5 Steps You Have to Take Before Producing Your Children’s Book – Part II

In our previous post we looked at the first three steps every children’s author needs to take to best prepare their book for publication. In part 2 of this topic, we are going to look at the last two steps as you inch closer to the book layout phase. Once you have looked at your manuscript, and determined your page breaks and appropriate illustrations for each page, you can turn your attention to making those illustrations a reality!

Step #4: Pick an Artwork Style

Pick up any number of children’s books and you will see a range of illustration styles. It’s important to select which style you want for your book, and it’s best to decide this before approaching illustrators. Why? Not every illustrator will be able to produce the style you want, so why waste your time connecting with the wrong artists? Look through children’s books and decide the style you like.

Step #5: Pick an Artist/Illustrator

Many authors rush to this step before all the previous ones, but this is a mistake. If you reach this step already knowing your page breaks, which illustrations go on which page and which illustration style you want, you are making the rest of the process so much easier for yourself and your illustrator.

So, how do you pick the right illustrator for your book? As already mentioned in step #4, identifying illustrators that are able to work in the style you desire is an obvious must. But you also want to look for some other qualifiers:

• • Previous work: If an illustrator has illustrated other books, ask for samples. If an illustrator has a lot of experience but not necessarily with books, look at their artwork. Pretty much every illustrator today has an online portfolio or gallery and many also regularly post their work on platforms like
  • Instagram Availability: A professional illustrator will be able to give you an idea of their availability to work on your project. Some can get started right away while others will only be able to take you on in a few weeks or months from now. You have to decide how quickly you want your illustrations done.
  • Collaboration style: Some illustrators prefer working strictly through email or direct messaging. Often, this is to compensate for any language deficiency. (Nowadays, there are so many creatives available in every corner of the world, and not all of them are proficient in English.) You will have to decide if a strictly online collaboration is right for you. If you choose to go this route, we strongly recommend you have taken care of the previous steps outlined in this blog post before kicking things off with your illustrator.

We recommend as much as possible that authors pick illustrators with whom “real” calls and conversations can take place. It can be so difficult to properly communicate your artistic vision for an illustration through email. Moreover, if you are working with an artist in a foreign country, their concept of certain things may differ from yours. For example, we worked with an author who had selected her own illustrator, and encountered issues with an illustration of a kitchen for one of her pages. She had in mind a standard North American kitchen, while the kitchens in this illustrator’s country looked quite different.

Children’s books can be complex, yes, but they can also be fun! It all comes down to being prepared. Of course, nothing beats having a team by your side. At the Aaxel Author Group, we work on many children’s books, and you can check out all of our services here.

Do you have any questions about the publishing process? Contact us so we can discuss more!