I am thrilled to introduce Saki Tanaka and her debut picture book Between Words: A Friendship Tale. Saki was in my class at The School of Visual Arts (SVA) some years ago. Saki's talent and hard work and persistence was clear from the start. In our interview she generously shares her story behind her book and her journey to publication - she is truly an inspiration! From the Kirkus review: ''Through powerful visual storytelling, this exquisite tale makes clear that words aren’t necessary to develop a truly lasting bond... A pitch-perfect tale for shy friend-makers everywhere.'' Saki is an exciting new author and illustrator and I am happy to report that we already can look forward to her second book Nimbus Plays Alone out in early 2025!
The cover of Between Words: A Friendship Tale
It is exciting to hear about an artist's debut picture book – can you tell us about your journey from idea to publication?
WHEW. And what a journey it’s been! I recently found the very first draft of Between Words and it’s dated September 22nd, 2014. The book’s pub date is May 21st, 2024. It literally took ALMOST A DECADE from idea to publication, which is bananas. Though I’d heard that putting books out into the world can sometimes take this long (and I was stubborn enough to keep going), what I didn’t expect was how excavating this story would become a deeply introspective process full of swerves and curves that ultimately helped me find my sense of belonging in the world.
The earliest draft of Between Words dated 9/22/14.
How did BETWEEN WORDS get started? What were some of the stages of working on this book? What was your favorite part? And the most difficult part?
2014:
The initial spark was a moment of intrigue I felt upon hearing a radio segment about one of the world's deepest fresh water caves. It made me wonder what kind of beings might live there, and if it could perhaps be a portal to another world! The lack of visuals allowed me to dream up what this might look like, without getting tied down to any realistic depiction of the cave pool.
2014-2019:
A writing class I took at the local Y encouraged me to tell a story from start to finish (which I'd never done before, and never thought I could). I remembered the radio segment about the cave pool and decided to make this the setting for a story about a boy who had wanderlust, always chasing new horizons (based on a globe-trotting friend). I think this is my favorite part of the process, when an idea takes root and starts to percolate into a story. The thrill of it makes the more grueling (and for me the most difficult) revision part worth it.
An early sketch of Kai gazing out the window towards new horizons.
I worked on this manuscript on and off—the story never quite "clicking"— I remember this was around the time when I’d signed up for your picture book making class at SVA and you gave me helpful feedback on this draft. You’d pointed out various thematic and topical issues in the story that I’d left unaddressed. This was a big AHA moment for me because I started to get a sense for what I wanted this story to be and not be about. It was the nudge I needed to hit the first RESET button on a story I’d been tinkering with for about 3 years by that point. It was bittersweet but liberating!
My mind shifting back to this “open” mode finally helped me realize that the plot needed to center on my own lived experience, not my friend’s. The story finally started to feel right when I flipped the script so that Kai’s journey echoed my transient childhood. His core issue now mirrored my challenge as a kid, having to move from country to country and yearning to find belonging (the "write what you know" maxim rings true!). Concurrently, I’d continued to develop my illustration style and this gave me the confidence to sketch out some scenes from the story that had been swimming (ha) in my head.
Very early sketch of an underwater scene from Between Words.
An early painted underwater scene from Between Words.
Dozens of drafts and style shifts later, I got the rough draft (or “book dummy”) into good enough shape to query with, did a ton of research about literary agencies, and managed to connect with my dream agent, Linda Pratt, who represents my work now.
An updated underwater scene I submitted in my book dummy to Linda.
2020-2024:
Right as the world shut down because of the pandemic, our submission of what now feels like a very different version of BETWEEN WORDS was acquired by a magical editor, Kait Lee Feldmann, at Scholastic. The story was about too many things at this point (the importance of finding a home, familial connections, making friends) and Kait really helped me hone in on the heart of the book by asking me what memory and feeling fueled my need to tell this story. This question brought me right back to my first day at a new school, in a foreign country, feeling lost on the playground surrounded by unfamiliar faces and words—then seeing another girl who was also standing by herself. She smiled at me, so I waved at her and she waved back!
