I’m not the kind of person to skip ahead and peek at the end of a novel I’m reading. But when it comes to writing and illustrating children’s books, I’m just as likely to start with page one as I am page 32.
Recently, I caught up with an old friend who also majored in graphic design at her respective mid-western alma mater. Soon to embark on her own project illustrating a picture book, she asked about my process. I may still be at the beginning of my journey as a children’s book illustrator, let alone an author, but the more I work, the more I hone my own creative process and learn what it is that makes me tick (or rather, paint!).
When I first began, I assumed that narrative art would naturally, follow a linear process. Write, revise, and polish the manuscript. Then illustrate each page from 1 to 32. In that order.
I don’t know any author/illustrator who works that way. Myself included.
“I’ll dream in watercolor shades of pink and purple and everything in between before I’ve got the cadence of the first sentence right.”
What I told my friend was to do what fills her. Whatever fuels her passion for art-making, whatever brings her back to the drawing board. Whether that’s page one or page 32.
For me, the beginning of a new story starts with pictures, not words. I’ll doodle character sketches for weeks before my story has a fully fleshed-out plot. I’ll dream in watercolor shades of pink and purple and everything in between before I’ve got the cadence of the first sentence right.
When a rough draft is finally written, I gravitate towards those illustrations that are already living inside my head, that wait only for me to pick up my pencil to come alive on paper. And sometimes, as is the case with my current story project, it’s the very last page of the book.
These days, when so much is uncertain, when our country is missing the playbook on how to live in this strange new world, I find comfort in knowing how my story is going to end. That’s the beauty of narrative art. It’s has beginning, a middle, and an end. It’s ‘once upon a time’ and ‘happily ever after.’
There is time to color the in-between. Indeed, more time than any of us would ever wish.
But let us not forget that this story too has an end.
