I USED TO BE AFRAID will be released in a few weeks. Here is a little bit of backstory on how the book came to be...
I USED TO BE AFRAID is a book about perspective. It's all in the way you look at things. In the case of our protagonist - this one little girl - she used to be afraid. Very afraid. Until she learned to change the way she viewed her world.
These are the book's first journal sketches from way back in 2007...
Sometimes a book needs time - time to be thought about. This one needed lots of time!
Finally, in 2014, it was time to create I USED TO BE AFRAID. The first step was to identify fears. The encircled fears are the ones that might work well as illustrations...
The art style went through many changes along the way. Every book's art is determined by its story. A brand new art style was created especially for this book...
Die-cut holes are incorporated throughout to illustrate each fear which, with a turn of the page, transform from frightening to not so scary after all.
The die-cuts were particularly challenging at times (or really, all the time!). For example, in "I used to be afraid of shadows", the die-cut hole is the little girl's shadow cast upon the wall. The shadow is the exact same shape as the girl, of course.
When the page is turned, the die-cut becomes the shadow of the girl's right hand in her heart-shaped shadow puppet, which is the exact same shape as her hand, of course.
But what this means is that her hand and her crouching body are also identical in shape!
And then there were the fears that never made it into the finished book - like "getting teased" and "heights" - in order to make room for deeper, more universal fears like "change" and "being alone"...
And sometimes, no matter how hard one tries, fears are simply impossible to overcome completely. Like how our little protagonist used to be afraid of her big brother...
And she still is!
Sometimes.
