Can't win em all!

At my agent's suggestion I got to throw my illustrator hat in the ring on a fun story that will go to press next year.  (in other words I got to submit some rough sketches). The editor passed saying they didn't think my style was a fit with the story.  That's a bummer because I think it would have been a lot of fun! This is another example of how a lot of good can come from a rejection.  For one thing I figured out how I like to illustrate skeletons in a fun way.  This is tricky, because as my niece pointed out, when one illustrates a small skeleton you run the risk of people thinking of a kid skeleton.  Kid skeletons are a bummer if you think about it.  Also if you get too anatomically correct with a skeleton it gets creepy.  Now, a bit of creepy is great because it is a skeleton after all, but too much defeats the purpose of it being for a kids book.  So it was a good problem solving lesson among other things. I'm thankful for the opportunity and I got a lot out of it.

Here are a few examples of the sketches I submitted.  I left out some of my favorites because I don't want to reveal the plot before the book is out.