Kristi Valiant

July 25 Book Signing in Evansville, Indiana

2009-07-08T11:06:00.003-05:00

I have my first ever book signing at a store coming up for a book I illustrated. I've done book signings at schools and conferences before, but at a store is scarier because attendance is more nebulous. I'll be bringing a pot of pancit to hand out samples. Pancit is a Filipino noodle dish with chicken and veggies - the recipe is in the book and it's delicious! I'll also be wearing my red apron just like Cora does in the book. I hope to see you there!

Saturday, July 25, 2009
Barnes & Noble, Evansville, Indiana
2 pm
The book: Cora Cooks Pancit (multicultural hardcover picture book)
Written by Dorina Lazo Gilmore, Illustrated by Kristi Valiant

HOPE CARD for the kids of the Australian fires

2009-07-03T13:19:00.004-05:00

Early this year, Australia was shook up with devastating fires and flooding. Many SCBWI (Society of Children's Writers and Illustrators) regions sent donations to help replace books for schools and libraries and HOPE cards. Each HOPE card has an illustration or two and messages from children's book writers and illustrators to the kids in Australia. I was asked to create an illustration for our Indiana SCBWI region's HOPE card and here it is. We pray that everyone affected by the Australian fires and flooding finds hope in the midst of this shaky time.

Fun Cora News

2009-05-25T13:52:00.003-05:00

Whoo-hoo! There's a lot to report. First, I received my Cora books a couple weeks ago, and they turned out beautiful!

Second, I set up a book signing at Barnes & Noble for July 25 here in Evansville, IN. I hope you can come! I'll be bringing a big pot of pancit to give out samples. It's delicious and the recipe is in the book.

Third, REVIEWS!

Terry Hong of the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program Blog, BookDragon, posted a wonderful review of Cora Cooks Pancit. Hong wrote, "Gilmore, who grew up in a Filipino Italian kitchen, tells a heartwarming tale that illustrator Valiant captures with the perfect combination of whimsy and action. You can actually feel Cora’s longing as she watches her siblings in the kitchen, her wonder as she listens to Mama’s stories about Lolo, her worry that her pancit might disappoint, and her beaming pride when the whole family enjoys the meal she so lovingly helped to create. This is one treasure of a family book. Delicious, too!"

Jama Rattigan reviewed Cora Cooks Pancit on her Alphabet Soup blog and said, "Kristi Valiant's illustrations are the warm stuff of golds, browns, and rich jewel tones. Cora's expressions are convincingly hopeful, joyous, pensive, and tentative, as she anxiously tries her hand at new tasks. Kids will especially love the added storyline of the family dog, who follows Cora around with a toy in his mouth, wanting her to play. The true joys of cooking -- from the initial anticipation, through every step of preparation, and finally, the sharing and tasting, is palpable with every page turn. By the time you come to the final double page spread of the whole family at the table, you'll wish you were right there, feasting on the adobo chicken, lumpia, and Cora's first pancit."

Also, Stephanie Ruble interviewed me on her blog, sruble's world.

NaPiBoWriWee - Results

2009-05-08T16:47:00.003-05:00

I made it! Just barely, but I made it. At 11:35 pm on Day 7 I finished my 7th picture book manuscript in 7 days! Whoo-hoo!!!

PB 1: Funny fiction, main character is an elephant.
PB 2: Funny fiction, main character is a hamster.
PB 3: Rhyming (Why did I do that to myself? I've never written in rhyme! But at least I have a poet in my critique group).
PB 4: Sweet fiction (Again, a stretch for me because I don't like sweet'n'sappy).
PB 5: Funny fiction, main character is a flamingo.
PB 6: Funny & adventurous fiction, main character is a grasshopper.
PB 7: Kinda weird and scary, main character is a monster (It was definitely time for this challenge to be over!)

I really like some of my picture books that I wrote this week, and I would even go so far as to say they all have potential as first drafts. I'm going to put them away for a number of days before reading them again to see which I'll start revising. Did you participate? How did it go?

