I've been reading through some African children stories to find insperation and look what I can be expecting for myself to work it.And I must say that this is going to be very interesting!
Because, when I've read thourgh a few, I started to notice a pattern. And that pattern is that they all have a lesson to teach. I guess this is rather typical for children books, but what's suprised me is how they are teaching the children them. It's actually rather brutal themes in these books. They contained blood and death in a way stories for children never would have here in our part of the globe! People got eaten by wild animals piece by piece, or died by falling of cliffs or eating themself to death so that their belly kind of... exploded.
I showed some to my niece who is ten for that matter, and she just looked at them weirdly, kind of shocked she too. And this makes me wonder what kind of story I will be working with and if I will be able to get children interested in these kind of stories.
Art-wise I've almost started to panic. All these books ahve so many, and so detailed pictures! I'm not sure I will be able to pull that off. Maybe I'll do fewer more detailed pictures than I've planned, or that I'll do less detailed pictures, with focus on one or two objects/persons. I don't know yet, and I have to wait until I know what kind of story I'll work with.
