Every time we get an offer to do a book we feel super grateful and flattered that someone would want one of us to illustrate a book for them, but for many reasons we can’t say yes.

In this episode we get into the details of book publishing, including the economic, social, and career-building reasons we take on certain book projects, and why we say no to others.

Here are Will’s 10 Reasons for "Why I Can’t Illustrate Your Children’s Book.” Some of them deal more with submitting a book jointly with an author to a publisher, or self publishing a book; they are all things to consider and reasons for why you may want to second-guess saying yes to that person you sorta know who wants you to illustrate their self-published book.

1. Bad Protocol [5:40]

This question, about how to deal with people asking you to do their children’s book, is talked about often at SCBWI. The Most Asked Question: how do I find an illustrator?

Editors at publishing companies will tell writers, "You don’t need to find the illustrator, that’s our job." They take pride in this. One of the publisher’s major roles is to find the right illustrator and match them to the right manuscript. They have resources and lots of connections to find the best match.

Some people jump to conclusions and think that just because someone can draw and someone has a children’s book idea that they should be paired to work together, without doing research beforehand to see if they would be a good match. You wouldn’t go around prescribing medication to people before learning what their symptoms are and it's the same with writing and illustrating children’s books.

Publishers don’t want to be in an awkward situation where they love the manuscript but they hate the art, then they have to tell you and it can be something they just would rather avoid.

They have more art and manuscripts than they can publish.

They oftentimes will dismiss you, just because you are filing jointly, and the art is already done. As with everything, there are exceptions.

There are many other reasons as to why publishers prefer to pair the artists and illustrators. One marketing strategy they often use is to match a more veteran author or illustrator with a newer author or illustrator. A new author with a new illustrator, or vice versa, is too much of a financial gamble.

As you have more experience and become more well-known, you may have more power and influence over who you are paired up with.

Little Snowplow

2. Industry Perception [13:35]

Another reason Will would be hesitant to file jointly with an amateur or work on a self-published book is that it may affect publishers’ perception of him.

Even doing lots of projects on Kickstarter can look amateur. This is something that may be frowned upon merely because it’s a little more new. But sometimes books that started on Kickstarter can get picked up by publishers.

Even your online followers on social media has an influence on how much of an advance you are allotted.

One book that may be an exception to this :

Rick Walton Frankenstein book

They filed their book jointly and then 3 different publishers got into a bidding war over it. However, this is different, because they were two pros working together. So it’s not really an exception. We can’t think of an example of two amateurs who got a book published together that did super well.

3. I Don’t Know You [19:10]

When a publisher contacts an illustrator to do a book, the manuscript has already gone through a lot of rewrites. This is hard work and takes a thick skin.

However, if you contact Will to do your self-published book, he doesn’t know who you are and what you are like. Manuscripts always have rewrites and edits. It can take a very long time to complete the project. He doesn't know if you are in it for the long haul.

4. Award Submissions [22:32]

This is not super well known: Publishers, at their own cost, often submit books for awards, such as the Caldecott, the Dr. Suess award, state awards, etc.

It is a lot of work, they have to fill out all of the paper work and ship a couple hundred books to the right person at the right time.

Getting these awards is what helps the book take off. It gets more publicity, and starts to get bought and recommended by librarians. This is more for self publishing but is another reason that Will wouldn’t want to illustrate a book with an amateur.

Will has received 5-6 state awards. Jake has received a state reward. Lee received an ALA Award for a book: see link. And it made a huge difference.

I Lived On Butterfly Hill, Lee White

5. Reviews [27:06]
   Publishers have connections to get books reviewed. Which gets it on people’s radar.
   This is why I wouldn’t want to illustrate someone’s self published book. This doesn’t mean that a self published book can’t

6. Opportunity Cost [28:13]
   If you say yes to this children’s book is saying no to something else.
   It takes months to finish a children’s book and in the end there might not be much
   Average time to complete a children’s book: 6 Months. Jake, Lee, and Will can get a book done in less time but this is a good place to start.

If You’re Going to Partner or Work With Anyone, Be Clear About Who Owns the Rights to the Work. [33:16]

You need to go in with your eyes wide open.
Lee had an idea for a book that he brought an author on to help him write the story. He knew what the story was and was struggling with the words. So he brought this very very well known artist on. His assumption was that they would co-write the book and he would do the artwork. Her assumption, however, was that she was now the author and owned all the content, and that he was someone now illustrating her story. Long story short, It didn’t work out.

For any joint venture: have a clear expectation and maybe even a conference maybe even for a critique group. To protect yourself and them as well.

Ideas are not “copyright able.”

Be careful and go in with your eyes wide open.

7. Professional Production [38:24]

Honestly, if it’s the authors first time doing this, they don’t know what they are doing. And that can be another red flag as to why you shouldn’t do their children’s book.

Authors usually don’t know how to art direct and don’t have the skills to give art direction.

Lee’s Story:
Lee decided to help illustrate a self published book and he did some character sketches and showed them to the author. One of them was a anthropomorphic cow, and the lady said, “My mom would never wear that.” And then got into how the cow represented her mom and how it needed to look like her. Lee saw that there was all sorts of subtle things things like this and took it as a warning to get out of there and not do the book. Because it would be very hard to work with this author as an art director when they didn’t know what was important or how to art direct.

Then there are a whole bunch of things in the production side of things. Margins and type, etc.

Will will get these short emails from people telling him that they like his work and asking him if he will illustrate their book for them. And he wonders where their business proposal is.

8. Royalties [43:13]
   In creating all the art for the book, the author and illustrator are creating intellectual property (IP). And if the book takes off and becomes a big selling book, or a TV show, or a cartoon, or a movie, then the illustrator wants to go along for the ride and make money off of all of the things their IP is used for.

It’s hard to have a long career as an illustrator living off of just the advances received, you want to be getting royalties as well. You want to see books stick and generate royalties and income for the long term.

God Gave Us Christmas, David Hone

Lee was complaining about his small royalty check ($13), hoping to have company in misery. Then David Hone told him how much his check was (4-5 figures) and Lee was blown away by how much he had made.
Then there are the Brett Helquists who have funded their own retirement and their kids retirement off of all he royalties he’s made through Series of Unfortunate Events.

With self publishing there is a trust issue as to, how are you going to track sales and royalties. The publishers now have an online portal where you can login and monitor your book’s sales.

9. Distribution [46:53]
   This is a lot of work and for Will, Lee, and Jake something they have all dealt with doing their Kickstarters.
   Thousands of books take up space. They have had their basements and garages filled with books. Lee’s shipment of books was 2500 pounds, he literally had a ton of books. Now Lee and Jake have storage units to keep all their books. And 2-3 thousand books isn’t even a huge amount.

Jeff Smith, while self publishing “Bone”, ended up buying the house next door to house all of his