MOCHA Art Exhibit

2009-05-04T16:19:00.002-05:00

I have a couple pieces of art in an upcoming show at the Museum of Children's Art (MOCHA) in Oakland, CA - how fun is that! And you're invited! Here's the info from MOCHA:

You are invited to the Museum of Children's Art (MOCHA)'s Annual exhibit, Once Upon a Time: Children's Book Illustrators, Then and Now, May 8-June 2. This year we are featuring work by Don Freeman, author/illustrator of Corduroy and Norman the Doorman, and 27 other artists.

Sarah Ackerley
Eve Aldridge
Bob Barner
Lisa Brown
Nancy Carroll
John Clapp
Claire B. Cotts
Angelo Dominguez
Julie Downing
Soma Han Stickler
Sara Kahn
Elisa Kleven
Angelo Lopez
Lea Lyon
Jenny Matheson
Jeff Miracola
Kathryn Otoshi
Todd Parr
Jeff Peterson
Joni Stringfield
Paul Tong
Dona Turner
Kristi Valiant (me!)
Lisa Victoria
David Weitzman
Ashley Wolf

The reception/book signing is May 9, 2-4pm. I won't be able to be at the reception, but some of the other artists will be there. If you go, send me a photo!

(I created the links above by googling the illustrators. If I have yours wrong, please let me know.)

NaPiBoWriWee - Day 1

2009-05-01T16:04:00.002-05:00

It really helped me get into the picture book mood by reading and analyzing over 60 picture books this week. I forgot to mention both Mary Uhles and Diandra Mae joined me in the Picture Book Reading Challenge that we finished yesterday. Be sure to check out their results too.

NaPiBoWriWee is National Picture Book Writing Week, the brainchild of Paula Yoo. Paula said about 75 writers have signed up to write 7 picture books in 7 days starting today. Whoo hoo! Are you in?

To start the ideas rolling, I took a nap. Ok, the nap itself wasn't the goal, but when I'm sleepy and drifting off or drifting back is when I usually get my picture book ideas. And it worked! I'm off to write about a fidgety lil' elephant...

Picture Book Reading Challenge Results

2009-04-30T15:31:00.003-05:00

61 - that's how many picture books I read the last couple days for the Picture Book Reading Challenge. I decided to divide the picture books I read into 4 piles this time because I was having a hard time with just 3 piles on these.

Pile 1 = Amazing Books I Love & Want to Buy: 9 books.
Duck and Goose (Tad Hills) - I bought this yesterday.
Best Buds (Maxwell Eaton III)
Superheroes (Maxwell Eaton III)
The Odd Egg (Emily Gravett)
Wolves (Emily Gravett)
Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed (Mo Willems)
Duck at the Door (Jackie Urbanovic)
Little Oink (Amy Krouse Rosenthal/Jen Corace)
Duck! Rabbit! (Amy Krouse Rosenthal/Tom Lichtenheld)

Pile 2 = Very Good Books That I Would Read Again: 12 books.
Rhyming Dust Bunnies (Jan Thomas)
How to Win Friends and Influence Creatures for Kids (Deborah Zemke)
Llama, Llama, Red Pajama (Anna Dewdney)
Duck and Cover (Jackie Urbanovic)
Mouse Was Mad (Linda Urban/Henry Cole)
All God's Critters (Bill Staines/Kadir Nelson)
Cock-a-doodle hooooooo! (Mick Manning/Brita Granstrom)
Ginger Bear (Mini Grey)
The Cow That Laid an Egg (Andy Cutbill/Russell Ayto)
Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (Bill Martin Jr/John Archambault)
Bats at the Library (Brian Lies)
Freckleface Strawberry (Julianne Moore/LeUyen Pham)

Pile 3 = OK Books That I'm Not Excited Read Again: 29 books, but I don't want anyone to feel bad if I list their book.

