Paul McCartney has announced the publication of his latest animated children’s book, called Hey Grandude! The book features illustrations by Kathryn Durst and will be published in September 2019 via the Penguin imprint. Hey Grandude! marks “Macca’s” first picture book since 2005, when he published High In Clouds.

McCartney posted on Facebook: “I’ve written a new children’s picture book. It’s called Hey Grandude! Why? Well. . . 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.’ So I thought, y’know what, it’s actually a nice idea for a book, so I started to write some stories, and then I talked to the book publishers and they liked what I was doing.”

McCartney added: “So basically it’s about a character called ‘Grandude’ who represents grandfathers everywhere. He has four grandchildren and he calls them ‘Chillers.’ 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.”

Paul McCartney will return to CBS’ 60 Minutes on Sunday (September 30th). In a preview for the episode, McCartney was asked if he and John Lennon complimented each other:
“(McCartney): Once.
(Interviewer): One time.
(McCartney): . . . John gave me a compliment.
(Interviewer): In how many years?
(McCartney): I think it was Revolver. ‘Here, There, And Everywhere’ was one of my songs on it, but John said, ‘That’s a really good song, that. I love that song.’ I was , like, ‘Yes! He likes it!’ Y’know, I’ve remembered it to this day. It’s pathetic, really.
(Interviewer): Did you ever heap praise on him?
(McCartney): Yeah, I would tell him his stuff is great. You’d normally have to be a little bit drunk. …it helped!”