Set for a 2019 release, the former Beatle said his book about a magical grandfather is written ‘for grandparents everywhere’

Following in the footsteps of fellow children’s book luminaries Bob Dylan, Keith Richards and Madonna, Paul McCartney is to write his own picture book.

Hey Grandude follows an elderly, magical gentleman called Grandude and his adventures with his four grandchildren.

“He calls them ‘Chillers’,” said McCartney, a grandfather to eight. “They love him and they go on adventures with him and he’s kind of magical, so you’ll see that in the book. I wanted to write it for grandparents everywhere – and the kids – so it gives you something to read to the grandkids at bed time.”

Explaining the title, the former Beatle said: “I’ve got eight grandchildren and they’re all beautiful and one day one of them said to me ‘Hey Grandude!’. I said ‘What?’ and I thought, I kind of like that, so from then on I was kind of known as Grandude.”

The picture book is set to be illustrated by Kathryn Durst, who said she was “thrilled” to work on the project. “I have wonderful childhood memories of my dad taking my siblings and me on exciting adventures, just like Grandude does in the book.”

McCartney is the latest in a line of musicians to venture in to children’s publishing, with fellow former Beatle Ringo Starr and Rolling Stone Keith Richards also having released picture books with varying degrees of success.

McCartney has previously put his name to children’s books before: he teamed up with author Philip Ardagh and illustrator Geoff Dunbar in 2005 to produce the ecological picture book High in the Clouds, which followed a squirrel called Wirral and his attempts to win back his woodlands from developers.

Hey Grandude will be published in September 2019.