Authorgraph no 276: Neill Cameron

Interviewed by Lucy Starbuck Braidley

‘Donut Squad was never really supposed to exist. It was certainly not supposed to be my next big project…’

For many creators finishing a long running series and taking the next creative step can be a daunting prospect, and for cartoonist Neill Cameron, it was no different, ‘Mega Robo Bros was such a big thing, it took 10 years to tell that story, and it was such a huge part of my creative life that when that came to an end, I was looking around thinking, what do I do next?…what’s the next big story?’ To his surprise, what was supposed to be a creative palette cleanse – a series of fun comic strips featuring donuts for The Phoenix weekly comic – has exploded into a popular series with young readers. With two books released and another set to come later in 2026, Donut Squad’s blend of humour, chaos and snackable short stories has been a runaway success, in a way he could never have predicted: ‘The way I’ve come to see it now… is that doing the last Mega Robo Bros book was quite stressful and a lot of pressure, and I think all that pressure did something strange to my brain and as a release valve for that pressure, I started drawing these just very, deeply stupid little four panel gag trips about donuts…’

Ironically, the project designed to take his mind off the pressure of the next big project has become just that, ‘It’s completely taken over. I think it’s fair to say it’s just instantly eclipsed Mega Robo Bros in terms of popularity by quite some margin.’

Initially a series of loosely connected weekly strips in The Phoenix comic have amalgamated into a complex overarching narrative that sees, among other things, the donuts wanting to take over the world and battling with bagels. Neill explains how the project evolved from a simple strip, to his next epic creative endeavour, ‘… it just happens naturally, doesn’t it? You do a strip and then you think, ‘Oh, I could build on that’, and then, ‘Oh I know what the next version of that gag is.’, or ‘I know how I can build on that’….And then before you know it, you’ve constructed these giant elaborate cathedrals of nonsense, out of what was supposed to be this very simple idea… it’s fun and accessible to read but from a creative point of view, it’s become quite a lot!’

The new project has also unlocked a new way of working for Neill, moving away from carefully planned long-form narratives, towards a more organic development process which has offered him a new creative outlook. ‘Mega Robo Bros had a plan…. I knew the emotional shape of it and the emotions I want to end on, and I had that in sort of sight from the very beginning. This is just… I’m just making it up as I go along, and I think that’s done me a power of good, you know? Because it’s not working to a plan, it is just coming up with jokes and then building jokes on top of jokes, and seeing where it takes you.

I think that that is a completely different way of working, but it’s really fun and it means that you end up places you would never have… it opens you up to discoveries along the way in a way that you can’t, if you’re locked into a plan.’

When thinking about the power of comics as a form of storytelling, Neill reflects on what initially drew him to comics as a reader and that younger version of himself that he sees in many of his young fans, ‘In terms of its initial appeal and why [comics are] so appealing to kids in particular, I think it’s just because pictures are cool… I have quite a visual brain…and I think like lots of people do, certainly kids do. Kids love drawing, kids love making pictures, kids love looking at pictures…that’s just a huge part of how you are engaging with the world at that age… And so a storytelling medium that is ‘Picture Books Plus’ is intrinsically incredibly appealing to kids.’

As well as encouraging a new generation of readers through illustration, many children are turning creator too, after inspired to pick up a pencil by with the simple drawing style in Donut Squad and finding space for their own stories within the Donut’s stretchy world. ‘Donuts are quite easy to draw – that’s the joy of it. –  And so they’re very inviting to have a go at drawing your own. The amount that we get in the post is wild…I think that’s a really good lesson that I maybe hadn’t intuited earlier… When I was a kid and I loved comics, I loved the simpler cartoony styles like, Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Garfield, Calvin and Hobbs… you’re not intimidating readers with how great you are at drawing, you are inviting them in by making it feel like they could do it too. That’s a really important part of how kids engage with comics, which I should have known because that’s how I got started…. you read the comic and then you have a go at drawing your version of it or drawing those characters and then making up your own new ones.’

Despite Neill’s surprise at the size and scale of Donut Squad’s success, that recipe for creative gold was undoubtedly forged in the pressure of producing for a weekly comic, something he’s been adept at for over a decade now. ‘I’ve been doing it for however long The Phoenix has been around now, which is like 14 years or so, and if anything I’m doubling down at this point… it’s literally every week, and I think it’s great for me… You have a weekly deadline, and you have to finish things, and you have no choice about that… I think that’s one of the best things you can do as a creator. I’m always telling this to young people that are starting out: finish things and let people read them… and that implies don’t overthink and don’t go too mad with your vision for the scale of this thing…Start with a four panel gag strip and then see what that prompts, and let things build more organically that way. Actually finishing things gives you a sense of achievement and self-belief, and letting people read them reinforces that… you come to trust yourself and believe in yourself as an artist. Start small and build up is a good rule of thumb, and I feel very lucky to have that weekly deadline because it’s what enforces that.’

The donuts may not have achieved world domination they dream of (yet), but if Neill Cameron continues to take his own advice for creative success, their popularity is sure to keep on growing.

Lucy Starbuck Braidley is the producer and host of Comic Boom – The Comics in Education Podcast, co-author of upcoming title Comics in the Classroom and Head of School Libraries at the National Literacy Trust.

The Donut Squad books and Mega Robo Bros series are published by David Fickling Books.