The Railway Series - Continuation

Continuation

Christopher Awdry, for whom the stories were first devised, continued writing the stories almost by accident. He was a keen railway enthusiast like his father, and it was on a visit to the Nene Valley Railway that he received the inspiration for his first story. A railwayman's account of a locomotive running out of steam short of its destination became Triple Header, a story in which Thomas, Percy and Duck take on Gordon's Express but find it more than they can handle. Christopher devised three other stories, Stop Thief!, Mind That Bike and Fish.

He showed them to his father, who suggested that he submit them for publication, with his blessing. At the time, work on the television adaptation was underway, and so Kaye and Ward (then publishers of the series) were willing to revive the Railway Series. The book Really Useful Engines was published in 1983. By coincidence, W. Awdry had considered this as a title for his own 27th volume before abandoning the project.

Thirteen more books followed, including the series' 50th anniversary volume, Thomas and the Fat Controller's Engines. A number of stories were also written for the television series, most notably More About Thomas the Tank Engine, the Railway Series' 30th volume.

However, Christopher Awdry found himself increasingly coming into conflict with his publishers, which ironically arose through the success of the television series. The television series had made Thomas its central character, and therefore the most well-known of the engines. Consequently, the publishers were increasingly demanding stories that would focus on Thomas at the expense of other characters. As a compromise, volumes appeared that were named after Thomas but did not actually focus upon him. Thomas and the Fat Controller's Engines featured only one story about Thomas and Thomas Comes Home did not feature Thomas until the last page.

The series' 40th volume, New Little Engine, appeared in 1996. The then publisher, Egmont, expressed no further interest in publishing new Railway Series books and allowed the existing back catalogue to go out of print.

Despite this setback, in 2005 Christopher's own publishing company, Sodor Enterprises, published a book entitled Sodor: Reading Between the Lines. This volume expanded the fictional world of Sodor up to the present day and dealt with many of the factual aspects of the series. With this publishing company he also wrote several railway-based children's books, most of which were set on real railways in Britain. He continues to promote the original stories and to participate in Railway Series-related events.

Fortunately, for fans of the series, the publishers reviewed their policy and, in 2006, started to re-introduce the books in their original format. After many years of being unavailable, the fourteen books written by Christopher were also re-released, early in August 2007.

Furthermore, Christopher wrote a new book, extending the series to 41 volumes. The new book, titled "Thomas and Victoria", addresses issues relating to the railway preservation movement. It is illustrated by Clive Spong, and was published on 3 September 2007.