A NEW LOOK FOR A NEW BOOK

Recently, a bookseller remarked on how different my picture books looked from each other. I suppose Plaister Press has given me the freedom to do one-off books rather than be brand or series led. By having all my in-print books now standing together on the Plaister Press bookshelf and not scattered among different publishers’ lists as they were in the past, there’s less of a need to make them all look alike just in order to be recognizable.  

   So I have been enjoying a different technique for each new book – glazing in Selkie - a lot of waiting around with this process as each glaze has to dry naturally:

wet watercolour washes with colour dropped in and pigment tide-lines in The Little White Sprite and Zoe’s Boat -  always a bit chancy: 

waxing in We’re Going to Build a Dam - a sticky business:

and ink splattering in Flood – messy - I have to be outside to do this.

Now, with my latest picture book, I’m scratching. This needs a tough paper as I’m scratching with a dry pen nib while the paint is still wet. Arches 90lbs rough can take this.     

   Just as an author strives to find a new voice to fit the narrative of each new story, I like to do a similar thing with images. I search for a ‘look’ that matches the underlying feeling of a picture book story and that invariably means finding a new technique to best express it. 

    It’s not easy making each book look so very different from the last and as I embark on a new book there’s always a temptation to repeat the tricks of technique mastered in the previous one. I sometimes wonder whether, were a particular title to take off, the business side of me would put pressure on the creative side to follow it with a brand of very similar looking books. But that has not happened yet. 

EMAIL FROM JOYCE DUNBAR

Hi Gillian,

Thanks so much for the copy of FLOOD. It's a lovely book and to me it's a marvel that you have written, illustrated and published this book on your own. A brave undertaking! You need a very special combination of skills. At first you must have been a lone ranger - but as recent articles show, more and more authors are taking charge in this way - including many who are previously published.

The rest of us are threatened on two sides - on the one hand the new breed of self published authors - often very media savvy - why else would they do it? - and good at self promotion. On the other side, publishers forming larger and larger conglomerates with a tight agenda - and with precious few exceptions, smaller publishers afraid to take risks. Which leaves traditionally published authors somewhat stranded.

It's a beautiful book, with your characteristic variety of texture and delicacy of tone - telling a story with a strong theme of survival against the odds - in such a quirky way that I couldn't help wondering where it came from. The happiness
of the ending is muted and left me with a vague feeling of melancholy.

Then, it struck me.  It reads very well as an allegory of your (our) struggles as a writer. You are Fussy Hen, Slodger the children's book industry - now getting old and lumberingly large; fox at first is the wolf at the door, morphing into the guy who helped you set up Plaister Press; the flood is what threatens us all. 'Fussy hen
found to her surprise that she could steer' - is your discovery that you can take control of your career with a bit of financial backing; the island is where you are now - a lone publisher with the big old one beside you -   not altogether secure but
not drowned either. The ending is safety on a tiny lonely island, so both happy and sad.

I didn't try to figure this out - it just dawned. Maybe it is as much my projection as your unconscious. But anyway - it is a very intriguing example of the way images indirectly and metaphorically can tell a story about change.  I think we are both
so lucky to have started our careers in the 70s and 80's. A golden time.

I can only say this because I've known you so long as a friend - and I hope you won't think I've taken liberties. I hope it sails forth into the world with as much courage as you have shown in producing it and in taking charge. Bravo! To you and Fussy Hen!

Love

Joyce

Thank you, Joyce, for your insights. My last three picture books have had a water theme but not the one I’m working on now. This new book is about a mouse with not a drop of water in sight.  I wonder what that can mean.

FORGET NOAH'S ARK!

Forget Noah’s Ark! When the floods arrive, there are three creatures who have their own ideas about keeping their heads above water.

Flood, a captivating picture story underlining the importance of co-operation in times of trouble, is the work of author and illustrator Gillian McClure who has set up Plaister Press to bring back into print some of her most popular books and to publish exciting new titles.

McClure’s distinctive illustrative style, which involves the use of watercolour, waxing and sprayed ink to obtain a ‘splattery’ look, is ideal for this warm-hearted cautionary tale about pulling together when a soaking wet disaster strikes.

It just won’t stop raining and out in the fields, Old Slodger the Ox keeps his head down and his eyes to the ground. Close by is Fussy Hen who is too busy squawking and looking this way and that for the cunning Hungry Fox. And sure enough the Hungry Fox has his beady eyes on Fussy Hen. What none of them has spotted is that the waters are rising rapidly and when the three animals finally realise that they must work together as a team if they are to reach land safely, there is a danger they might have left it too late…

A funny, characterful and beautifully illustrated way to show that getting on swimmingly solves a lot of problems!

(Plaister Press, paperback, £6.99)

I'm very grateful to Pam Norfolk, books editor for the Lancashire Evening Post newspaper group for this review.

A SUMMER ACTIVITY - WE'RE GOING TO BUILD A DAM

We’re Going To Build a Dam is the latest Plaister Press picture book - a good summer holiday read when, hopefully, children are messing around on beaches.
We had a lot of fun with the typographic design of this book, bringing about an interplay of text, image and typeface that feeds into the overall narrative. There are places where the lettering is used graphically as here where it follows the movement of the stream.

