If I Had a Little Dream

A Spring 2017 Indie Next Selection

Nina Laden’s warm and lyrical picture book sees and appreciates through a child’s eyes how fortunate we are to live in the world we do.

Celebrate the wonder of the world in this reassuring picture book about the joy, love, and beauty that is part of each and every day. Our world is full of possibilities if you look for them.

Behind the Scenes with Illustrator Melissa Castrillon

This is the second page of the book, and I wanted to have two different shots of the girl in her house. I initially thought this would work best by having a close-up vignette on the left page and then to pan out and show the house and front garden in all its glory.

But I changed this for the final and decided that to pan into the scene would create a better mood and make the sequence flow better.

Composition is really important in my work, so for this spread I decided I wanted to create an image where you could see both above and below the pond.

In the final, I kept to the original composition, but my wonderful art director, Lizzy Bromley, suggested putting birds flying away on the opposite page. It’s a small touch but very effective, creating a whole scene over the two pages. Thanks, Lizzy! 🙂

Again composition played a key part in developing this page. The initial design was to have a small narrative within the spread, having the sister in the tree singing with the birds on one page and then singing the lullaby on the opposite page.

In the finished artwork, color was important in linking together the sister, the birds, and her lullaby. I chose the color blue because of bluebirds, but also because it’s a dominant color next to yellow, which is used the most throughout the book.

• Simon Schuster Paula Wiseman Books