Happy January,

The book that I’m working on now, MOSSY, is almost finished.  I have a few more double-page spreads to go.  I’m glad I have a deadline, as I’m forced to make decisions about my artwork and to dedicate all my time to finishing my book.  It is always a little sad to finish a book, and be done with all the characters, settings and “extras” that I’ve been painting all year.  I still feel that an Eastern Box turtle shell is a thing of beauty, and I’ve enjoyed painting it.  I’m intrigued with the miniature beauty of moss forests and they too have been a challenge to paint.  In MOSSY, because it is set mostly in an old-fashioned natural history museum, I decided to put various collections; butterflies, beetles, shells, and mushrooms, in the borders.  All my life, I have collected books on these kinds of collections, and especially the art work that showed them in the old days.  I had the most fun painting the butterflies and moths, but I had a much harder time painting minerals and gems.  One of the fun aspects of setting my book in 1913 almost 100 years ago, was dressing the characters in Edwardian fashions.  When I was growing up my mother kept boxes of old-fashioned clothes that we were allowed to go through and play with on special occasions.  I remember a top hat made of beaver that was silky and shiny, as well as ball gowns and beaded lace and fringed shawls.  My grandmother Brett had a lady’s dress shop and she dressed in a formal way that wasn’t that far from the Edwardian fashions the people in my book wear.
As always, during the more focused efforts at the end of my book the characters become more fixed in my mind.  This makes them very hard to leave behind.
This month, I’ll be showing my chickens at the Northeastern Poultry Congress, January 13 and 14th.  I’ll be taking lots of photos of poultry for next year’s book ? a “poultry” Cinderella.  The book doesn’t have a name yet, but it will be set in St. Petersburg.  It will have a large cast of poultry, dressed in opulent Russian finery from the days of Catherine the Great.  I will set my story in winter, but we will go to St. Petersburg in June to get ideas.   I will use my imagination to add snow!
If you live in New England and would like to see 2,500 exhibition poultry, make a stop at the Eastern States Exposition in West Springfield.  It is free, and lots of fun.  If you are looking for laying hens or examples of exotic breeds, there are birds for sale.
In my work, I have more than one story I’m working on.  There is a retelling of THE TURNIP, a rural folktale that I will also set in Russia.  We have a trip to the Russian countryside scheduled in June to get ideas and an overnight stay in a Russian Dacha ? or country house that I hope will be fruitful.  We will also stop in Sweden and look at the beautiful farms there, as well as a stop at artist Carl Larsson’s  house.
Artistically, I’ve gotten a little more layered in my painting.  I like painting one translucent watercolor layer over another with a goal in mind of reflectivity and depth.  The borders have given me a chance to play with different groups of colors too.  I like how the natural beiges and browns of shells, feathers, and mushrooms for example, contrast with splashes of red, purple and yellow in the more showy specimens in the collection.  Usually I travel to get ideas for the settings of my books, but in MOSSY I used my backyard and the Agassiz and Peabody Museums at Harvard in nearby Cambridge Massachusetts.  The building that is the museum in my book is my old nursery school, Wilder Memorial in the neighboring town of Hingham.  The most important part of my story, the turtle MOSSY, hasn’t appeared in our yard though.  The turtle pond we built is for aquatic turtles, not terrestrial (ground living) turtles like the Eastern Box turtle like Mossy.  Lots of frogs have moved in and I’m hoping for possible painted turtle sightings next spring.  Two of my friends have pet Box Turtles and the Boyce family sent me some lovely photos of their turtle, Amelia.
Happy writing drawing and exploring nature,

Your friend,

Jan Brett

Crossroads of America Poultry Show

Happy December,

My husband Joe and I are just back from the crossroads of America poultry show, where I exhibited twenty two of my white crested black Polish bantams.  There were over 10,000 poultry exhibited, from 30 states.  I’ve been raising chickens for 12 years.  I began with feed store chicks that I wanted to grow up tame enough for me to use as models for a children’s book I was illustrating called HEDGIE’S SURPRISE.  I modified the looks of my silverlaced Wyandotte hens when painting them to create a character for my story. They became tame enough to stand on my art table.  Painting them was far more difficult than I imagined!  After I went to my first poultry shows, I acquired Silkies and soon afterwards a trio of white crested black Polish bantams.   One of the Polish cockrels has a role in GINGERBREAD FRIENDS and later a buff Cochin pullet became the model for the team pulling the Easter bunny’s coach in THE EASTER EGG.

