Check out #KidChristmasAdvent on my Instagram.

This is a little clip of 'Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toyshop' in shops NOW

This week the seminal British comic 'The Beano' celebrated 85 years of being enjoyed by kids all across the country (and the world).

Growing up The Beano was a constant presence in my life and I spent many a happy morning reading the comic (along with The Dandy and Buster) and felt totally enchanted by the incredible art throughout.

In 2012 the editor of The Beano Mr Michael Stirling and assistant editor Ryan Gavin gave me a fantastic opportunity to illustrate a weekly poetry segment.

This was my first ever professional illustration commission and I was so happy to see my drawings accompanying poems written by the likes of Jacqueline Wilson, Laura Dockrill , Spike Milligan and many other incredible writers.

I was also thrilled to create a couple of pieces celebrating The Beano in the style of classic artists. My Beanotown piece inspired by Lowry is currently displayed in the DC Thomson head offices on Fleet Street in London. It was also part of the incredible exhibition 'Beano: The Art Of Breaking The Rules' curated by Andy Holden at Somerset House in 2022.

Before then 'Beanotown' and a painting of The Bashstreet Kids 'Pug' inspired by Van Gogh was also hidden amongst the artwork of the Dundee Gallery for a special celebration of the classic comic.

What an adventure I have had with The Beano. My 8 year old self would have have been over the moon to know that one day I would get my first big published commission in the pages of the comic that I loved so much.

Thank you The Beano. And Happy Bloomin Birthday 😘

Happy Fathers Day ❤️

Hi all. Heres a look at the ‘Island’ The fully illustrated edition written by @davidjalmond and drawn by me will be in shops from June 22nd

Myself and superstar @SmritiPH have a new book coming soon. ‘Peace On Earth’- our second collaboration after 2020’s ‘Rain Before Rainbows’ - will be published by @BIGPictureBooks on September 7th 

Thank you 2022. Hello 2023 :)

The Kid Christmas Sketchbook Part 2

A second peek behind the scenes of my latest book 'Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toy Shop'

A few days ago I shared the scruffy, sketchy beginnings of what would become my sixth author/illustrator book ‘Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toy Shop (Out NOW)

Today we are going to look at the next stage in creating the book: The Terrifying Rough First Draft stage.

First Draft

It’s not really that terrifying to be honest, but there is always a bit of trepidation when I send this off to my editor. It’s the first real look at how the book is going to turn out. Its when I see if the excitement and enthusiasm I felt in the sketchy stages is actually going to pay off and the book does have potential to be as good as I felt it would be.

I probably (definitely) do over think these things- everything can still be changed at this stage after all, so yes it probably shouldn’t cause as much stress as it does- but its still a daunting moment.

For the first draft rough I take my sketches from my sketchbook and basically spruce them up so that they are more presentable. I do this stage mainly digitally, using my hand drawn paper sketches as a blueprint and drawing over them with my fancy Wacom tablet. At the same time I will hone the idea and story structure as this process goes on.

A lot of further big creative decisions are made here too. In fact that happens a lot during the whole process. Things will change, story ideas will develop and artwork will be tweaked all the way up to it being prepared to print.

The first step of that happens after I send through the First Draft Rough. My editor and art director will have a say on the drawings and offer input on what to change and how to move the story along. Sometimes this can be pretty brutal as being an arty type I am automatically a big old control freak. But I very quickly learnt that making books is a wholly collaborative process. Even though my name is on the cover all of my books have very much been a creative collaboration.

Anyway, I’m rambling a fair bit now, so why don’t we just have a look at some of the pages from the first draft rough :)

The Cover

Around about the same time as creating the First Draft I will start thinking about the cover. The publishers don’t usually want to see a cover sketch until the books rough internal pages are all ready to go to artwork. But the cover is always on my mind. For me seeing the cover- all be it in sketch form- helps to characterise the entire book. So I often think of the cover very early on.

Another thing that publishers will like to see is a number of different options for the cover. So I aim to sketch out 5 or 6 for them to choose. I definitely had my favourite of the sketches and assumed that they would also go for it. However, I was very surprised that they went for the final design. I love it, and I can now totally understand why it was chosen. But my favourite was actually the image right at the start of this newsletter- with Nicky and his uncles standing proud outside the Toy Shop. Nicky isn’t even in his Santa costume - I thought that we should keep that a big secret- which I now look back on as being a bit of a crazy decision on my part. Again, it shows how important the collaboration aspect is to making books. Having other insights and opinions are really vital.

