Darren Chetty and Sandhya Prabhat: I'm Going to Make a Friend
About Author
Darren Chetty and Sandhya Prabhat explore friendship in their new picture book, I'm Going to Make a Friend.
Darren Chetty (Author) is a Welsh Indian South African Dutch Londoner. He teaches in primary schools and at university and writes for people of all ages. He loves football and music and collects children's books, snow globes and toy robots.
Sandhya Prabhat (Illustrator) creates picture books and also illustrates and animates for movies, TV and social media content. She lives in the Bay Area, California, and is from Chennai, India. She studied Animation and Digital Arts and has a degree in Literature.
Interview
Exploring friendship in Darren Chetty and Sandhya Prabhat's I'm Going to Make a Friend (Little Tiger)
May 2025
This playful and heartfelt exploration of friendship, I'm Going to Make a Friend, is a wonderful picture book to share with any young child who worries about making friends in a new setting, as well as for starting discussions about what being a good friend means.
In this month's Q&A with author Darren Chetty and illustrator Sandya Prabhat, we find out how I'm Going to Make a Friend was created, as well as exploring inclusion in children's books, using picture books to raise questions, and why making friends is such a creative process.
Q&A with Darren Chetty and Sandhya Prabhat: Frienship and Creativity in I'm Going to Make a Friend (Little Tiger)
"I think that making a friend is perhaps one of the most creative things a person can do.
I wanted to explore what it might involve." Darren Chetty
1. What brought you into creating picture books for children? What other kinds of work do you do?
Darren: So, I've been teaching for nearly 30 years now - mostly in primary schools, and more recently at university. I'm a specialist in 'Philosophy for Children' (P4C). I've always been interested in picture books and used them a lot with children and with adults. My favourite picture books tend to provoke questions and conversation and leave space for reader interpretation.
I write about children's books and the representation of racially minoritised people. I wrote an essay about this and my teaching in The Good Immigrant. Earlier this year Beyond the Secret Garden, a book I co-authored with Karen Sands O'Connor, was published by the English & Media Centre. We also write for Books for Keeps.
Sandhya: I illustrate and animate for movies, TV, books and social media content. I also do picture books. In 2020, during the pandemic, my book I Am Brown by Lantana publications was received well and I began to get more children's picture book projects. It has been my dream since childhood to illustrate vibrant, hardbound picture books that would be displayed in bookstores for little hands to pick up - filled with imaginative and awesome stories! I can't believe I get to live my dream!
2. Which authors and illustrators help inspire you in your own work?
Darren: There are so many! I'm a huge fan of Michael Rosen's writing and how he writes from the perspective of a child. Likewise with Jackie Kay's poetry - Two's Company is a firm favourite of mine.
Looking at my bookshelves, some of my favourite writers and illustrators for younger readers are: Patrice Lawrence, Lucy Farfort, Chitra Sounder, John Agard, Grace Nichols, Benjamin Zephaniah, Dapo Adeola, Trish Cooke, Alex T Smith, Maurice Sendak, Shaun Tan, Jessica Spanyol, Valerie Bloom, Anna McQuinn, Ken Wilson-Max, Nicola Davies, Dean Atta, Errol Lloyd, Harry Woodgate, Jane Porter and Maisie Paradise Shearring, Rosemary Stones and Dan Jones.
Sandhya: This is certainly not all of them but - Quentin Blake, Oliver Jeffers, Priya Kuruyan, Rajiv Eipe, Christian Robinson, Beatrix Potter, Maurice Sendak, Vashti Harrison, Richard Scarry, etc.
3. What is your new picture book, I'm Going to Make a Friend, about?
Darren: The title gives away the plot. But it's also a pun. Friendship matters to most people as soon as they start school, if not before. And it never stops mattering, it seems.
The story is about a child who has moved home and is not making friends as quickly as they would like. As they make a friend out of found materials, they imagine what they'd like their friend to be like. Later in the story, as another child enters the scene, they start to consider what kind of friend they would like to be. Friendship is formed in the story through collaboration and creativity - but there are a few bumps in the road.
4. Can you tell us what helped inspire you to write this story about friendship?
Darren: I think that making a friend is perhaps one of the most creative things a person can do. I wanted to explore what it might involve. As it always involves another person, and everyone is different, it's not as straightforward as we sometimes assume. And I like that idea of depicting a child's reality but also their rich imaginative world. Sandhya did an amazing job of bringing this to life!
Sandhya: I received this as a commissioned project and loved the idea of 'making' a friend' - so smart and funny! Darren's writing was really inspiring, and I was honoured to take this on!
5. The story includes questions to consider about what a friend is. What kinds of discussions do you hope the story will help to encourage?
Darren: I think that's really up to the readers. So far, I've found that young readers have been keen to talk about their own interests and the extent to which their friends are similar to or different from them - oh, and also whether robots can be good friends!
6. Can you suggest other ways to extend what children learn from the story?
I think children should be free to enjoy and talk about stories without any expectation that they necessarily learn from them. Of course, they may do, just as we all often learn something from reading a story.
7. The robot the child creates will certainly help inspire children to create their own 'friends' - how did you decide on the approach you wanted to take in the illustrations for I'm Going to Make a Friend? Any favourite spreads?
Darren: I do love a pun - and making a friend is such an interesting idea to me. It's different from 'meeting a friend'. I think my favourite picture books are the ones where the words and the illustrations are doing very different things. When the child says 'I'm not scared', perhaps they're being honest. Or perhaps they're an unreliable narrator. Every spread is gorgeous - but I do enjoy seeing a robot play drums!
Sandhya: My favourite spread has to be where the characters fight and the robot splits into many pieces! It was so dramatic to draw, and I had a great time with that! The approach organically developed as we zeroed in on the character designs. I was sure that I'd use colour to distinguish the storylines right from the beginning, but the remaining creative choices came as I painted spreads and presented them.
8. The images reveal a beautifully diverse cast of characters. Given your other work, is representation important to you in your books? Do you feel that publishing is making the changes that are needed to reflect all realities?
Darren: I'm very aware of the long history of Black people and other people of colour being depicted as less than fully human. I grew up reading some of those books. We have a long way to go to redress the legacy of those characters.
Sandhya: Certainly! Even about 15 years ago, I wouldn't have had the chance to illustrate the diverse topics that I'm working on and definitely wouldn't have had an environment as encouraging as now to create characters that look and act like me! Things are getting better - I have hope for great many diverse stories to reach children in the coming years!
9. Are you writing or illustrating other picture books or children's books currently? What else are you working on?
Darren: I'm working on my second book for Little Tiger. It's coming along nicely. I've just started working on a picture book project with colleagues at UCL and families with no recourse to public funds. And I have a philosophically-themes collaboration, with my friend Adam Ferner in the works.
Sandhya: Many! Follow me on Instagram @sandhyaprabhat to keep updated!
10. What does a perfect 'downtime' day look like for you?
Darren: If I'm in London, a stroll along the South Bank, a coffee, an exhibition, and some book browsing. Otherwise, watching Swansea City win!
Sandhya: Spending all day with my toddler and twin babies, doing toddler and baby things!
School events: Do you visit schools for events? How can schools can get in contact with you?
Darren: Yes, I visit schools to talk about writing, to share my books, and to have philosophical conversations with children and teachers! You can find out more here.
I'm Going to Make a Friend