I’m just finishing up on my turtle book for the fall of 2012, and I’m planning a poultry Cinderella book for 2013.  I jump-started my imagination with a trip to the crossroads show.  Here are my reflections:

I’ve never been to a poultry show where on cooping in, someone hasn’t asked if they could help me. Mix that spirit in with the thousands of hours setting up breeding pens, hatching baby chicks, selecting and growing youngsters, and washing and preparing that every exhibitor logs, and then add the sheer beauty and majesty of hundreds of breed varieties of poultry at the top of their form and vigor and you have a start to what a poultry show is about. And, an electric current runs beneath it all, making a spectacular display into a stomach churning mega event.The birds are judged. Each and every chicken, duck, goose and turkey will be graded, it’s wings spread, it’s confirmation assessed, it’s breeds characteristics weighed and it’s vigor acknowledged. A poultry show is part celebration, part drama, part exhilaration and part whoop it up fun.

The Crossroads show, being a joint ABA and APA national virtually guarantees that the best breeders in the country will bring their best birds (with the exception of the judges’ birds which they cannot show if they are judging) . It insures that as you walk through the aisles of the show halls, you are seeing the top of the quality pyramid, the best examples of each breed and variety. You will see breeds and varieties that are so rare that you stop and wonder, “What is that?”  It makes a show of this magnitude, genetically speaking, an historic occasion.

At every show I have a ritual that never fails to please me as I think back on the show after it’s over. I clear my mind and walk through the aisles  with no agenda, just looking at every bird with focus. It’s strange how one bird will loom large. At that moment, he or she just shines. Once it was a effervescent white leghorn cockerel, another time an elegant grey Japanese cockerel, another time a standard white Cochin pullet so commanding that it drew me in like I was a fish in a line. At the last Crossroads in 2007 the special bird was a lemon blue old English cockerel. He had an unearthly beauty – each feather sculpted, the combination of breast, saddle, hackles and sickles explosively gorgeous. This year it was one of my competitors birds in the white crested Polish bantam class, a cockerel that was so eye capturing and fine that his elegant image still comes back to me when I ‘m running or trying to fall asleep. What is this spark or charisma that radiates from certain birds?  It goes beyond the instinctive behavior that birds show in courtship displays. There is a communication between bird and human that jumps the normal paths, and why it makes a big show like the crossroads seem like a treasure hunt.

I had an experience at a show when a flighty duck of mine got loose and flew crazily into the windows, thankfully missing the huge wide open door to the show hall. It flew to ground and zigged between rows in a panic. I had just about given up on ever bringing that guy home when one of our judges appeared, magically picking it up . He brought it to me as if it were “business as usual”. There was something transmitted in the judge’s hands that made me curious. How could he have first commanded my duck to give up , and then calmed him? I don’t think this ability of a great poultryman can be described, but I think it can be emulated, just like if you see a graceful runner, you feel by just observing, a little can rub off on you. I like to take a little time at a big show like this to watch and try to put into my muscle memory the way great judges and breeders handle the birds. There does seem to be moments where it seems like you can emotionally communicate with poultry by touch.

A visit to The Crossroads isn’t complete for me without a visit to the turkeys.  Maybe it’s because I can’t have turkeys myself, but I love to hear them call, and especially admire their fanned tails as they “bestow their magnificence”. Wild turkeys are very prevalent in new England where we live, and it never gets old surprising a hen with poults or a flock of jakes in the woods. To see all the stunning domestic varieties close up is a marvel, especially considering the selective breeding it took to create them.

Tearing oneself away from ones own birds and their emanate success or failure is difficult, but I usually know one or two juniors who have bought birds from me, and being a spectator at the junior show is fascinating. I see their progress as well as the “future of the fancy”. I remember being a kid and yearning for the chance to own a creature that I could nurture and believe in. It’s poignant to see the junior exhibitors realizing how steep the learning curve is. I feel even more poignant when I know I’m still trying to crack the code myself! I remember the production red chickens my sister and I bought for 35 cents from the local dairy farm, and how we trained them to ride on the handlebars of our bikes. We thought they were the most beautiful chickens in the world. There is always a little heartbreak on that road to show super grand champion.

