PUPILS went barking mad for the visit of a Stourbridge author who bases his stories around the adventures of his pet dogs.

Group of Year 3 students from Olive Hill and Rufford primary schools visited Redhill School to meet writer Angus Lees - who also serves as a councillor for Pedmore and Stourbridge East - and his family.

Students were treated to a reading of a story written by Angus about his beloved pugs, Eric and Coco.

The story was accompanied by sound effects created and performed by Year 9 students and was read by Angus' wife Julie.

Julie also gave anecdotes about Eric and Coco's adventures, and told the children how these real adventures helped to inspire the story.

The children were then given time to complete workshops, with the first involving creating some new characters and plotlines for the Eric and Coco stories.

Kate Dorrell, learning centre manager at Redhill, said: "The children were so imaginative and ideas ranged from zombie characters to Sonic the Hedgehog!

"A particularly popular storyline featured Eric eating Tinsel and contracting 'tinsellitus'!"

The second workshop was with Matt Lees, Angus's son and illustrator of the story, with the children fascinated by how the illustrations for the story were created using a layering effect on an Apple Mac.

They got to see all the early versions of Eric and Coco and also tried their skills at sketching onto the computer.

Kate added: "The final workshop was what everyone was waiting for - to meet the stars themselves, Eric and Coco.

"Angus discussed the pug breed and told the children what makes them so special, then they got to have a fuss and play with both Eric and Coco, who were loving the attention!

"Once we sent the primary school children away with stickers, flyers and drawings as souvenirs of the day, some students from Redhill were invited to creative writing and graphic illustration workshops with both Angus and Matt.

"Here they learned about the processes of writing, illustrating and publishing a book and were able to gain valuable information that may help inspire a career in writing and illustration.

"A wonderful day was had by all, thank you so much to the Lees family and especially to Eric and Coco."