Pile 4 = Don't-Ever-Make-Me-Read-It-Again Books: 11 books.

I combined a few reading lists and also read books that were prominently displayed at Barnes & Noble and Borders.

My analysis of my favorite books: They all made me laugh out loud, and I wanted to make my husband read them (since we don't have kids yet to force books upon). Most of these books have sparse text and simple storylines, with a twist or surprise to the ending. Wolves has a surprise ending in which someone gets eaten (gulp!) and then a revised extra ending for sensitive readers - hilarious. I love the way the text plays with the illustrations in these books. Duck! Rabbit! is the ultimate play between words and illustrations. You really have to get this book to see what I mean. And the two books by Maxwell Eaton III use speech bubbles to give quirky personalities to the characters. The fact that a polar bear's butt reminds Max that Pinky likes marshmallows in Best Buds is quirkiness at its best. Each of the nine books in my Amazing pile has a unique spin about it; not your typical, "MC doesn't want to go to bed...," "MC loses a tooth...," "MC has bully problems...," or any of the other topics that editors say saturate their piles. I guess Duck and Goose is about sharing when it comes down to it, but the lesson isn't pointed out, and you can't help but love their funny squabbling about how to take care of the "egg" they found and the surprise that it's not an egg. So if we write about a common theme, it really needs to stand out somehow.

My analysis of the books I didn't like: Most had far too many words, and I found myself wanting to edit them down to be more efficient and funnier. Some of them also had a lesson that was far too preachy (one certain recycling book had me groaning the whole way because it was soooo didactic). A couple of the books I didn't like tried too hard to be funny and ended up lame and annoying to me. And a couple didn't have a satisfying ending.

I sent in my picture book dummy that I wrote and sketched to be critiqued and will get that back at an SCBWI event next weekend. I'm putting that story out of my head until then, so that it'll be fresh when I get it back, and then I'll decide which of these piles I would put it in as a reader. Now it's time for me to start writing other picture books using the lessons I learned from reading all these picture books - it's time for NaPiBoWriWee!!!! I'll be writing 7 picture books in 7 days! Go to Paula Yoo's blog for details and to sign up.

Picture Book Reading Challenge for April 30

2009-04-27T16:18:00.002-05:00

In the comments section of my post on creating a Picture Book Reading Challenge, a few us decided that we would take the Reading Challenge and post our results on April 30. Do you want to join us?

Read a couple posts back for the full description of the challenge. Here's a summary:

1. Find a list of great picture books or combine lists to create a reading list at least 50 books long. Here are a some suggestions:
Fuse#8 countdown,
New York Public Library's 100 best list,
Amazon's Best Books of 2008,
Great Read Alouds,
Picture Books That Will Make You Laugh,
Classroom Read Aloud Picture Books

2. Find these books in your library or hang out at a bookstore to read them. Preferably read all the books on your list in one day.

3. After reading a book assign it to a category: Not-My-Taste Books, OK Books, or Amazingly-Great Books

4. Figure out what made the Amazingly-Great books amazingly great and why the others weren't.

5. Read your own manuscript and assign it a pile. Oooooooo!

6. Post whatever part of your results you want.

Illustration Friday - Impossibility

2009-04-17T09:36:00.004-05:00

This is a quick color study for my own picture book dummy that I'm working on. If you both write and illustrate picture books, you can create sketches for your whole manuscript and submit those along with your story to publishers - it's called a dummy.

Picture Book Reading Challenge

2009-04-13T13:27:00.002-05:00

I'm mainly an illustrator, but I'm working on writing picture books too.

Lin Oliver quoted Richard Peck as saying, "For every one book you write, read 1000." I know I've read loads of picture books these past couple years, but I don't know if I've hit 1000 - possibly. I always have a huge stack of picture books checked out from the library. A couple months ago I gave myself a Picture Book Reading Challenge. I checked out over 60 picture books from a great-read-out-loud list and read them all that one night! I felt like an editor reading slush (except these were published books, so probably a whole lot better than most slush).