As I walk away from a big show like the crossroads, I carry with me two strong emotions. The first is pride for my birds. They weren’t elevated to championship row this time, but they looked healthy and beautiful.  The second is gratitude for the traditions in the fancy, for respecting the master breeders and exhibitors who breed the stock we show sometimes for generations, and the judges that try so hard to amass their knowledge and hone their eye to evaluate our poultry so we can raise the bar another year.

Bye for now, your friend,

Jan Brett

Happy November,

This is Jan Brett.  I’d like to tell you about my creative life in hopes that you will be inspired to write and illustrate stories of your own.
My books correspond to the calendar year, although I am always puzzling together future book ideas, and in the fall, my publisher sends me on a book tour.  My husband and I travel across the country on a huge bus, the largest that is allowed on US highways — why so big?  We bring Hedgie along with us, our rather large hedgehog character.  He helps me welcome kids and their parents and teachers to my book signings.  The bus also has room for my 2011 collectible buttons picturing Rollo troll and his moose friend.  I give them out to everyone who comes to my signings, I also give away posters and my news notes — full-color letters I write to children about my latest book, HOME FOR CHRISTMAS.  I also bring aboard my easel, paper and markers so I can give a drawing lesson before my signing.  It is open to everyone, and it’s not just for young artists, but young writers too.  I like to explain to children how I got the idea for my book and all the fascinating places I went to in order to make the setting of my book authentic.  In this case the country I went to was Sweden.  Not only did I visit a place where Norse legends feature trolls, but where moose, reindeer, bear, otter, and lynx abound.  Especially moose, who feature in my book, along with Rollo the troll.  There is even room for a giant antler my friend Elof found in Kiruna, Sweden near the Arctic Circle.  Our bus will travel to  25 towns and cities, and I’m looking forward to speaking to all the children and their parents, teachers, and librarians who will be at my signings.  I’m also looking forward to having lunch with the Lunch on the Bus contest winner and her three friends.
While I’m on the book trail, I will miss my chickens and ducks back home.  I am hard at work on my book about a turtle who grows a garden on her back, but I’m also gathering photographs of chicken breeds to give me ideas for my chicken Cinderella book.  We have a trip scheduled to St. Petersburg Russia where I am planning to set my book, although I’ll be plumbing my imagination for the right “half for real” and “half for fantasy” world I want to create my poultry fairy tale.
MOSSY still has a lot of pages in it to complete, but I’m starting to feel like she is a real character.  When I look in the water of our turtle pond I used for the book’s setting, I really appreciate the intricacies of the changing flora and fauna around our pond as the seasons change.  Mossy is an Eastern box turtle, a terrestrial species that occasionally takes a swim in the pond.  I’ve seen bullfrogs and green frogs in the pond and lots of tadpoles.  There have been lots of dragonflies and butterflies too.  A friend of mine released a spotted turtle in the pond but I haven’t seen it.  It was crossing a street and he helped it into the woods away from traffic.  Turtles are dwindling in Southeastern Massachusetts where I live and some species are endangered or threatened.  Unless a turtle is going to be run over, it’s best to leave it alone because their travels take them from one habitat to another, and we humans shouldn’t disrupt their travels.  I’m concentrating on making a good environment for turtles, and I hope they will visit my pond.  Our pond is pretty deep, it extends below the frost line, has built-in caves and basking rocks.  Last spring we added a large area of loose, loamy sand that we hope is good for nesting, and my friend Scott planted wild strawberries all around.  We have miles of perfect turtle habitat behind our house, unfortunately it’s also the home of the deer tick that carries Lyme disease a pest that is very active during early spring when it is interesting to look for wildlife in the vernal ponds.
Illustrating children’s books is always an adventure that leads you into unexplored paths.  I hope you will give it a try, you may not be exploring turtle ponds or poultry yards but you probably will be exploring something equally fascinating.  Good luck with your creative project!
Your friend,
Jan Brett