Little Saki, feeling lost on her first day of school in a new country.
This friendly gesture saved me as a kid. The relief I felt then (and the nervousness leading up to that moment) became the emotional core of this story, making the book about how small acts of kindness can help a friendship bloom without a common language, and how this can begin to foster a much needed sense of belonging for outsiders. Unlocking this puzzle was both the most challenging and gratifying part of making the book. Once we found this direction, I got to work:
1. I thumbnailed the story from scratch (there was a lot of back and forth at this stage, trying to hone in on the story beats and adjusting the emotional peaks and valleys to create tension):
The first set of thumbnails are just doodles, with the mood/emotions mapped on as an overlay.
The next set of thumbnails starts to consider scale, POV, composition and flow. It’s still pretty rough.
The final thumbnails are tight enough for me to scan and enlarge into a dummy PDF for the team to review.
2. I then did a number of value studies:
I usually do these quickly with cross hatching or gray brush pens. If a layout isn’t working I’ll take it aside and try multiple compositions and value studies till the foreground, middle and background start to coalesce.
3. I designed the characters and set up a turnaround:
Character turnarounds came in very handy. One mistake I made was not doing these in color, and thus painting Kai’s mermaid friend inconsistently. Turnarounds done in color would’ve saved me a lot of digital correction/painting time.
4. I sketched a lot to study form/shape:
5. I painted a lot to study color:
Cobalt turquoise, opera rose, and lemon yellow are my favorite primaries to work with. Schmincke’s granulating browns and grays are my favorite neutrals. I figured out the palette for the entire book before launching into finals.
6. I finalized the line art:
I carve these images out of a blank sheet using colored lead pencils, scan them, then clean up digitally. Once this line art gets approved, I print it on watercolor paper for the next and final step.
7. I painted the final art!!!:
I painted the first layers with watercolor, added details with colored pencils, then finalized the piece with digital correction, collage or clean up as needed.
What were you like as a child? Did you always draw and paint since you were very young?
My earliest memories of painting conjure up such a vivid sense of joy. I was probably three or four years old, wearing one of those plastic coated fabric smocks, dunking brushes into tubs of paint, marveling at the streaks I could pull across pads of newsprint propped up on easels three times my height. This physical thrill of mark-making has stuck with me to this day. I’m grateful because my father painted as a hobby and encouraged my budding interests. He also exposed me to fine art. I couldn’t get enough of the surrealists and my favorites were Salvador Dali and Remedios Varo. I was also one of those kids who was always looking for portals into fantastical lands, and arguably still am! I grew up loving Mexican and Japanese folk tales, western fairytales, manga, and anime (Ghibli’s Totoro and Castle in the Sky being the pinnacle of this obsession for little Saki) and this inspired me to make up my own stories that took place in magical worlds. I'd spend hours drawing, writing, and building these imaginary places into being.
Where do you live and what is your studio like? What are your art materials?
I live in Denver, Colorado. My studio is a cozy room filled to the brim with inspiration, experiments, treasures found in nature and thrift shops, books, books, and more books! My art materials include (but are not limited to) watercolors, colored pencils, multi-color lead pencils, crayons, pastels, and neon tempera paint (a recent favorite).
When/How did you decide you wanted to do children's books?
When I worked as a designer in a previous life, I often got comments about my design work being very illustrative. When I took general illustration classes, I got comments about my illustrations feeling appropriate for children’s books. This was when external encouragement overlapped with inner knowing and intuition: where could my obsessions for magical worlds, storytelling, and drawing pictures come together? Making kids’ books! It was such a “duh” moment I had to laugh, and still do in retrospect.
Did you have some rejections along the way? What have been some of the ups and downs?