I divided them into three piles: 1) books I loved and wanted to read again, 2) books I thought were ok but didn't want to read again, and 3) books I thought were boring or not to my liking. I ended up with only 6 books in the "books I loved and wanted to read again" pile.

Then I read my picture book manuscripts I'm writing. Here's the real meaty question: Which pile do my work-in-progress manuscripts belong? All of them went in the middle "ok" pile.

How do I get my manuscripts into the best pile so that they'll actually be acquired? I studied in-depth each of the books I put in the best pile to see what kind of books I love and what I loved about them. I found out that I love picture books that are hilarious, clever, fast reads, and that the illustrations tell at least half the story, sometimes even contradicting the words to be funny. I decided to rewrite one of my manuscripts completely with the intent of it landing in my "books I loved and wanted to read again" pile. After rewriting it (and drawing as I wrote), I feel it's much stronger, and now I'm sketching it into a dummy to submit to publishers. (If you're an illustrator as well as author, you can submit a sketch dummy instead of just the manuscript to publishers.)

So if any of you picture book writers or illustrators want to check out loads of picture books, read them all in one sitting, divide them into piles based on your tastes, and study the ones in the best pile, I hope it'll help you too! That's my challenge for you. And I may join you and do it again with another big stack of books.

Illustration Friday - Poise

2009-03-27T08:26:00.004-05:00

I've been working on this piece for a show entitled "Beginnings." Here, Adam and Eve are poised on the brink of causing death to enter the world by disobeying the only command that God gave them - not to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Picture Book Proofs

2009-02-27T12:15:00.004-06:00

Editorial Anonymous recently defined some technical book industry terms. She states, "proofs are an example of the book, printed on the big professional printing presses (but not bound), and this is our chance to make sure the alignment of the printing, the page trimming, and the color is correct."

Illustrators don't always get to see proofs. For digital illustrators like myself, we don't have traditional paintings that the publisher can compare to the proofs to make sure the colors match, so we love it if we get to see the proofs for color purposes. The picture book that I illustrated, Cora Cooks Pancit, is coming out in April, and the publisher was so gracious as to let me see the proofs this week. I love the way the colors printed - exactly how I hoped! Here are the individual pages and the jacket.

Illustration Friday "Flawed"

2009-01-30T08:36:00.004-06:00

Since Cora was unsure how to check the noodles to see if they were done soaking, she tried to smell them. Oops!

I illustrated these for the picture book, Cora Cooks Pancit.

Cora Cooks Pancit

2009-01-23T11:57:00.004-06:00

What have I been working on? Mainly this book: Cora Cooks Pancit for Shen's Books.

Cora loves the kitchen, but her older brother and sisters always get to help with the real cooking while she gets stuck with kid jobs like licking the spoon. When her older siblings head out for the day, Cora finally gets the chance to be Mama's assistant chef. She chooses to make her Grandpa's pancit recipe, a Filipino noodle dish.

The pancit recipe is included in the book, and it's delicious! My husband and I made a big pot of pancit a few weeks ago, and we've already bought ingredients to make it again. Mmmm...

Amazon says the book will be out in April, so look for it in April or May in your bookstore!

Illustration Friday "Contained"

2009-01-11T21:59:00.001-06:00

It's fun to watch the lil' wiggly kids in taekwondo learn to contain their wiggliness.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year... a bit late

2009-01-03T16:29:00.005-06:00

Well, this a bit late, but I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas with your family and friends, and had time to reflect on the true meaning of CHRISTmas!