Mossy Dummy Pages 17 – 18

Happy October,

This is Jan Brett, and I’d like to say a few words about what’s going on in my life as a children’s author and illustrator.
I have about a month to work on my new book, MOSSY before going out on the book tour, and I’m looking forward to a stretch of time where I can devote a lot of time to it. When I’m working on the finishes, I’ll continue doing a little research on the side, but it’s mostly putting slot of hours in painting. I created a fairly elaborate book dummy this time. If you could see it, it’s loose cartoon like drawings done with rapidiograph ( a kind of mechanical ink pen) and watercolors on typing paper. It’s a about 1/2 the size the final pages will be, but in the same proportions as the published book. Tomorrow I’ll bring the first 17 pages to NY city to show to my editor, the art director and designer. It’s always disconcerting because there are already things I plan to improve, but I’m possessive about my work. This is probably because the best work comes from way back in my sub-conscience, and when a lot of people add their opinions it’s hard to hear my own voice. This is not to say that sometimes others are right. The publisher works far ahead of the publishing date, and they present a brief visual version to book buyers early on. That means I do a few pages in the beginning of the story, some in the middle and several at the end. It’s not the ideal way to work, but if I had completed more of the book earlier it would be different.I love wild flowers , and since Mossy takes place in the spring I’ve been sticking to the wild flowers the bloom at that time. But one of the last pages pictures Mossy, her mate Scute, and their little babies and I realized I could time it anytime that turtles are not in hibernation. I’ve been gathering the flowers that grow in early October including one of my favorites new England purple aster, and goldenrod. I was surprised to see their are over 25 varieties of goldenrod.  I may be asked to work on the jacket next, but after that I’ll be working on the pages showing people in their 1913 time period clothes, which should be fun, since I m interested in costume.

                       

Norwell Turtle Pond

Once a child asked me what the hardest part of my job is. One of the hardest parts is not having more time to work on my books ideas!  I have three book ideas in the back of my mind work to work on when I’m driving in the car, running, or when I’m getting ready to fall asleep.  They are almost like the big jigsaw puzzle people set up on the table, to be worked on in spurts.  You might find that keeping a mental notebook about a creative project a good way to make use of all your creative energy, with pieces ready when you sit down with a couple of hours of solitude.
Good luck and happy reading,

Jan Brett

Happy September,

This is Jan Brett, and this is my September hedge a gram- the time I take each month to describe what I’m doing in my art world.
It takes a year to create one of my picture books, and I begin in about February, so by September I have finalized the story part of my book. Many kids ask, ” which comes first, the story or the pictures ?” For me the story comes first, but it is always a story that can be illustrated with images that I would like to draw and paint. For example, I like to draw furry creatures, but mechanical objects or things that require a lot of perspective are hard for me. Like for example, a car with a personality. I feel a kind of excitement that is hard to explain about certain things. I love moss, snow, birch trees, lichen, the color gray-green, coral, reindeer, hedgehogs, feathered creatures, pussy willows, sea urchins, red mushrooms and orchids to name a few things. That interest bubbles up in my drawings. I am fascinated by reptiles, but when I draw them I find it hard to capture their essence in the same way as when I draw a hedgehog, a mammal.  In the book I’m working on, the main characters are reptiles, turtles, and the star of the story is Mossy, a turtle who grows a garden on her back.  It wasn’t until I completed my book dummy that I realized I needed all the moss, ferns, and flowers to make her into a being I could then make into a main character.  I spend a year working on the pictures, and that spark of interest and obsession I feel at the beginning has to last.  Someone once asked me if after working on a book for a year, if I was ready to move away from the character and setting, was I tired of it?  No, No, No!  I stall until the very last minute before parting with the finished artwork.  I never feel like it’s ready, and I feel like I’m leaving my best friend when it’s all packed up and sent to the publisher.
Today would be a typical day in my life as an author illustrator.  At breakfast, Joe and I plan a photo session for an ad and discuss an upcoming trip to Russia, for a 2012 book THE TURNIP.  We are also going on a trip to India and we will go bird watching but I will also be trying to find some stories and fables that work for an idea for a book I have that I’m calling Dancing Slippers.  I have definitely fallen into the trap of being infatuated with the character – a tiger and a setting, India,without a fully formed plot.  When I was little my mom read lots of stories set in faraway places that I loved  –  the JUST SO STORIES by Rudyard Kipling set in Africa, THE STORY OF PING by Marjorie Flack set in Asia and THE TAIL OF MRS. TIGGY WIGGLE by Beatrix Potter, set in England.  Also, I devoured all the Hans Christian Andersen and Brothers Grimm stories as well as my favorite ALICE IN WONDERLAND by Lewis Carroll.  They took me to strange and exotic places too.
Back to my day, after breakfast I worked on a double page spread for THE STORY OF MOSSY.  Now that I have two spreads done, I will send them to my editor.  She will troubleshoot and make suggestions about the look of my future book.
I stop working to get ready for a photo.  In the photo, I am reading HEDGIE’S SURPRISE to one of my chickens.  It is for an appearance in Indianapolis at the national poultry show this October 29th.  My husband Joe and I reviewed the photos, and worked on the copy, finishing in time to go to one of his concerts at Tanglewood.  He plays the double bass like Berlioz the Bear in my 1991 book by that name.
During the concert, I let myself be taken away by the music – it often leads my thoughts to unexpected places.  I’m going to be juggling some thoughts about my tiger/India book and also a possible Cinderella peopled by poultry that was my editor’s idea.  Sadly, at the concert I can’t get out a pen and paper because it would look extremely rude and distract the concertgoers.  They will be in their own listening worlds!
Tonight I will sign 10 books for a contest winner and record the Hedge a gram.  Finally I settle down to planning another spread for my book, and if I have time, plant a terrarium I just bought.  There are a lot of mosses and ferns in the Berkshires in Massachusetts our summer home.  I want to keep the moss fresh and happy all fall while I paint them for my book, moss models!  I also will write a note to a man I just met that has a beautiful avairy with hundreds of exotic birds.  One of the pages I plan for Mossy is set in a natural history museum and I’m painting different collections in the borders.  I’m hoping I can borrow some of his feathers.  He also has tame Eastern box turtles and I would love to photograph them.  Good models seem to be popping up everywhere, and a wood frog hopped across my path yesterday.  I have been taking my iPhone everywhere, especially trail running on the Appalachian trail.  I have one eye on the path and one eye on the moss, ferns and little waterfalls along my route.  My day ends with the promise of a dream that may unfold into another book or open a door that fires the imagination.
Good luck with your days ahead, and save some time to create a lasting story or picture!

