Lisa Wheeler: Creating Picture Book Characters

Lisa Wheeler is the award-winning author of over 35 children’s books including Even Monsters Need to Sleep and the popular Dino-Sports series. Lisa's book, The Christmas Boot, is the 2017 SCBWI Golden Kite Award winner for Picture Book Text. Bubble Gum, Bubble Gum is the 2017 Michigan Reads! One Book, One State Children’s Book Program recipient. Her other awards include The Michigan Mitten, Texas Bluebonnet, and the Theodore Geisel Honor given by the American Library Association. Check out Lisa’s website at: www.lisawheelerbooks.com

Packed house for Lisa Wheeler's session at the SCBWI Summer Conference.

Lisa breaks down what she sees some of the important ingredients that form a picture book character:

dialogue, the author's voice, description (or, more importantly, minimalism with description); the character's name (make sure not to pick a name so limiting that nothing else can be remembered or said about him); internal monologue; the character's relationship to secondary characters; his ability to solve his own problems.

She cautions authors to allow the illustrator to interpret details about your character instead of providing descriptive passages. "You don't know what you're going to get from the illustrator -- and that's fine." She shared how Molly Idle illustrated their forthcoming book People Don't Bite People by not once illustrating a person biting another person. Lisa says she could never have envisioned her book that way -- that's part of the magic of the partnership between author and illustrator.

From People Don't Bite People by Lisa Wheeler, Illustrated by Molly Idle

Molly Idle Keynote: Yes And—Setting the Stage for Crazy Creative Development

Molly Idle is the Caldecott-honor winning author and illustrator of Flora and the Flamingo. 

She talked about the collaborative work that bookmaking is, and how she uses stage and improvisation techniques to boost her personality.

Keeping an open mind is the key to successful collaboration, she says.

In improv, there's a game called "Yes, and."

The first player kicks out an opening line. For example, "Did you remember to clean out the cat barf from Uncle Billy's car?"

Your job as a player is to accept that and add AND, she says. So you'd reply, "I did remember, and I think the smell is going to linger for quite some time."

"It sounds so simple, but it is so easy to do just the opposite and block," she says. "We are born to 'Yes.' We are born instinctively to be creative. To express our boundaries both real and imaginary."

She uses stage techniques a lot in her work. When she's figuring out how to lay out characters, she thinks about and experiments with many things ... putting characters center stage, even not having them react at all (which is the second-most powerful thing you can do on stage).

She encouraged us to push out of our comfort zones and keep many choices as possibilities. "It's the only way to come up with new ideas."

We have to ask ourselves, "How can I push my creative comfort zone out?"

The answer? You have to know your bit. This means know your lines. To really know a line is to know why you say it. You need to know the line before that. And the line before that. And why you're in the scene in the first place.

"You have to know the whole play to know your bit. If you know the whole play, you can jump in and help," she says. 'You know why you're supposed to be there."

Molly knows the editor's job. She knows the art director's job. She knows the designer's bit too—and the printer's. This means that in the end, the book will be a better book.

Molly Idle's website
Follow Molly on Twitter

The Annual Juried Illustrators' Portfolio Showcase

A team of judges (including Loren Long, Justin Chanda, Mac McCool, Steve Bjorkman, and Alice Pope) spent two hours perusing dozens and dozens of portfolios and picked one grand prize winner and two honor recipients.

And the Grand Prize Winner is...

Molly Idle

Honor Award recipients... 

Ye Won Lee

Debbie Ridpath Ohi