Flooded: Winner of the Klaus Flugge Prize for Illustration 2023

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Working with an editor and art director can really help to push the story to its best, by asking simple questions like, “What’s the story about” or “What’s the point? They would also only drop off a case of books and leave us to run it – it was so lovely to have you on hand to chat to the children and recommend them books, as well as the small (but appreciated!

But as in this story if we leave it too late, the “clean up” will take longer and the consequences may be with us for far longer than necessary. All the animals ignore the obvious and go about their busy lives, disjointed from one another and preoccupied by their own problems. The story is relatively simple - a town is being flooded and the animals must work together to try and fix it - and the illustrations are captivating; there is so much to.

I think those years have been like training for me as an illustrator and doing the Masters in Children’s Book Illustration helped me to push to a different level that is more personal than when I was completing briefs for others.

In this story we see animals living with a problem, the water levels are rising and everything is getting flooded . This page is an allegory to the attitudes we have seen towards climate change over the years, and it only seems to becoming a more pressing issue as more and more people are adversely affected, through droughts, wildfires etc. For more details, please consult the latest information provided by Royal Mail's International Incident Bulletin.

It's also quite re-readable - on a second read through you appreciate the stoat/weasel/otter (not quite sure what he is) trying to get everyone's attention throughout the book to tell them what's going on.

It’d be lovely to hear of any little Easter Eggs (surprises) that readers can find in the picturebook? It was the second module on the course and it’s when I started to think about sequences and how a few images could tell a story.It was selected by the Unpublished Children's Books Showcase, as the third most voted project, with 29 votes from the jury. Can I be cheeky and ask for a tour of your workspace - it was great to get a snippet from your video. The drawings and diversity of the animal kingdom will keep younger minds guessing and pointing out different characters on each reading.