Happy reading, Jan

HOME FOR CHRISTMAS Kiruna Sweden research

Happy August,

This is Jan Brett, and this is my August hedge a gram- the time I take each month to describe what I’m doing in my art world.
It takes a year to create one of my picture books, and I begin in about February, so by August I have finalized the story part of my book. Many kids ask, ” which comes first, the story or the pictures ?” For me the story comes first, but it is always a story that can be illustrated with images that I would like to draw and paint. For example, I like to draw furry creatures, but mechanical objects or things that require a lot of perspective are hard for me. Like for example, a car with a personality. I feel a kind of excitement that is hard to explain about certain things. I love moss, snow, birch trees, lichen, the color gray-green, coral, reindeer, hedgehogs, feathered creatures, pussy willows, sea urchins, red mushrooms and orchids to name a few things. That interest bubbles up in my drawings. I am fascinated by reptiles, but when I draw them I find it hard to capture their essence in the same way as when I draw a hedgehog, a mammal.  In the book I’m working on, the main characters are reptiles, turtles, and the star of the story is Mossy, a turtle who grows a garden on her back.  It wasn’t until I completed my book dummy that I realized I needed all the moss, ferns, and flowers to make her into a being I could then make into a main character.  I spend a year working on the pictures, and that spark of interest and obsession I feel at the beginning has to last.  Someone once asked me if after working on a book for a year, if I was ready to move away from the character and setting, was I tired of it?  No, No, No!  I stall until the very last minute before parting with the finished artwork.  I never feel like it’s ready, and I feel like I’m leaving my best friend when it’s all packed up and sent to the publisher.
Today would be a typical day in my life as an author illustrator.  At breakfast, Joe and I plan a photo session for an ad and discuss an upcoming trip to Russia, for a 2012 book THE TURNIP.  We are also going on a trip to India and we will go bird watching but I will also be trying to find some stories and fables that work for an idea for a book I have that I’m calling Dancing Slippers.  I have definitely fallen into the trap of being infatuated with the character – a tiger and a setting, India,without a fully formed plot.  When I was little my mom read lots of stories set in faraway places that I loved  –  the JUST SO STORIES by Rudyard Kipling set in Africa, THE STORY OF PING by Marjorie Flack set in Asia and THE TAIL OF MRS. TIGGY WIGGLE by Beatrix Potter, set in England.  Also, I devoured all the Hans Christian Andersen and Brothers Grimm stories as well as my favorite ALICE IN WONDERLAND by Lewis Carroll.  They took me to strange and exotic places too.
Back to my day, after breakfast I worked on a double page spread for THE STORY OF MOSSY.  Now that I have two spreads done, I will send them to my editor.  She will troubleshoot and make suggestions about the look of my future book.
I stop working to get ready for a photo.  In the photo, I am reading HEDGIE’S SURPRISE to one of my chickens.  It is for an appearance in Indianapolis at the national poultry show this October 29th.  My husband Joe and I reviewed the photos, and worked on the copy, finishing in time to go to one of his concerts at Tanglewood.  He plays the double bass like Berlioz the Bear in my 1991 book by that name.
During the concert, I let myself be taken away by the music – it often leads my thoughts to unexpected places.  I’m going to be juggling some thoughts about my tiger/India book and also a possible Cinderella peopled by poultry that was my editor’s idea.  Sadly, at the concert I can’t get out a pen and paper because it would look extremely rude and distract the concertgoers.  They will be in their own listening worlds!
Tonight I will sign 10 books for a contest winner and record the Hedge a gram.  Finally I settle down to planning another spread for my book, and if I have time, plant a terrarium I just bought.  There are a lot of mosses and ferns in the Berkshires in Massachusetts our summer home.  I want to keep the moss fresh and happy all fall while I paint them for my book, moss models!  I also will write a note to a man I just met that has a beautiful avairy with hundreds of exotic birds.  One of the pages I plan for Mossy is set in a natural history museum and I’m painting different collections in the borders.  I’m hoping I can borrow some of his feathers.  He also has tame Eastern box turtles and I would love to photograph them.  Good models seem to be popping up everywhere, and a wood frog hopped across my path yesterday.  I have been taking my iPhone everywhere, especially trail running on the Appalachian trail.  I have one eye on the path and one eye on the moss, ferns and little waterfalls along my route.  My day ends with the promise of a dream that may unfold into another book or open a door that fires the imagination.
Good luck with your days ahead, and save some time to create a lasting story or picture!

