Sequel to popular Indigenous children's book Wylah the Koorie Warrior released

With the release of the sequel to their debut novel Wylah: The Koorie Warrior hitting bookshelves across Australia on May 30, it's hard not to get caught up in their excitement at having their words and illustrations bound in a glistening cover. "It's amazing. I absolutely love it," Pritchard said.

It started as just an idea and some images in 2019 but when a kick-starter campaign reached its goal in three days - and a week later doubled - it grabbed national media attention. Then came a two-book publishing deal that has now become three.

The first book - Guardians - became a bestseller in Australia with more than 30,000 copies sold so far. And with Custodians about to arrive in stores, they are already working on the third book in the series. Their ideas - which filled a gap in the market - created a real buzz and the pair is overwhelmed with the reaction.

As a new author, Pritchard admits he loves going to bookstores just to see if there are any copies of Wylah on the shelf.

For Gould, creating the books which celebrate Indigenous culture is part of his own personal journey of discovery - only finding out about his heritage with the Peek Whurrong tribe when he was in grade six.

Pritchard grew up in New Zealand where Samoan and Maori culture is widely celebrated in every aspect of life. That is something he wants for Australia because he feels people are missing out on so much of the richness culture brings.

A visual effects artist, Pritchard worked with famed Australian director George Miller for four years and the string of movie credits to his name include Happy Feet, The Great Gatsby, Prometheus, Pacific Rim: Uprising and Mad Max Fury Road.

His links to some of the biggest movies to hit the screens in recent years have helped shape how the books were written and their characters. "The film industry was fun but I always wanted to do my own stuff, write my own stories," he said.

"When I was working on Mad Max Fury Road I made lifelong friends with one of the screenwriters - so I was always bugging him about Wylah and he was always feeding me story tips. All of those tropes from the film industry - story telling, story boarding, visualisation - all comes into Wylah to make it look like a feature animated film and written like a film."

Because they own the global rights to Wylah they are planning on turning the book series into a TV series and films in the future.

The pair is currently speaking at the Sydney Writers Festival, and also attended the Australian Book Industry Awards where Wylah was shortlisted for best book of the year in the 7-12 age group.

They will also soon Zoom into Sydney Opera House for a digital talk which will go out to 200,000 children in remote areas. "They love what we are doing," Pritchard said. And they are in good company for the event with Ahn Do the only other author doing the talk this year as part of the NSW Premier's reading challenge.

Custodians take readers on a journey to some of Victoria's most spectacular spots such as the Twelve Apostles on the Great Ocean Road, The Grampians (Gariwerd) and Warrnambool's coastline.

But it was a race to get the book finished in time for publication with Pritchard roping in his children to help colour in his illustrations. "Sierra coloured in over 60 of the illustrations. I do the outlines," he said.

"It's so time consuming to do the illustrations... you're doing 100 of them in a month.

"There are the yowies, the bunyip, the drop bears - they're part of our legendary mystical characters. The drop bears were a nod to Aussie myths but have recently been discovered as being real megafauna animals.

"Book two mostly takes place in a mysterious and forbidden valley filled with Australian cryptids and Aboriginal myths."

For the past year they have been working on turning Wylah into a trading card game featuring characters from the book which they printed prototypes just in time for the Sydney festival.

"There are hundreds of Aboriginal tribes and nations that have no representation. We'd love to represent them and their animal totems as cards in the game," Gould said. "There's so much fantasy in Australia that no one has tapped into."

Gould - a self-confessed card and video gamer - said down the track there could be a video game.

When they visit schools they do character workshops with students to create and name a new creature for their card game, and on page 303 of the new book their illustration of all the megabeasts is featured.

Some were done in Warrnambool schools, others in New South Wales, Singapore and Malaysia where they have been sharing Indigenous culture with students overseas.

They plan to take the books international when the three-part series is complete.

The books and card game is their way of introducing culture to young kids in ways they can relate to and feel excited about learning and collecting creatures of cultural significance. The books are, in Pritchard's words, a bit How to Train Your Dragon meets Moana meets Hercules.

"We wanted it to be a spearhead for culture," Pritchard said. "There's a lot of people talking about culture in Australia but not to this age group of - seven to 12 year-olds. There's not much out there for them that's positive and educational, especially for teachers. To see that age group identify with it and grab it, and then corporations come and sponsor it - that was quite unseen before."

Wylah even inspired children to dress up during book week - many using their own tribal markings. Seeing pictures of the children as a character he helped create was heart-warming for Gould, who said he didn't get a chance to grow up with his Aboriginal culture.

"I was kind of told to stay away from that. By the time I found out I was, it was a culture shock," he said. "It's a massive journey I'm proud to have accomplished."

He said his goal was to now try and make things better for Indigenous people and make the culture more accessible. "I want people to be able to grow up on the culture and learn as much as they can while they're young and experience it like I never have," Gould said.

"I've made it my life goal to make something like this and eventually make a game and maybe a movie. I have stories in my head but struggle to put them on paper because of my autism." Pritchard brought his idea of the Koorie Warrior to the Elders and then to Gould - they paired up and together Wylah was born.

Having worked with writers in the film industry, Pritchard said there was a lot of pressure to create something special. His former colleagues are "blown away" with what he has achieved.

"Not just that I've written a story and actually created a book, but in terms of what it's doing in the marketplace and impact to the audience. Their kids are loving Wylah and that's been a full circle moment," he said.

Pritchard said his Australian friends who go to New Zealand wonder why this country doesn't celebrate culture like they do there. It was the same feeling he had when he arrived in Australia.

"You are missing out on this amazing culture and I always thought I wanted to do something about it. This is our way of showing how much you can celebrate culture," he said.

"Jordan has a similar idea. Let's just make it positive. Let's show the good side and fun side of culture. Let's make it cool for kids. Other people can talk about the more serious side of it but we are writing purely for what matters to kids."

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