Tigers, Bears, and Newts. Oh my!

THE KING OF BOOKS comes out in just ten weeks. That’s only two more newsletters from now! So it’s time to share a little bit about where this story came from.

Just yesterday, kids at a storytime asked me where I get my ideas from. For KING, I actually woke up with the idea. It was July of 2020. Quite the summer, if you recall. I woke up hearing this confident cat (at the time) saying “I love books!” and knew the overall story was how he did all the wrong, ridiculous things with his books until someone explained that books were in fact, for reading. I rushed to find any paper and write it all down.

Over the summer I worked on my idea, made ugly first drafts, discovered the title (sort of), and started thinking more about character design.

I didn’t get very far before I connected the dots between this illustration experiment (center) and my “cat”. Of course, he was a tiger! I adore tigers and have illustrated them several times over the years.

I also drew this grand home around the same time. The combination of the tiger, the bright pink, and that house made me think of the Hawa Mahal - a pink palace in the city of Jaipur, India. But also of the Painted Victorians in San Francisco. My setting would be a jungle, and King’s confidants would be an elephant, a monkey, and a wild boar. It was time to start putting this together into a dummy…. I’ll share all about THAT next month.

We were lucky enough to take a family trip to London for April vacation week. I hadn’t been since 1999, and my husband hadn’t been since he was a little kid. So we did the usual first visitor’s stops: Buckingham Palace, St. James Park, British Museum, Tower of London, and Windsor Castle.

With miles of walking, shopping, and eating in between. We had an excellent Yeoman for our Tower tour. I think he’s also excited for THE KING OF BOOKS to come out! The new poppy art exhibit was being installed at Tower of London when we were there, and as today is Victory Day, it’s the official opening.

I also snuck off to the MOCO museum one morning and was really excited to see so many favorite modern artists: Warhol and Banksy, below. I also popped into the Wallace Collection to see a piece stuck in my brain since art history class at Syracuse: Fragonard’s Girl on a Swing, far right.

It was also my first time there since having Celiac. I was happy to get a wonderful full English breakfast one day, a few great pints of cider, and Indian Dosas at Borough Market. Plus a full week of tea only, no coffee. I could have stayed another week, there is so much to do and see and as busy as the city was, it always felt friendly and safe.

I did pick up several children’s books at Daunt Books. What an amazing store!

Back home in New Hampshire, I found a teeny tiny easter newt in red eft stage in the middle of my street. I helped him to safety and thought of Kari Percival’s book SAFE CROSSINGS. So that’s where this month’s drawing sheet came from. I think I’m going to shift my drawing sheets to more common animals for a bit.

This was a great video showing the red eft and adult stage of the eastern newt in action.

I also managed a few school visits and started an illustration class called Character Bootcamp with “Make Art That Sells”. Now that I’ve adjusted to the idea of ‘homework’ again, I’ve been enjoying the assignments - especially the toy ones!

A reminder that pre-orders, library requests, and early book reviews go a long way in helping a book to succeed. You can read the advanced copy of KING here, and if you could help in any of the above ways, that would be amazing! Thank you!!!

READING: Hitchcock Hotel by Stephanie Wrobel. I didn’t mean to pick up a book set in New Hampshire when I was in London and reminiscing about my old obsession with Hitchcock films.

LISTENING TO: The audiobook of The Key to Deceit by Ashley Weaver. My daughter bought me the first in this WW2 London mystery series which I finished during vacation.

WATCHING: We’ve dropped our morning cable news habit and somehow found ourselves watching early seasons of The Real Housewives. NYC, Atlanta, NJ. The early 2000s were simpler times, less polished, and with more yelling and bigger hair. But somehow it’s a comfort watch!