About Lucy
Hello. I’m Lucy and I love reptiles! As a child, I was desperate for a pet, but I’m allergic to absolutely any animal with hair or fur and so, at the age of five, I became best friends with a forty-three-year-old tortoise called Toby (or Prince Toby as he now insists on being called). Thirty-one years later, he lives in my kitchen and rules my life. When I’m not running around after my royal reptile, I’m a Senior Lecturer in English Literature, with research specialisms in children’s and young adult fiction, crime fiction and popular culture.
In my vast collection of books, films and television series, I realised that I have a nice little sub-section featuring all things reptilian – snakes, dragons, dinosaurs and, of course, tortoises – and so I decided to share my reptile-related media and paraphernalia with reptile lovers everywhere. In particular, I'm a huge fan of Jurassic Park, so much so that I co-ran a Jurassic Park conference in 2018 for the 25th anniversary of the original film and, in 2022, I achieved my lifelong ambition of teaching the Jurassic Park franchise as part of one of my undergraduate modules. My favourite reptile is, of course, the noble tortoise, but I'm also rather partial to a Velociraptor (don’t tell Toby). I'm a keen creative writer and I’m currently working on a children’s chapter book all about Prince Toby.
About (Prince) Toby
Toby is a seventy-four-year-old Mediterranean spur-thighed tortoise who lives in my kitchen (and ventures into the garden when it’s warm enough). He loves cucumber, kale and sleeping – not necessarily in that order. He is also an avid reader. He hates baths, shoes and a Tradescantia zebrina plant called Bertie. You can follow Toby's antics over on Twitter and Instagram: @PrinceTobyTort. Toby joins The Reptile Files as my Editort-in-Chief (having recently been promoted from Editortial Consultant). His main role, I suspect, will be to ensure that I spend enough time blogging about tortoises (and, by tortoises, he means him). Because he’s so photogenic, he can also be seen on the blog posing next to a variety of reptile-related goodies in the style of a nineties gameshow prize demonstrator.
