{"id":4447,"date":"2017-09-15T07:20:51","date_gmt":"2017-09-15T13:20:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=4447"},"modified":"2017-09-15T07:38:40","modified_gmt":"2017-09-15T13:38:40","slug":"what-im-doing-at-kirkus-this-weekplus-what-i-did-last-week-featuring-katherine-roy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=4447","title":{"rendered":"What I\u2019m Doing at Kirkus<\/em> This Week,
Plus What I Did Last Week, Featuring Katherine Roy"},"content":{"rendered":"


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\nToday over at Kirkus<\/em>, I’m reading between the lines, so to speak. That is here<\/a><\/strong>. <\/p>\n

* * *<\/center><\/p>\n

Last week, I talked here<\/a><\/strong> with author-illustrator Katherine Roy<\/a><\/strong> about her newest picture book, How to Be an Elephant: Growing Up in the African Wild<\/em> (David Macaulay Studio\/Roaring Brook Press, September 2017). Today, she follows up with some beautiful sketches from her research trip to Kenya, a bit of a peek into her process, and some final art from the book. (Pictured above is an early sketch.)<\/p>\n

Enjoy!<\/p>\n


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Sketches:<\/font><\/strong><\/center>
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Katherine: “Early visual notes and doodles, as I taught myself to draw elephants.
A few of these tiny pieces later became the basis for final art in the book.”<\/em>
(Click each sketch to enlarge)<\/center>
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“Field Notes from Kenya”:<\/font><\/strong><\/center>
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(Click each to enlarge)<\/em><\/center>
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Rough Drafts:<\/font><\/strong><\/center>
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Katherine: “Two versions of a night-time birth scene. I stole the composition that worked best from a different drawing, with elephants protecting a calf from an approaching lion.”<\/em>
(Click each to enlarge)<\/center>
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Katherine: “Two versions of a herd with calves encountering hyenas. Hyenas and lions are both a threat to young calves, but ultimately I decided to go with lions in my book.”<\/em>
(Click each to enlarge)<\/center>
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More Rough Drafts:<\/font><\/strong><\/center>
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Growing up …<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center>
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Lion charge …<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center>
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Lion defense …<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center>
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Making space …<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center>
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Newborn …<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center>
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Workspace …<\/font><\/strong><\/center>
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Katherine: “Puzzling a book together starts with little pieces on my desk.
Later, it moves to my wall, and the pieces get slightly bigger.”<\/em>
(Click each image to enlarge)<\/center>
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Katherine: “Drawing in our safari jeep in Kenya …”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center>
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Some Final Art:<\/font><\/strong><\/center>
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“With flapping ears and whiffling trunks,
the herd quickly spreads the news. …”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge and see full text)<\/center>
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“African elephants are one of the few species on Earth that
live in permanent social groups. …”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge and see full spread with text)<\/center>
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“A baby elephant’s vocabulary of barks, cries, grunts, and trumpets is designed to
call her family’s attention to her most basic needs. …”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge and see full spread with text)<\/center>
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“Even with so many lessons behind her,
a baby elephant has years of education ahead ….”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge and see full spread with text)<\/center>
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* * * * * * *<\/center><\/p>\n

HOW TO BE AN ELEPHANT; GROWING UP IN THE AFRICAN WILD. Copyright \u00a9 2017 by Katherine Roy. Published by David Macaulay Studio\/Roaring Brook Press, New York. All images here reproduced by permission of Katherine Roy.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Today over at Kirkus, I’m reading between the lines, so to speak. That is here. * * * Last week, I talked here with author-illustrator Katherine Roy about her newest picture book, How to Be an Elephant: Growing Up in the African Wild (David Macaulay Studio\/Roaring Brook Press, September 2017). Today, she follows up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,26,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogger-interviews","category-nonfiction","category-picture-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4447"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4447\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}