This post was originally published on Picture Book Den, a blog about picture books by picture book authors and illustrators.
December is here again! So, following on from last year's quiz I thought I'd test your picture book knowledge with another Advent-calendar-like picture book challenge.
When I first started out in children's books, I was illustrating as well as writing. One of the pieces of advice my first agent, Gina Pollinger, gave me at our very first meeting was to study the work of successful illustrators and – in particular – how they drew their characters' eyes. "It's important to get the eyes right," she told me, "if you don't, the character won't come alive and children will not believe in them." Although I never really made it as an illustrator, this is still an excellent piece of advice to any budding picture book illustrator.
When I first started out in children's books, I was illustrating as well as writing. One of the pieces of advice my first agent, Gina Pollinger, gave me at our very first meeting was to study the work of successful illustrators and – in particular – how they drew their characters' eyes. "It's important to get the eyes right," she told me, "if you don't, the character won't come alive and children will not believe in them." Although I never really made it as an illustrator, this is still an excellent piece of advice to any budding picture book illustrator.
So, for this year's quiz, how many of these classic picture book characters can you recognise from the eyes peeping out from the Christmas tree foliage below? Click on each image to reveal the answer. To make things a little more festive – there's a common theme to the even-numbered images.
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8. (No – this one is not Homer Simpson's nipples!)
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How did you do?
| 10/10 | Eagle-eyed: Brilliant! You have 20/20 picture book vision. |
| 7-9/10 | An attentive pupil: A good effort. You know your Blake from your Briggs. |
| 4-6/10 | Not bad looking: But perhaps you should add some new reading glasses to your Christmas list. |
| 1-3/10 | Blinking awful: Are you sure you had your own eyes open? |
Follow the fiendishly funny exploits of evil-eyed über-brat Bradley Bartleby in my Christmas picture book, The Santa Trap, illustrated by Poly Bernatene and published by Macmillan Children's Books.
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