What is a Stroogle? To some children, he looks like a strawberry, to others, a colourful chicken that hatched from a purple egg, to others; he's a 'way cool superhero'. Who are his parents? Well that remains a mystery.

The first book, The Stroogle, is a modern twist to the classic ugly duckling story. The simple rhyming text leads the reader through an adventure of rejection, misunderstanding and sadness to friendship, courage and acceptance.

Unlike the traditional story where the swan grows beautiful and is subsequently accepted, the Stroogle is befriended by a rather drab looking mouse. He then has the courage to show his 'true colours' when he leads the mouse on a daring rescue of the garden gnomes from the much larger hungry fox.

The Stroogle was written and illustrated by Dr Cameron Stelzer during the year he spent working at the Natural History Museum in London (2002-03). He was inspired by the many weird and wonderful creatures the museum held in its collection.

The character evolved in Cameron's pocket sketch book and everything around him became part of the story. Street buskers became garden gnomes and even stuffed foxes and mice from the museum's collection found their way into the story. A well-timed visit to the Royal Botanical Gardens provided Cameron with all the garden and farmyard scenes for the book, and it was during a visit to Germany that he stumbled upon the perfect name.

"I discovered a small shop near the famous Hofbrauhaus in Munich which sold only strudel: apple, raspberry, rhubarb, even spinach and vegetable - it had everything! Since my little character has an enormous appetite I wondered what would be an exciting name that sounds like strudel. I discovered the word strudel also translates to 'whirlwind' or 'eddy' which are appropriate descriptions for such an adventurous little round character. I played around with the letters and came up with 'Stroogle'."

Cameron worked on the final pictures for the book for six months and on returning to Australia the text was rewritten into its rhyming form. It was published in October 2004.

The second Stroogle adventure The Stroogle's New Home was published in November 2005.

The Stroogle's New Home is a visual delight with colour and detail on each page. The pictures combine with the simple lyrical rhyme to create a truly magical journey.
The story is an exciting tale about working together and what you can achieve with some clever recycling!

"Something is not quite right in the garden. The mouse has a tree stump house and Gretel and Grandpa garden gnome live in mushrooms but the Stroogle has no home of his own. He searches until he finds an old tin can but the farmer throws it in the garbage bin with the four friends inside! Before they can escape they are tipped into the garbage truck and carried far away to the rubbish dump. How will they get back to the garden and will the Stroogle finally get his home?"

The third Stroogle adventure The Stroogle Warms Winter was released in April 2007.

"When winter's chill is here to stay
and snow and ice won't go away
it's only with the warmest heart
that you can make the springtime start."

In this story the Stroogle searches for a way to warm his frozen friends. The book comes with a bonus read along CD containing enchanting original Stroogle music and narrations of the first three Stroogle books.

The Stroogle's fourth adventure is The Stroogle Sails the Seven Seas. The story begins when the Stroogle discovers an old pirate's map in a bottle. Together with his two friends, Gretel and the mouse, the Stroogle sails off on a raft in search of buried treasure. Along the way he meets the dreaded Pie-Rats and after a skirmish onboard a giant pie ship, he is ordered to walk the plank. Luckily Grandpa Garden Gnome arrives just in time to rescue them in his new submarine. The journey continues underwater, in a cave, through a pie fight and off to treasure island. With an unexpected twist at the end involving some fairy magic, this story is full of humour and will appeal to both boys and girls alike.

Once you have read the story, you can go on your own treasure hunt and find over 300 hidden objects throughout the pictures.

The fifth book in the Stroogle series, The Stroogle and the Golden Dragontakes the popular hero to a fairytale world of castles, dragons and adventure.

Sparky, the Golden Dragon is the adorable new character with a major sneezing problem:

The dragon replied, “I am friends with the bees,
but pollen from flowers keeps making me sneeze!”
“I burn half the forest with every AAACHOO!
Oh what in the world am I going to do?

After running into a mischievous leprechaun who promises to help them, The Stroogle, the dragon and two comical bumble bees embark on a quest to find three missing ingredients for a medicine to cure the sneeze. Their journey takes them to the top of a wild windy mountain and into a mysterious moonlit castle where secrets await them!

In the tradition of the previous Stroogle adventure, there are plenty of things to locate in the watercolour illustrations once you have read the story: These include a puzzle to solve, hidden images from famous fairytales and just for luck, there are 100 four leaf clovers to find!

The sixth Stroogle book, The Stroogle in Space has now landed!!!