OXFORD publisher David Fickling is to launch a new weekly comic for boys and girls in May.

Contributors to the comic, called DFC, include Philip Pullman, writer of the award-winning His Dark Materials triology, on which the film The Golden Compass was based.

Details of his weekly strip, The Adventures of John Blake, illustrated by John Aggs, are being kept a closely guarded secret - to be revealed when the first comic is delivered into homes on Friday, May 30.

Mr Fickling, whose office is in Beaumont Street, insisted he was not trying to cash in on the current fashion for nostalgic reprints of 1960s and 1970s children's books and magazines.

He said: "I still remember the heart-pounding excitement of receiving my very own comic on the doormat every week and now the DFC can bring that to every child in the land.

"But this isn't a revival. For today's children, it is almost a brand new form of entertainment."

There will be no adverts and the comic will have its own website, www.thedfc.co.uk, including a creative comic maker.

Mr Fickling, a former Oxford University Press editor, formed his own children's imprint in 1999 but now works with multinational publisher Random House, producing about a dozen titles a year.