Martin Freeman is providing the voice of Gromit for an audiobook based on the claymation star’s ‘autobiography’.

Grand: The Autobiography of Gromit, as told to Nick Park, will be published on 22 October.

Speaking about the decision to cast Freeman as Gromit, Park said: “When you create a character who has no voice and whose facial expressions are everything, what do you do when your publisher reminds you there’ll be an audiobook? Who could possibly be the voice of a character everyone feels they know, but nobody’s actually heard?”

“The more I thought about it, the more I realised Martin Freeman was the obvious choice, really. I was genuinely thrilled and honoured when he said yes.”

Park added: “Martin is not doing a Gromit ‘voice’ as such. He’s reading Gromit’s story as Gromit put it: his inner thoughts, his candid insights and endless witticisms, bringing to them his usual colour, thoughtfulness and wry humour.”