Meet the farm business manager who has written his first children's book

The result, Ralph The Seaside Donkey, is set in Yorkshire and inspired by Sykes’ love of animals and the countryside.

"Everybody I know are countryside people. I’m not a townie at all,” says the 57-year-old. “Animals and countryside and farming is what I’m brought up with really.”

His story follows Ralph, an adorable seaside donkey, who has an adventure just as he thinks his popularity is beginning to wane.

Instead of heading to the Yorkshire Dales with the other donkeys for the winter he finds himself at a stable yard.

There, he makes a new friend in a Shetland pony, saves the day, and becomes the most famous donkey in Yorkshire, returning to the seaside as a hero.

"I could never have dreamt I’d have a product like this,” says Sykes.

“It’s a proper endearing children’s story, which is great for grandads to read or adults to read as a bedtime story or even for children to read themselves. There’s drama in it, there’s a happy ending and there’s also a moral to it.”

Sykes contacted Virginia Barker of North Lincolnshire-based independent publisher Sand Hall Publishing with his tale.

"She turned it from Yorkshire speak to English speak and it all went from there,” he says. Her daughter produced the illustrations and last year, the book hit shelves.

"I could never have dreamt it,” says Sykes. “When we got it back from the printers and we saw what it looked like, I couldn’t believe I’d done it, not at all.

"When I was at school, all I was told I was any good for was talking. I wish I could show some of my teachers...

"They would be flabbergasted. In one of my school reports was ‘Nicholas would do better if he didn’t have to write.’”

The farm business manager isn’t stopping there. A second book is already underway, following Ralph as he meets new friends. Sykes aim is to get it released this year.

"At the moment, it’s just a manuscript on some paper,” he says. “That’s as far as it’s got as we’ve been busy with the first one.

"We thought we’d sell one before we sold two…The hard work is done. The story is done. You can sit there over a blank piece of paper with nothing come out.

"I sat there one night and lo and behold this story just developed.

"If people are as much delighted with the second as they are with the first one, we’ll see what progresses.”

Ralph The Seaside Donkey, created by Nicholas Sykes and written by Virginia Barker, is out now.