Happy reading, Jan

MOSSY finished artwork pages 12-13

This is Jan Brett, and this is my July Hedge a Gram, my newsy letter to kids and interested people that I put together so you can have a glimpse into my life as an illustrator, and picture book writer.
Since July is the month where our country celebrates it’s birthday, I would like to make sure to thank all the men and women in the armed services, and their families for their service. My daughter is a Marine, and I know how proud I am of her and her husband for their service. They joke that Marines age in dog years. Behind the joke is the truth that our Marines, Soldiers, Airmen and Sailors work very hard in areas that range from hard to unpleasant to dangerous, and although they rarely complain we have to take that extra step in our thought processes to appreciate what they do. It’s very hard when a spouse or Mom or Dad is deployed, and I put some coloring pages on my website just for you. Color them and e- mail to Mom or Dad so they can admire your art skills.
I am currently working on a picture book called The Story of Mossy. It’s about a turtle that grows a garden on her back, and is taken off to a museum because she is such a marvel. She leaves behind another turtle that misses her and remains faithful while she is making headlines at the museum. A little girl talks the biologist into returning her back to her home and she is reunited with her friend.
I’ve finished the book dummy, the cartoon version of the story- a mock- up of the 32 page book. I started out doing thumbnails” small versions of the pages, but ended up starting over and creating a larger dummy so I could more accurately realize all the nuances in the borders. My editor Margaret encouraged me to work it out at the dummy stage rather than going to the finished artwork too soon. It is always hard to hear that, but I have lot of trust in my editor, and now I’m glad I did. It means I’m way behind schedule.
If you are working on a story, I can tell you it isn’t always a smooth process! The most important thing is to keep a high standard in your head and keep moving. Like a lot of things, just spending all of dedicated time on the project helps.
I’m tremendously enthusiastic about finally reaching the finished artwork stage. I have a new iPhone so I have been taking photos of local wildflowers on my runs. We’re currently living in the Berkshires in Massachusetts, and there is a lot of natural beauty in the Tyringham valley.There is also a cascading brook that runs three miles down our big hill, with lots of mossy, ferny habitat to set Mossy’s home in.  I especially need lots of photos of little waterfalls. Moving water is hard to capture, so I’ll use the photos as my guide.
My book takes place in two locations, Mossy’s home and the natural history museum. On the museum pages I’m putting the museum collections in the borders.  The page I’m working on now is surrounded by rocks, minerals and gems. They are fun and challenging to draw. I first went to the Harvard Museum to see their collection, which is very inspiring. The different forms are out of this world, some like the meteorites quite literally are from out of this world. I will have collections of shells, fossils, beetles, orchids, bird’s eggs, feathers, and arrowheads in the borders.  I’m not including any specimens of animals, although that is always my favorite part of a natural history museum. I will never forget the first time I saw a taxidermist Pangolin. A very unusual and seldom seen animal.  It looks like an anteater with a pinecone hide.
Even though my fall book tour is months away, we are finalizing our stops at stores. I will be signing Home For Christmas. At the Book Expo, the book industry’s big convention, I saw the first bound copies. There is ” foil” on the Jacket, a sparkley material, that I saw for the first time as well. I love the jacket. Now I just have to wait and see if people like mischievous trolls as much as I do. There is a fascination with children that live with animals, Romulus and Remus, Mogli in the Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling to name three.  I was always curious and envious.  I tried to talk my parents into letting me sleep in my horses’ stall when I was in 5th grade but they wisely said no. Finally I got to live vicariously through Rollo the troll when he moves in with an owl family, bears, otters, becomes pals with a Lynx and finally a herd of moose. It’s always a bit anxiety provoking to have a book you’ve worked on excitedly be just about released.
One book is finished, but not published yet, it will be in September, another book is being worked on, and a third, the Turnip, is being planned for. We are planning to go to St. Petersburg in early June of next year to look at some Russian farms and rural architecture.
I hope all that summer energy is making you want to work on your writing and art projects. I love to get out and do long distance runs and turn over ideas for books in my mind.  Happy Reading and Creating!

