This story is part of Reading Champion, a series carefully linked to book bands to encourage independent reading skills, developed with Dr Sue Bodman and Glen Franklin of UCL Institute of Education (IOE).

This traditional tale tells the story behind the Chinese proverb “Draw the dragons, dot the eyes” and the eye-dotting ceremony. A painter refuses to draw in the eyes of the dragons, but the Emperor will not listen…

Reading Champion offers independent reading books for children to practise and reinforce their developing reading skills.

Fantastic, original stories are accompanied by engaging artwork and a reading activity. Each book has been carefully graded so that it can be matched to a child’s reading ability, encouraging reading for pleasure.

Adam Bushnell

Adam is a former teacher who turned his hand to writing full time in 2007. He has written both adult teaching guides and children’s fiction books and is often touring schools and libraries and running creative writing sessions. He lives in Durham.

Amerigo Pinelli

Amerigo Pinelli lives in the heart of the city of Naples, Italy, among narrow streets and old churches. A long time ago, when he was a child, he met a pencil, and from that moment on he started to play, joke, fight and make peace with it. He studied in the Art School of Naples and the Comic School of his hometown. After that, he specialised in illustration at the International School of Illustration S. Zavrel. He worked in animation and publishing. He thinks making a living from doing the thing he enjoys the most is a great gift and he considers himself very lucky. He works digitally but always does a pencil drawing first. Sometimes he misses the feeling of getting his hands dirty with watercolors, tempera, acrylic or inks, so he prefers to use all the tools he can, depending on the job. Also he feels mixing techniques is always fun! His two daughters, Chiara and Teresa, made his life full of color and joy. They are really unpredictable! For him and his wife Giulia it’s impossible to get bored.