Although I usually write and illustrate my own picture books I’m open to the idea of illustrating stories by other authors. At the moment I’m doing just that, a picture book called The Totally Terrifying Three by Haiwyn Oram. The text is excellent and tells of three characters: a Dragon, a Witch and a Giant all of whom believe they are totally terrifying. Until they come across a toddler who doesn’t bat an eyelid.

It is often said that picture book texts are easy to write ‘money for old rope’ I was once told. Hmm, really? I’m not so sure. In fact, after writing for 3-6′s for some 13 years myself, if anything it’s getting harder! I think it was Maurice Sendak of Where The Wild Things Are fame who said picture books are like a visual poem. I think there is something in that. The skill is to choose the kind of words that convey the right mood to drive the story forward whilst at the same time leaving a gap in the text to let the illustrations flourish, enhance and contribute to the story. Money for old rope? I think not! I confess, I’m not always successful myself. There are plenty of poor books out there. But there are also some real gems. I’ll highlight some of these in a future post.

Meanwhile, with a bit of luck and a following wind, I shall finish the illustrations for this book by mid February. I started drawing the roughs late October so by the time it is complete the artwork will have taken me just over 4 months. After a period of colour proofing, tweaking the final text and showing it off at various book trade fairs, the final product  - a nice shiny hardback book – should be on the bookshelves Autumn 2011. With a bit of luck…

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