I’m not sure where I first encountered Adam’s work but I immediately became a fan when I did. So has my son. His favorite bedtime story is the delightful ARE YOU SCARED DARTH VADER? On the surface and what immediately attracts you to Adam’s artwork is that he is a master craftsman. But what makes his work truly great is his ability to create images that connect and resonate with the viewer.
Adam has two books that just came out. (Talk about proficiency!)
THE STORY OF GUMLUCK THE WIZARD is a chapter book for 6 – 9 year-olds. It’s a fully-illustrated story of a silly little wizard who wants to be a hero.
A LITTLE LIKE WAKING is an illustrated YA novel about a young woman who discovers her life isn’t real life. She’s living in a dream, and she has to figure out what to do about that before the dreamer wakes up.
Adam has written and illustrated more than forty books for kids. These include New York Times bestselling picture books like Frankenstein Makes a Sandwich, and Chu’s Day (with author Neil Gaiman). His work has been adapted for film and television. And not surprising, he’s won a bunch of awards.
He lives in Tucson, Arizona, with his dog, son, and wife.
What is your favorite part/step of the process?
Well, I suppose I like the part where the idea or the story or the image is just something I’ve been thinking about a while, and I’m just sitting down to really get to it, and it’s still potentially the greatest thing I’ve ever made. That fades quickly. But I often like the process of sketching out characters. Knowing I need an aunt or an orangutan or a talking boat, and playing around with a hundred different looks for each until I fit together just the right set of characteristics.
What was the book or comic that you fell in love with when you were a kid/teen?
When I was eleven I read The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. It’s not traditionally a kid’s book, but it was just what I needed at the time. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s very funny—and that humor more often than not comes entirely from careful phrasing and word choice. THGttG was the first book I’d read where I really heard the author’s voice coming through, and it enchanted me with this idea that two sentences could be nearly identical in content but so dissimilar in character. That one could be head-and-shoulders funnier than the other with just a little care.
If there was a genie that would promote your work in any way you could imagine, what would that look like?
Do you remember some years back when Apple made a lot of people mad because the new U2 album had appeared for free in their iTunes and they couldn’t get rid of it? I’m probably drawing the wrong conclusion from that episode, but I’d want something like that. No big promotional ploy—just a genie that crosses their arms and blinks and then every kid has a copy of my new chapter book, The Story of Gumluck the Wizard. I would rather have readers than money.
I would, just to be clear, prefer to have readers and money.
You can find Adam and his work at:
Did you enjoy reading? Subscribe to The Kid’s Comics Creator newsletter and get articles like this directly in your inbox the first and third Wednesday of the month.
