might not be great at one thing doesn’t mean they’re not amazing at another. I tried to get that in and the message of just keep cracking on: keep trying things until you find something you’re good at and then you can excel.”
Griffin with daughters Nellie, 3, and Willow, 1, with the first copies of 'Harvey Hippo Finds His Talent.'
Griffin has written the book with former team-mate Bureta Faraimo, who has done the illustrationsThe rangy forward, who played for Salford in the 2019 Grand Final, never even realised he had an artist alongside him in New Zealander winger Faraimo. Griffin recalled: “I’d seen him doodle bits down at training but was unaware of the level he was. I never did this to get the story published. I just wrote it for the kids.
“But my family and friends read it and said ‘why don’t you go for it?’ Trying to sit down with a one and three-year old without pictures, though, was quite hard going. That’s when I approached Keith (Lambert), Castleford’s welfare manager, and asked if he could direct me to a publisher and illustrator.
“His jaw dropped a bit! But he said Bureta had approached him about doing an animation/illustration course. I went to speak to Bureta in the gym. His face tilted a bit, too, when I told him! But I emailed him the story that night, he loved it and said he'd get to work on doing the illustrations. It’s all completely out of the blue. It’s mad we were in the same team, let alone the same sport, and both interested in this sort of thing.”
On his other team-mates' reaction to discovering he was a budding author, Griffin said: "You can imagine I got a bit of stick at the start. It's a rugby dressing room! I got all the expected jokes. But the book's done pretty well and once it made it into shops, they gave me a pat on the back and said 'fair play!'"
He returned for pre-season training on Monday and Harvey Hippo could also be set for a return. Griffin revealed: "I’ve already written a follow-up. I’ve sent it off to a few people and we’ll see what comes back. But hopefully, fingers crossed, we can get a bit of a series going."
* Harvey Hippo Finds His Talent is published by Scratching Shed Publishing Ltd, price £7.99
Read more similar news:
Comments:
comments powered by Disqus