Ok, here is a look at the cover sketches that I presented, including the design that we ended up using.

Phew….so there we are.

Hopefully you have had a little further insight into the sketching stages of ‘Kid Christmas’.

Thank you so much for reading these two- slightly rambley- recollections of how the idea developed (you can read Part 1 HERE)

Great Thanks also to everyone who has read the book. I’ve been absolutely chuffed to bits with the response that the book has had and it has made all the hard work and trials and tribulations (as fun as they all are) worth it.

Happy Christmas all. Ho Ho Ho.

David :)

Today we said goodbye to my mum Beryl Elsie Litchfield who sadly passed away in November. I just thought that I would take the opportunity to share a couple of things about her as she was pretty incredible.

First of all Mum devoted her life to looking after children. When I was really young she worked as a childminder and took care of a number of local kids. Growing up our house was always full of other kids who she was caring for. This was great for me as I always had someone to play with. 

I was proud of mum for so many reasons. After my dad died mum decided to go to university. She was 45 years old at this point  and  she studied to become a qualified Social Worker. I went with her to her graduation and although I was still fairly young and didn’t fully appreciate much of it, I do remember feeling great pride in what my mum had just achieved.

Another thing mum did soon after losing Dad was take herself off and go and see more of the world. One day- completely on her own-she caught a plane and visited Italy. Not bad going for someone who had barely left England up until this point.

I remember feeling really worried about her on that trip. But luckily she met a group of ladies who were also travelling. They took mum under their wing and became firm friends. Mum travelled with them every year after that and they saw so many amazing places together including America, Canada, and all around Europe.

Another great thing that mum did was around 4 years ago she decided to join an art class. I had never seen her draw anything at all up until this point, but it turned out that she was really good. She went every week and experimented with all sorts of art making materials and techniques and she absolutely loved it. After this I asked her if she would like to draw a picture for one of my books ‘Lights On Cotton Rock’ which she duly did. When the book was published she took it into her class and gave a talk all about it.

Beryl was a great Mum and later a fantastic Grannie. she was only 71 when she passed and we feel so sad to have lost her. It feels like there were still so many new experiences for her to try and people for her to meet.  

But she taught me, my brother and my sister so much and we will always remember her spirit for life, her bravery and her devotion to her family

We love you mum and we are going to miss you so much ❤️

The Kid Christmas Sketchbook Part 1

A peek inside the development of my newest book 'Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toyshop'

Hi all. Not too long until ‘The Big Day’. To celebrate I thought that I would give you all a peek into my sketchbook and maybe offer a little insight into how the idea for my latest book ‘Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toyshop’ developed.

Scruffy Beginnings

From what I can remember the idea began with the title. I had one of those strange, day-dreaming type questions, what was Father Christmas called when he was younger? ‘Boy Christmas’? ‘Child Christmas?’ ‘Son Christmas?’

‘Kid Christmas’.

It just sounded perfect, it sounded like a Superhero’s name. I really liked it.

So, as usual when the first spark of an idea strikes I started doodling in my sketchbook. This is a very exciting point in a project where the possibilities are absolutely endless. The story can go anywhere. Its exciting, but these quick little sketches- which I always assume will never be seen by anyone but me (and here I am showing you all)- are always, incredibly, outrageously scruffy. But thats kind of the point I think, those first drawings are quick and urgent (and look like they were possibly drawn by my dog).

And here they are….

Concept Art

The idea sat brewing in my mind for a while. And even though it was nowhere near formed I decided to tell Katie-my editor at Frances Lincoln Children’s Books- all about it. She was also excited by this first little nugget of an idea and asked if I could mock up some artwork. This is the kind of thing that you have to do to get the powers that be at publishing companies on board with a project, especially as all I had at that moment was the aforementioned scruffy sketches.

The image that I created was this one:

I really liked the idea of the story being set in a Victorian era. When I think of the perfect looking Christmas I see the snow capped rooftops of a Dickensian London. Like a lot of people ‘A Christmas Carol’ is one of my favourite books, and the image of Christmas that story presents was definitely the look I was hoping to capture. Also, the recognisable character of Santa that we all know and love- the big beard, big red coat, etc was first depicted in the mid 1800’s so it just felt like the right time period to set this story in. I wanted this first piece of concept art to very much capture that Victoriana feel, and I think that it does.

Thankfully, Katie and the other kind folk at Frances Lincoln Children’s Books agreed that it was an exciting idea and based on this first initial visualisation and a handful of possible story idea notes the the project was remarkably given the go ahead.