My husband and I took a friend of ours, who is an international college student from Korea, up to Wisconsin to visit my family for Christmas. There's a crazy amount of snow in Wisconsin this year - close to 30" when we got there! Our friend had never seen so much snow, so we had fun with snowball fights and giddily playing around in the snow. It reminded me of winters when I was young. We would dig snow tunnels through our backyard (like in the photo above). Our small city in Wisconsin would flood the football fields at the elementary schools to make them into ice skating rinks, and we would ice skate for recess! These kind of moments that transport me back to being a kid are incredible bits of momentum for writing and illustrating picture books. May your new year be filled with childhood memory momentum too.

My husband and I spent New Year's in romantic New Harmony, IN.

Terroist attack

2008-11-29T14:44:00.003-06:00

Children's book author & illustrator Linda Ragsdale was shot in the back in the terroist attacks in India and underwent surgery. After the attacks, her husband flew to India on an emergency visa to be with her. Linda's such an energetic and fun woman; the first time I met her she bought me dinner and we laughed all night. Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers for a quick and full recovery.

Highlights Magazine

2008-11-26T11:34:00.003-06:00

I'm so honored to have illustrated a wonderful Christmas poem by Eileen Spinelli in this month's issue of Highlights Magazine. Highlights - "the world's best-loved magazine" - how sweet is that!

The only thing I didn't realize was how dark and dull my illustration would print on magazine newsprint. The top is what it looks like in the magazine, and the bottom is how it's supposed to look. Hmmm... I'm hoping for more assignments from Highlights, and I'll be sure to up my brightness and colors next time around.

Illustration Friday "Pretend"

2008-11-14T14:02:00.002-06:00

This is one of the card designs I did for Christian Collection's Christmas 2009 catalog. I know it's a whole year away before you'll be able to buy the cards, but that's how timing works for when they need the final art!

Trade Book Sketches

2008-10-30T09:00:00.003-05:00

What am I currently working on? A sweet, trade picture book for Shen's Books. Here's a lil' sneak peek at the main character. I'm still in the sketch phase. It's so much fun to create a personality, a tiny life that exists in this book.

Operation Christmas Child

2008-10-20T09:48:00.002-05:00

The thing I love most about this time of year is a program called Operation Christmas Child. You take an ordinary shoebox, fill it with toys, school supplies, hygiene items, and a note, take it to a local church who will send it to Samaritan's Purse, who will carry your box around the world and give it to a needy child. It may be the first present that child has ever received. What a tangible way to show little children that God loves them, and they are precious in His sight! If you're interested in filling a shoebox, you can go to the Samaritan's Purse website to see where in your city you can drop off your box: http://www.samaritanspurse.org/index.php/OCC They collect boxes until Nov 24, so that they still have time to ship them around the world before Christmas. Here's a video about the program:

I love this ministry, and try to do as many boxes as I can each year! Please join me.

Illustration Friday "Strings"

2008-10-10T12:14:00.005-05:00

When I saw the Illustration Friday topic of "strings," I thought of a tightrope. And since I have penguins on the mind, I decided to draw a performance poster for Mr. Popper's Penguins.

I won SCBWI Midsouth Conference Poster Contest!

2008-09-25T08:54:00.006-05:00

I packed my bags and headed to the Midsouth SCBWI Conference last weekend. I had a wonderful time.

A new part of the conference this year was a poster contest for children's book art. The conference faculty chose the one that they felt looked most like the cover of a children's book and mine won. How exciting is that!

There were a lot of beautiful illustrations at this conference. Those of us who had attended last year's conference and had met with the Art Director, Laurent Linn, have greatly improved our portfolios based on his articulate suggestions. It's so encouraging to learn at these conferences what makes strong illustrations for the picture book industry and to see other artists grow. I can't wait to see next year's artwork after meeting with Victoria Jamieson this year.

