The Making of Kooky Pets book. Chapter 9
Now that the Kooky Pets Team is set up, it’s time to introduce you to one of it’s most illustrated members: Sir Arne Zackleton.
Let me take this opportunity to unveil just a little more about the Kooky Pets Team. You know that the team is formed by a group of erudite and scientist but I didn’t tell you that they’re all a bunch of mites. Yes, mites, you’re reading right, the tiny guys that live inside your mattress. But these are not regular mites. They are devoted to the research and study of the Kooky Pets and they spend their lives located in their bodies just like parasites. Oh, but don’t you worry: they don’t suck their blood. They only watch them in microscopic silence.
As I said in a former post, this is the only member of the Kooky Pets that I’m showing until the publication of the book. The rest of characters look in the same style as this. As a matter of fact, Sir Zackleton doesn’t belong to any of the collaborators. I created it myself because I needed a couple of extra characters to feature some comments on the book.
Let me share with you a little of about Sir Zackleton. To create him, I’ve been inspired by a man who I profoundly admire: the Irish explorer Ernest Shackleton, who led an epic journy to Antarctica in the early 19th century. If you don’t know about his odyssey, I suggest you to read the book “Endurance” by Alfred Lansing. It narrates the amazing experience of a group of explorers fighting to survive in the most inhospitable circumstances after their ship was trapped by ice in the Antarctic.
This real story is one most vivid lessons about the power of courage, hope and determination I have known. So when I feel upset about how my career as an author and illustrator is developing, then I like to think of people like Ernerst Shackleton and I find the inspiration.
By the way, the character’s first name, Arne, is also a tribute to another man that I admire. If you haven’t guested yet, it’s from Arne Saknussemm, a character from Jules Verne’s “Journey to the Center of the Earth”.
Now, you tell me, members of the Kooky Pets team. Where did you get your character from? Any tributes and hidden messages? Share your secret with us.
i love him! and what a great idea: silent, watching mites… i like how he’s very burly, with those little curly-cue feet. and his face has so much character to it! you can tell he has had an intense, full life, and that he’s paid attention to all of it…
fantastic…i love how you developed your character…i’m assuming this will be a personification of you in the book.
@ Steven- No, is not a personifiction of me. After all, I’m just the author. As I said, I’m doing a few extra characters becasue I need where to fit some comments from people who collaborated and then vanished away.
Also because I need an even number of characters so they can fit the page numbering. That’s what happens when you do a book, you have to make everything fit well, even if this means to make a few characters.
Madame Kuhn is a mixture of all i ever wished to be..with a hint of my mother and other women..i gave you plenty of lisence to create “me” as needed for the book..but i know you have visited my FB so know more
i wonder if my sons little pup Rebel the mastiff will show his face as an extra…he sure looks the part already!