Dr Simon Spence

Perseus Dr Simon Spence

**Winner of the bronze medal at the international Moonbeam Children's Book Awards**

Perseus is the first book in the Early Myths collection, a series of children's picture books on Greek myth. Each book covers a character from mythology and brings the tale to life through illustrations and story-telling, with inspiration from ancient art and literature. The books are aimed at 4 to 10 year olds, are beautifully designed and easy to read.

Perseus is the tale of a young boy who has to flee from his home with his mother and grows up in a foreign land. To prove his worth he claims he can take on the magical Gorgon, Medusa, with her stony-gaze and snake-hair! With the help of the gods he flies across the lands and faces his greatest challenge, rescuing princess Andromeda along his journey and arriving back to claim the throne. But will he succeed in becoming king and uniting his family?

For teachers and parents, we have a notes section at the back, describing how our illustrations have been inspired by ancient Greek vase-painting, sculptures, and early literature. The kids don't need to know this aspect to enjoy the tale, but the grown-ups can learn about how we have taken time and care to construct our book, using the early historical sources, rather than simply repeat a generic version of the myth.

Awards for our Early Myths collection:
- Perseus: bronze medal winner at the Moonbeam Children's Book Awards 2014
- Odysseus: honourable mention at the Royal Dragonfly Book Awards 2015
- Odysseus: finalist in the Wishing Shelf Book Awards 2015
- Atalanta: silver medal at the Moonbeam Children's Book Awards 2016
- Atalanta: honourable mention at Purple Dragonfly Book Awards 2016
- Atalanta: finalist at the Readers' Favorite Awards 2016
- Herakles: 1st prize for illustrations and 6+ picture book at the Dragonfly Books Awards 2017
- Herakles: gold award at the Royal Dragonfly Book Awards 2017
- Herakles: silver medalist in the Wishing Shelf Children's Books Awards 2017
- Theseus: best illustrations at Purple Dragonfly Book Awards 2018
- Theseus: honourable Mention in Picture Books (5 and younger category) at the Purple Dragonfly Book Awards 2018
- Theseus: silver medalist at the Moonbeam Children's Book Awards 2018