Children’s jungle mystery sells out its first print run

Nine children in Bad Fischau-Brunn, in the Wiener Neustadt district, have written and illustrated a children’s book whose first print run has sold out, ORF reports. A reprint of 350 copies has already been commissioned.

The book, “The Jungle Detectives”, follows a group of animals trying to recover the king’s stolen amulet and save the jungle. Children aged five to 10 developed the story during a book workshop organised by the Na-tuerlich bewusst association.

From February to April, the nine participants met weekly with workshop leader and publisher Sonja Kittel. They came up with ideas, developed the plot and characters, and drew the illustrations and cover.

When the group had to choose between ideas, Kittel used a voting game in which children moved to different corners of the room to show their preference. Kittel has submitted the mystery for a literary prize, and the young authors are already collecting ideas for a sequel.