Which was amazing! And please note, it doesn’t usually happen this way. I would recommend having at least an outline of a narrative to go along with your concept art and sketches, before pitching your idea to a publisher.

But yes, the story.

Chiselling Out A Story.

I had a main character, a concept of sorts, a setting and a great deal of support from my incredible publisher. Now I just needed the most important thing. An actual story.

Again, I went back to my Sketchbook. I started to think about the sub-characters. Who would Santa have in his life at this point? How would he be able to get hold of so many toys? Why did he decide to dedicate his life to delivering all of those toys to children every single year?

The idea of Santa’s uncles being toymakers and owning the Claus Brothers Toyshop quickly developed and, through more scruffy sketching, I started to slowly chisel the narrative out.

Thumbnails

Once I had the basic outline of the story in my head and in note form, I started to piece the pages together through-once again- very, very scruffy ‘thumbnail’ sketches.

Again, this stage is really exciting as the story really starts to form and some big decisions about structure, plotting and pacing start to take place. The thumbnails give me a good idea of how the story could flow and what information to include in each spread. Despite the fact that so much of it will still change in time, this step is the first true visualised version of the whole book. It’s an opportunity to see it on page, not just in my head.

Here are a few of the thumbnails. If you have the finished book you might be able to see the pages that these little doodles eventually became.

So, as we have deciphered the key word for all of these stages seems to be ‘scruffy’.

For me being very scruffy and quick and loose with my drawing during this stage helps me bring the ideas out. Theres an urgency and a freedom to it where there are no creative barriers. At this stage everything is scribbled down with no inhibitions. No one is going to be looking at the quality of the drawings, their sole purpose is to be the first building block of a bigger-hopefully slightly tidier- project.

Which brings me on to the subject of Part 2’s post, which will look at the first, official ‘Rough Draft’ of the book and the all important cover sketches. This stage is were other people- including my editor and art director at Frances Lincoln- will actually need to see what I am doing and offer feedback on the sketches that I do. So the pressure builds a bit here.

Gulp. What a cliffhanger :)

Keep an eye out for Part 2 coming in a few days.

Thanks for reading all x

Kid Christmas Sketchbook Part 2 Coming Soon.

Brrrrr.....a snowy couple of days here in the Shire 

Absolutely blown away to see that 'Cress Watercress' is one of The New York Times @nytimesbooks Best Children's Books of 2022   @Candlewick @BrightAgencyUS Congrats all x

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/08/books/review/the-best-childrens-books-of-2022.html

Make Your Very Own Kid Christmas Tree Decoration

CHRISTMAS QUESTION #4:

DO YOU KNOW WHO SANTA’S LITTLE HELPERS REALLY WERE? READ MY NEW BOOK ‘KID CHRISTMAS: OF THE CLAUS BROTHERS TOY SHOP’ TO FIND THE (Absolutely, definitely, maybe True) ANSWER 🏠🎁🎅 (look out for another #ChristmasQuestion in a day or two 🤗) #kidchristmas

More Reviews to shout about 🎅

This past week there have been some exciting and lovely reviews for ‘Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toy Shop’ both online and in print.

Here are a few Highlights....

The Independent Newspaper Best Christmas Books

Thank you to The Independent Newspaper for picking 'Kid Christmas' as your BEST OVERALL Christmas Book for Kids and for the really lovely review. I am over the moon :)

You can read the whole article -which includes all the other AMAZING books in the list- HERE or see below for the review…

Also, this past weekend ‘Kid Christmas’ was chosen as one of the TOP 100 BOOKS OF THE YEAR by The Times Newspaper.

And then there is this very lovely piece on the excellent Mini Travellers Blog as part of their Brilliant Books for Kids this Christmas List:

Thanks to all the reviewers and bloggers. Don’t forget, if you would like to write your own review of ‘Kid Christmas: Of The Claus Brothers Toy Shop’ you can on places like Amazon, Goodreads, Waterstones, etc…all are greatly appreciated and help spread the good word of book around the internet.

Thanks for reading all. More soon.

David :)

CHRISTMAS QUESTION #3: 

DO YOU KNOW WHY WE LEAVE CARROTS FOR SANTA’S REINDEER ON CHRISTMAS EVE? READ MY NEW BOOK ‘KID CHRISTMAS: OF THE CLAUS BROTHERS TOY SHOP’ TO FIND THE (possibly not true but maybe also absolutely true) ANSWER 🏠🎁🎅 (look out for another #ChristmasQuestion in a day or two 🤗) #kidchristmas