Your Friend, Jan Brett

Sketch for MOSSY 2012 fall

Happy June!

This is Jan Brett, and this is my June hedge a gram.  What I call my hedge a gram is my thoughts about children’s books — especially the one I’m working on.  When I was little I knew I would be a children’s book illustrator.  I wanted to get started right away.  It was difficult to find anyone who knew about how it was done.  Actually, every time I write and illustrate a book I reimagine the process.  Sometimes, I strive to do it differently.  One of the things I find inspiring is how kids think along paths less traveled or better still, bushwhack their own way into a story.  By writing my hedge a gram I hope kids and adults who want to write children’s books will see some of my milestones, my creative excitement and some of the down slides when I have to work through a problem.
I usually begin my book in early February.  The idea has been percolating for a year or more, but this isn’t a rule, it usually happens that way though.  I’ve had an idea about mossy the turtle who grows a garden on her back ever since we saw a snapping turtle underwater covered with water plants, rippling in the current.  The turtle rose slowly from the bottom, under our dangling feet.  We were on our dock on Goose Pond.  I decided to take the turtle character out of the water, turn her into an Eastern Box Turtle and have her be discovered by a biologist who brings her home to be an exhibit in her Museum.  I set my story back in time to late Victorian called the Edwardian period about 1908 — 1915.  I did so because small museums that grew out of people’s collections from the natural world — shells, bird’s nests, orchids, fossils were all the rage.  At the end, the biologist’s little niece makes an argument for setting the turtle free, and together they release Mossy, but not before she is painted in great detail.
One of my favorite places in the world is the Peabody Museum of Art.  Part of it is called the Agassiz Museum, after Mr. Lewis Agassiz a brilliant scientist, explorer, collector and director of the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology in the mid-1800s.  Many mounted specimens were taken from remote parts of the world and little is known about them even today, these creatures are so secretive.  When you go to the Museum, one marvels at the diversity of nature.  I hope in my book I can capture a bit of that feeling.
Even though I have big ideas, lots of excitement and energy to devote to my book it has been difficult.  I’ve mostly finished the 32 page dummy and I went over it with my trusted and most admired editor Margaret Frith.  I kept getting the feeling that Mossy didn’t win me over enough, so I decided to insert a double page spread at the beginning showing her growing her garden.  That would make the book 34 pages.  So I took out a page in the middle where I went on a little too long about the pros and cons of Mossy staying as an exhibit in the Museum.
I feel both sides have equal credibility so I found the answer in a compromise.  Mossy stays a year in the Museum, garnering interest and being admired and studied, but then she goes free after a wonderful detailed portrait is done of her.  The portrait is a very useful tool.  The Peabody is filled with wonderful portraits of horses done by Native Americans.  They tell things about the horses that a photo could not.  There are also portraits of Native Americans themselves, and those capture something about the human spirit that a photo does not always capture.
At my meeting with Margaret, we came upon the idea of using the frame as a device to organize my illustrations in the book.  It gives a hint to the turning point of the book, the grand portrait of Mossy.
I use the passage of time in this book like a character.  It starts out when Mossy is a young turtle.  She has a pair bond with Scoot who is waiting for her when the biologist returns her to the wild.  She has baby turtles eventually, and the last page is of Mossy as an old, old turtle.  I was amazed to read about a turtle that had 1887 carved in its shell, but is still walking around on Martha’s Vineyard island.
I hope by reading my ups and downs, problems and solutions, you will see how books get molded and formed.  It’s easy to get discouraged, but the rewards make it worth the trouble.
Good luck on your story and don’t give up on it!  Don’t forget the trick of just before falling asleep, ask yourself, “How can I fix this problem.”  You might have the answer in the morning.  Happy reading,

Your Friend,

Jan Brett

Arctic Sweden from Helicopter near Kiruna, Sweden

Happy May!

