Alan Brough is chuffed when I tell him that my 13-year-old son, my reluctant reader, loved his new book Charlie and the War Against the Grannies. It might have had something to do with the title; my son had something of a run in with one of his grannies in recent times; but it was high praise indeed when he deemed the book "not boring".
"That's great to hear that," laughs Brough, "My first real review! If the book can help engage someone with reading than I've done a good thing."
As he is best known for his television and stage roles, it's hard not to want to steer Brough in a totally different direction, not to ask him what's on his playlist, why he thought Spicks and Specks was such a success.
But his enthusiasm for the book, for reading and writing in general, is so infectious, we run out of time to talk about anything else.
"For me reading is such a wonderful joy," he says.
"And I've always been a reader. There were lots of books in the house, Mum and Dad read all the time. I was implicitly encouraged to read."
Can he remember any of his favourite books as a child?
"I've been thinking about this question because I assumed people might ask me, but if I'm honest, I can't remember.
"I remember reading Encyclopedia Brown [a series about a boy detective which was first published in 1963]. I liked anything about smart kids.
"I also read a lot of science fiction, I loved Star Wars when I first saw it and I adored all the novelisations which came from it. There was one called Splinter of the Mind's Eye which I remember really well … it would almost be called fan fiction now.
"I just read whatever was around. I wasn't one of those kids who read Treasure Island and had an epiphany that one day I would be a writer. I just always read."
So what did inspire him to turn his talents to fiction writing?
"I've been writing various sorts of things, but not books, for a long time," he says.
"Writing for radio, for television is a very collaborative process, the whole idea of being totally in control of this idea was really lovely.
"You create this world, you populate it, you run it, and that was really nice."
He realised once he had started the story that he was actually writing it for himself, and not with a dedicated market in mind.
"I was thinking about what would make me read it. It soon became apparent that you can only write for one person and that's yourself.
"You can't guess what a 12-year-old boy is going to be like, because 12-year-old boys are all so different."
He says writing a book was very different from anything else he had done, hard at times.
"It was a very different process and it required a lot of concentration. I tried to apply myself as regularly as I could but I have a young daughter so that was not as easy as I had hoped.
"I knew it would be a big undertaking but it's pretty cool to hold the book in my hands."
The story is a fun-filled adventure, as almost-12-year-old Charlie Duncan and his mates embark on a series of adventures. They want to live normal suburban lives but are confronted by magical bikes, people from underground and grannies with glass eyes who turn their snot-covered hankies into deadly weapons.
As you would expect from Brough, there is plenty of humour.
"Humour helps you understand the world in different ways," he says.
"When I'm with my daughter and her friends, she's only five, you can see that humour engages them.
"I think kids respond to humour, particularly when it's a way of knocking people down a peg or two, teachers, parents, it's a way of bonding with your peers."
Charlie and the War Against the Grannies. By Alan Brough. Macmillan. $14.99.
