Yesterday evening, illustrator Lisa Sheehan celebrated the publication of her first Nosy Crow picture book, Lionel and the Lion’s Share (written by our very own Lou Peacock who is the writing alter-ego of our head of picture books, Lou Bolongaro). Lisa shared her launch with lovely Paula Metcalf, whose book published by Oxford University Press, Dog in Boots, has also just come out (Paula is published by Nosy Crow, too: she illustrated Nothing Can Frighten a Bear written by Elizabeth Dale which we published last year). The idea of a shared launch worked so well: the community of people who love and work on picture books is close and small and pretty generous and kind to one another and so many of us were there to cheer both books on. Lisa and Paula had managed to bag the lovely Conigsby Gallery as a venue, and both of them had put such a lot of effort into the evening. At one point in Lisa’s book, Lionel the Lion swipes a lot of hats, so there was a fantastic display of hats.
Meanwhile, Paula’s sister had had a cookie cutter made in the shape of Dog, so there were dog biscuits (see what she did there?) as well as Lionel cupcakes all round. They signed and chatted for hours.
Lionel cupcakes and Dog biscuits
We first encountered Lisa’s work when she was on the excellent Children’s Book Illustration MA course at Anglia Ruskin University, and it’s so great, several years on, to be her publisher. The Financial Times has already reviewed Lionel and the Lion’s Share – here’s what they said.
Take a look inside the book:
Congratulations, Lisa and Paula!
