A fright on the beach became a story about a dog for an Ocean Grove woman with a “scaredy cat”.
Pet-dog Pip’s increasing anxiety was the inspiration for Heather Gallagher’s latest book for children, she explained.
“We were walking on the beach one day and he ran away from another dog,” she said. “When he finally came back I asked him why he was such a scaredy cat, and then those words kept playing around in my mind.”
The words and her dog’s anxiety inspired Heather to develop her look-and-find-style picture book, in which a little girl asks readers: “Have you seen my Scaredy Cat? He’s afraid of this and afraid of that”.
Readers then looked for a tail or a paw or other parts of the animal in each spread until the scaredy cat was finally revealed, Heather explained.
“While it’s primarily intended as a fun read for kids it could also act as a jumping-off point for talking about anxiety.”
Queensland illustrator Anil Tortop helped produce the book, Heather said.
She planned to launch Scaredy Cat with the help of veterinarian Alicia Kenney at Ocean Grove’s Bookgrove store on 9 June.
