Reading · Desk of Jade Johnson

In case you didn’t know, writing books is hard.

Sure, there are some writing prodigies out there. I believe Stephen King writes his books all in one go? But this post isn’t for him. He can get outta here (respectfully).

I’m writing this for other artists turned authors who have good ideas but realized, laptop open or pen poised, that maybe you don’t know how to write?

Or rather, you don’t think like a writer. Because if you’re anything like me, you need visuals to make sense of things.

POV: Me trying to visualize A Court of Thorns and Roses

If you also need pictures in your instruction manuals and maps on the end papers of those wordy fantasy novels, here’s how I’m writing my picture book, The Way Home, with minimal hair pulling:

Instead of jumping into my first draft, I brain dumped my entire story into a document. Nothing fancy, just a quick outline of how the story starts, the characters and their whereabouts from scene to scene, and the ending.
I then used the outline to thumbnail my spreads. At this point, I’m just visually moving the story forward. More than dialogue, I need the story to make sense from one spread to the next. I used this template from Debbie Ohi.

If my thumbnails were a movie, it would be called Everything Everywhere ~~All at Once~~ All Over the Place

Now I can create dialogue around my thumbnails. So far, working backwards has kept my writing fresh and makes sure the reader “gets it” from the story unfolding rather than over explaining myself.

I could also add easter eggs, which I personally love in picture books, and silly character lore that I might not have come up with otherwise.

I can’t promise this method will work for you, but I do have a pitch-able (fifth) draft now. I plan to comb through it one more time before getting my book dummy and a few samples ready for the July Unpublished Showcase, fingers crossed.

Subscribers will be the first to see how The Way Home is coming along, both to keep myself on track and because I can’t be the only one who loves watching projects come together.

What are you working on this week? Anything in particular? Tell me all about it!

How to visually write a picture book

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