So many! Collectively speaking, I believe I’ve gathered at least a dozen plus rejections of various book dummies. Rejections obviously never feel great, but I’ve come to believe and understand that it’s usually for the best. I shudder to think about some of my old book dummies getting acquired and being launched into the world—I’m genuinely glad this didn’t happen! The other positive to notice in these seeming negatives is that rejections often hide clues about how you can improve your story. One example of this was when an editor mentioned liking the back matter diagram of different cloud types more than the story itself for my book dummy about a rain cloud who lacked self confidence. I rewrote the entire book, incorporating different cloud types as secondary characters and this version of the book was acquired by Jess Harold (my second editor at Scholastic turned current editor at Macmillan)! I’m excited to share that Nimbus Plays Alone comes out February 2025.
Is there anything you learned back in class that has particularly stayed with you?
SO MUCH. Everything from finding inspiration, to working on craft, to opening third doors, to building community.
I loved how you brought interesting prompts to our classes that often became the beginning of new stories and illustration ideas. One of these was a small detail in the historical origins of “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” from which I developed a fun character and an entire book dummy, which ended up swaying my agent’s decision to represent my work.
You taught us how to structure stories and establish cadence through thumbnailing, as well as by reading and analyzing classic and contemporary picture books. Learning this skill really helped me bridge the visual and verbal lanes of my ideation and storytelling process.
It was wonderful to get to hear industry professionals (authors, illustrators, designers) that you invited to come speak to our class. Many of the learnings from these sessions, especially tips on getting your foot in the industry through “third doors” like RUCCL and CBIG editor reviews, have connected dots and propelled my path forward.
I found some of my first author illustrator friends through your class. Our critique group still meets bi-weekly to this day. (Hi Seeds!)
Do you have any special words of advice or encouragement for illustrators/writers starting out now?
If I had to boil it down to three things, they would align with what I mentioned above about things I learned from your classes all those years ago.
Be interested, be inspired, be intentional: Follow your curiosities (especially outside the field of illustration and kids’ books) and notice what you notice. Write them down. Also get in touch with little you. What did she/he/they most enjoy doing? What were they obsessed with? Journal about these memories and recollections. I find many of my story seeds through this excavation where a spark of interest about something in the world cross-pollinates with my own internal cravings. All of this groundwork then makes it easier for you to apply the “why am I making this?” filter—whether it’s to entertain or inform, to enchant or empower—be intentional about the countless decisions you make when creating your work. I find that my favorite picture books out there tend to be by authors and illustrators who seem to have clear goals that shape their visions.
Work on your craft over and over, ad infinitum: Read all the books, draw all the things, try all the mediums, make all the mistakes. Keep the mistakes you like and make them on purpose. Make a TON of work (takes the pressure and preciousness off of each piece) and be willing to rewrite, redraw, repaint the same story or scene over and over till the result makes your heart soar. I’ve only achieved this to its fullest extent a handful of times in my book making journey and it’s a natural high I will chase for the rest of my life.
Find your peeps: Community is everything. It’s what everyone says for a reason. By taking classes, joining writing groups, engaging in conversations at conferences, I slowly started to find kindred souls who also wanted to tell and illustrate stories for kids and kids-at-heart. Without this tribe of incredible book creator friends and the insights they shared, I wouldn’t have signed with my agent, met my mentors, or gotten book deals. I wouldn’t have been able to slog through rejection after rejection and revision upon revision. Some of these people have become my ride or dies, which seems like a small miracle for this introverted weirdo who was resigned to forever feeling like an outsider and a bridge burner. For me, making this book felt like remembering and going home to the “real me,” and the people (both inside and outside of the industry) that helped me along this journey turned out to be the souls I’d been yearning to meet all my life. It makes sense that when you’re doing what you love and expressing a deep truth about yourself, the right people naturally gravitate to you and you to them. And I think this is the best realization that’s come out of this whole journey.
Look for Saki's book at your favorite bookstore and library!
Visit Saki's website here: https://sakitales.com/
and Saki's instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/sakitales3
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