I have spent the last few months concentrating on illustrating but now, although I continue to work on several illustration projects, it's time to turn my mind to my writing which has been a little neglected of late.
        With Jack and The Mysterious Bicycle Shop still looking for a home I have my next Mid Grade novel to finish. I also have a handful of ghost stories for children which I am very excited about.
        Don't worry, I will continue to post regular illustrations - I don't want you to miss out :0)

    At last, after many months of it being in the planning stage, here is the cover of the book I am currently  illustrating. Written by one of the foremost occult practitioners it is to be published by Megalithica and it will be out, hopefully, in June 2019.  I am still working on the inside illustrations. 
     It has been a steep learning curve but I am really happy with the results. A great big thank you to Storm Constantine and Danni Lainton at Megalithica and to the author Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki.

   ...and things have gone very well. Trials and tribulations with CMYK colour palettes and I had to get used to a different graphics software that allows you to limit your colour choices from RGB to CMYK but I finished the rough outs for a 32 page full colour illustrated poem and produced the draft of a book cover. Busy, busy, busy :0)

old stream
through the green
the shape of a heron

I woke up yesterday morning with the idea of fish wearing antique spectacles swimming around in my brain. I have no idea why or how that came into my head - but here you go :0. 

Self imposed deadlines have a habit of tripping you up - even if it's down to someone else in the chain realising they have slipped up and you end up having to do the extra work :0(
You just have to try your best.
But it is still frustrating to get the feeling you are not sticking to your word.
it's all part of this crazy self-employed illustration world :0/

     I spent 10 hours at the drawing board yesterday finalising 17 chapter heading images for my first illustration project and I still don't think I worked hard enough. Whatever you do you have to be able to do it consistently day in day out, week after week to get to where you want to be.
     You have to be able to shrug off the excuses for not wanting to turn up and... turn up. Working for yourself is not easy. It is far easier to get up and go to work for someone else but right now I get to do what I want, when I want, how I want. But, that means I have to do it - with no one to incentivise me, but me. Even though I enjoy immensely what it is I now do, it is hard to make myself sit down and get at it. Self discipline is a tough gig :0( and now... I must get on with what I am supposed to be doing :0) which is colouring in for a living.

    Winnie the Pooh had it right. Eating honey is wonderful but, there is that moment, just before you start to eat it, that is even better!
     It is the same with illustration. There is a moment in the action just before the crucial moment that is the prime illustrative moment. The actual main event - the shock, the reveal, the bang, crash, boom or wallop rightly belongs to the prose. As an illustrator you can't step on the toes of the author but that means we get to do the set up, set the scene, build the tension, for the author to do their thing. 
     Prose and illustration hand in hand, producing something better than either of them separately and greater than just the sum of the parts.