This is Jan Brett, and this is my May hedge-gram. Every month I stop my work so I can write about what I’m doing in my life as illustrator and children’s book writer. It gives me a good feeling to think I could talk about my work in a way that would help aspiring illustrators know what it’s really like. My version, anyway.

I am very anxious to begin the finishes for my turtle book, MOSSY. I’ve done thumbnails of the 32 page dummy, and collected a lot of the research material , but several other projects have gotten in the way. For the last week I’ve been working on the news notes or “all about” letter to kids about HOME FOR CHRISTMAS. I reassembled all my books and photos from our trip to Sweden last year with our friends Elof and Gudrun, who are Swedish. Since my book takes place in the Swedish countryside I bought lots of books showing the plants and animals that live there. For one thing Swedish squirrels have long tufts on their ears. Also their bumblebees look like they’ve been dipped in white paint – just the very end of them. There were lots of plants that were new to me, and many birds. I’ve been in quite a few arctic countries – ones that are above the arctic circle, Baffin island, in Canada, Iceland, Norway, and now Sweden. Next Spring I’m planning a trip to Russia, and St. Petersburg must be fairly close to the arctic circle too.

One of the birds I saw in Sweden that I drew in my news notes is the Capercaillie, which is the world’s largest grouse. It lives in wild places that are fairly remote, so it has become a symbol of unspoiled nature. We got up at 3:00 in the morning to be up at sunrise in order to see the male’s courting dance that he performs for the females. It is a gathering called a lek, and the males compete with each other. On our walk into the forest we saw a few females, but the males were not to be found. The Capercaillie also lives in remote parts of Scotland where conservationists have had a tartan, the name for Scottish plaid cloth, created using the colors of the Capercaillie, black, white, brown and blue. The money from the sale of the tartan helps to preserve the habitat.

In Stockholm, Sweden’s best known city there is an open air museum. They have brought historically important houses from all over Sweden, and reassembled them. One building was a log storage barn, quite small. It was standing on 6 trees, that were peeled of their bark, and the spreading roots at their bases were left intact. It looked all the world like the hut on fowl’s ( chicken’s) legs that appears in Russian folk tails. I made sure I added one like it on the troll’s farm.   Skansen is the name of this wonderful park in the heart of the city. I was also able to see all the animal characters in my book, moose, bear, otter, lynx, grey owl, squirrel and bumblebee.  The only character I couldn’t find was a troll. Maybe they saw me but I didn’t see them.

I am very eager to get back to my turtle book. I am taking note of the wild flowers in our yard and in the woods, and when they are blooming so I will have it right when Mossy and Scute, my two turtle characters are shown in their natural habitat. I have yet to see a real live turtle this year, but that’s because I need to spend more time in the woods. When we move up to the Berkshires for the summer in a few weeks I will spend quite a bit of time on the Appalachian trail, and maybe I’ll see some turtles. We have created a turtle pond, and so far only a huge bullfrog has moved in. I’ve been wondering why there hasn’t been any spring peepers in our pond, when we’ve been hearing them out back, but it may be that they don’t want to share the pond with the huge bullfrog! I read that a bullfrog will eat hummingbirds. We are adding a sandy spot next to the pond so female turtles will be attracted to an ideal nesting site. I have heard that turtles like soft fluffy soil that they can dig in, in order to lay their eggs.

I hope story ideas are coming to you fast and furiously, and you are jotting down ideas that you can work into a story. I find it works best to write the story first. Maybe you have written a story, and now are ready to create illustrations. I usually make a 32 page dummy first, at about half the size of the finished book.  Then I can work on the ups and downs of my story. I’m trying to let all the energy of spring energize and motivate me! Good Luck with your creative projects.   Happy Spring,

Your Friend,

Jan Brett

Happy April!