SCBWI Midsouth Conference

2008-09-23T09:08:00.003-05:00

This past weekend I attended the Midsouth SCBWI Conference in Nashville, TN. This region seriously puts on amazing conferences! Here are some of my notes:

Bruce Coville (author of more than 90 books)
I've loved Bruce's books that I've read and listened to. He's such a super dynamic and animated speaker. If you ever get a chance to hear him, go, go, go!
HA! WA! YIKES! If you can get all three of these reactions in your reader, you've written a great book.
HA! Kids love humor. How do you get a laugh? Use one of the following words: fart, booger, butt, naked, etc. But the best laugh is one that comes from the story itself. For example, a bully gets puts into his place.
WA! An honest tear. Easy tear - kill the dog. But the best tear comes from the story itself. For example, tears of joy when something so wonderful happens.
YIKES! Kids love scary books. The best scary is when a character you love is in trouble, emotional peril.
Use sensory details to sweep you into a scene. In any important scene, use 3 of the 5 senses.
Make a good story a great story by making your character face a tough moral choice. The question kids have is not, "Do I want to be good?" but rather, "Who do I want to be like?" Provide role models.
"Sometimes I write a fairytale because it's the best way to tell the truth." - C.S. Lewis

Victoria Jamieson (designs picture books, middle grade, and YA for Greenwillow)
Victoria has a website with her own illustration work, and she has a fun picture book coming out next summer, Bea Rocks the Flock!
She prefers illustrators to send in postcard samples of their artwork, not envelopes that she has to open.
Have a web portfolio where she can find more of your work, and she can print it out.
If you like a particular subject or type of book, do at least 3 illustrations like that for your portfolio.
Victoria showed us some picture book dummies which I found very helpful since I would like to write and illustrate my own picture books.
She talked about Darcy Pattison's Narrative Arc Formula:
This is a story about ______________________________
Who more than anything else wants __________________
(Alternate: Who more than anything else fears_________________)
But can’t get it because of these complications:
(Alternate: But has to face it because of these complications:)
UNTIL (climax/resolution).

Amalia Ellison (Assistant Editor at Abrams)
Why have an agent: Agents protect you in ways you don't realize until it's too late.
If you don't want an agent: query the assistant and associate editors and editorial assistants if they have aquiring ability. They are the ones who will be passionate about your books and will work on building a relationship with you because your success means success for them.
Amalia prefers email submissions with manuscripts as attachments (go green). If she feels your writing is great, but it's not what she's interested in, she'll pass it around the office. Amalia loves mysteries, math mysteries, and humorous adventure books - so do I! She was quite funny and a good storyteller.

I had a portfolio critique with Victoria Jamieson at this conference. Last fall, I had portfolio critiques with Laurent Linn from Henry Holt and Elizabeth Parisi from Scholastic, and I've been putting into practice all that they said about art for trade book publishing. I feel like my artwork has really grown over the past year, but I know I still have a lot of growing to do. I was excited to see what the comments would be at my critique this year, because most of the illustrations in my portfolio are new. There was one piece in my portfolio that an Art Director had said was my strongest piece two years ago. That was one of the only two illustrations that Victoria told me this weekend to take out of my portfolio now. How encouraging! What had been my strongest piece two years ago is now my weakest piece! Most of my new pieces are stronger, so that verified my growth as an artist. Yay!
These two illustrations Victoria pointed out as being some of my strongest:

Harold Underdown and Alexis O'Neill also spoke at the conference. If you're interested in writing or illustrating for children, I highly suggest digesting all of Harold's website and checking out his book, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Children's Book Publishing. Also, join SCBWI and go to some of these amazingly helpful conferences!

Illustration Friday "Island"

2008-09-12T08:16:00.000-05:00

This is a color comp I'm working on for one of my own picture book manuscripts, and it fits the Illustration Friday theme since little brother discovers big sister's island of vegetation in her bedroom.

This, of course, is just a messy color comp, not the finished painting, but I've been getting frustrated over it trying to get the colors and composition to work together. I was hoping to have the painting finished before the SCBWI conference I'm going to next week, but I doubt that's going to happen with all my other illustration work right now and with my main computer in the shop. But perhaps this illustration will end up falling into place... I do like some areas of color in this.

Check back after next weekend for my notes from the conference.