 

 The illustrations are painted in watercolour with a strong ink line that is matched by the typeface, Compendio, with its rough, broken line. The font is not wholly black but a dark grey. A gradation of tones is used to enhance the text; here the paler tone of the word ‘sand’ suggesting a substance of a different texture to boulders and rocks.

Here the function of the lettering is to imply sound: CRACK.

 

And at the end, the lettering becomes very much part of the narrative action in the way it is angled and placed,

as here where the dam is breaking up. Good luck with your dam building!

 

INSPIRATION BEHIND THE NEXT PICTURE BOOK

Baby Liv, born on 17 March 2013 is the inspiration behind the next Plaister Press picture book.

Her mind is still a blank page but gradually it will be filled with images and words and among them the new story that I shall dedicate to her.

LED CREATIVELY BY THE BOOK

In his article 'Led Creatively by the Book' in the Carousel Guide, Chris Stephenson writes: 'The body and soul of a picture book - illustrations, text, type design - should all evolve together.’

This is exactly what I wanted to do when I started working with typographic designer Lisa Kirkham,

and The Little White Sprite, with the tree dominating the page lent itself to the close interlacing of twigs, typeface and story.

    Starting with a rough like the one above, where the text was all in a block, we would work together positioning it into a more organic shape –

We were coming from different directions and that was exciting. Whereas I was used to thinking broadly about the picture book’s overall rhythms – the punctuation of page turns to create pause and suspense in a story, Lisa’s decisions were informed by the reading movement of the eye.  The placement of text and type design was like a form of visual intonation with spaces for breaths.  

    For example, words in a sentence singled out and moved to another line, like ‘a hole’, catch the eye and are given emphasis. We had to decide whether the emphasis was appropriate for that bit of the story.  

Whereas I might find a particular pattern of text, like that on the right hand page above, pleasing to the eye, I was having to learn to use my ears as well as my eyes when it came to very precise placing of text. There was something too staccato about the line separation of the words ‘tugging’ and ‘at me’ and, in the end, we put them on the same line to lessen the effect.  

This is all very subtle and probably passes unnoticed by the reader, but if it contributes unconsciously to a harmony in the book between eye and ear, then it’s worth doing.

Lisa and I are giving a workshop, Creative Use of Typography in the Children’s Book on 21 May 2011 as part of the SCBWI Illustrator Master Class series -

SCBWI Illustrator Series

And finally, Chris in his article mentions all the people who have helped Plaister Press come about. I’d like to add his name to that list with a big 'thank you' for his unwavering belief in the success of our venture. 

PLAISTER PRESS



 Plaister Press is now launched and the website Plaister Press has finally gone public after delays caused by the poor web builder being caught up in the Christ Church earthquake. Thankfully he wasn't hurt.
There was a piece in the Bookseller Bookseller Article last week that gave rise to some interesting discussions. One agent thought there would be many authors in the future wanting to bring their out-of-print books back into print and stressed how important it was to get publishers to revert the rights to make this possible. I'd like to think we would be known as 'author publishers'.

THE SNOW, THE SNOW!

A little bit of snow can turn the world upside down.  As airports close and trains leave passengers stranded, global companies find they are running their businesses in unlikely places. This week  Plaister Press (a company in its infancy) has had to share its very modest premises in Cambridge with a Canadian Shipping Company,a Swedish Mining Company and a London Advertising Company. All were impressed by the excellent wireless connection on offer. Plaister Press, in return, received some good tips on accountancy, marketing and invoicing systems in the hope that ,one day, it too will be global!

PLAISTER PRESS

I set out thirty six years ago as an author/illustrator but during the past decade I've been more writer than illustrator; holding a Royal Literary Fund Writing Fellowship for three years and producing a dozen or so unpublished picture book texts. Now I want to return to being author/illustrator again, revisit those texts - all at dummy book stage - and complete the artwork.

    I'm aware I've not chosen a very good time to do this when publishers are taking fewer and fewer picture books like mine.

 However, when a benefactor gave me £5,000 to proceed on a book, I saw my chance.  I created the Plaister Press (named after my benefactor) and republished Selkie in order to fund the first of my unpublished picture books. Now I have the happy prospect of years of illustrating ahead of me, working at my own pace, without hiatus and delay which I find so destructive to the process of creating a book and enjoying not just the interrelation of image and text, but typography too, as I work closely with freelance typographer and designer, Lisa Kirkham.

SHAPE CHANGER - SELKIE

When Random House wouldn't re-print Selkie, I was frustrated. Selkie had sold steadily for over a decade and would continue to do so, if kept in print. So I decided to re-issue it myself. I got back the rights - something that's becoming increasingly difficult to do - found a typographer who had a particular interest in picture books and a good local printer who would print 1,000 copies at a reasonable price.

    I now have a small warehouse under my spare room bed.

It's great being able to take Selkie into schools again; one of my most popular workshops is about magical creatures that change shape and is based on this book. 

    Now I feel I've become a shape changer myself - author/illustrator turned publisher. I'm in control again but, like the Selkie, I must make sure I don't lose my old skin if I want to change back and complete the next book.