some tractor relief

I’ve been a bit stressed out lately with deadlines (the most pressing being my picture book artwork for this spring’s Bologna book fair, a deadline which is… tomorrow!). But people have been very kind. Here’s a picture from Sam Reeve (who’s nearly eight), which arrived this morning.

His dad wrote: I told Sam how hard you were working, and he thinks what you need is a picture of a tractor, so he drew you one: it’s Steve Arrowsmith Brown’s, splitting logs.

And it’s true, a tractor was just what I needed! Look at the detail on this one, Sam drew it from memory. You can see another one of his fab tractor drawings here. Thanks, Sam!

And thanks, Dan Fone, for recommending what’s my new working music album of choice, How Strange, Innocence by Explosions in the Sky. (I’ve been listening to it on Spotify.) Alex Milway recommends the Parades album by Efterklang, particularly the song Cutting Ice to Snow, which sounds like it would fit nicely into one of his yeti books.