1: Artists have bills

If I could live on love alone then I absolutely would! Sadly, I do have to pay my bills and buy food (I mean, a life without cheese, chocolate, and wine would be a pretty sad life after all!) If I don’t charge for my services, then I will need to work a full-time job as well as working evenings and that makes a very tired, grumpy, and uninspired Zoe. Trust me, no-one wants to see that.

2:You get what you pay for

You probably wrote your book because you love it right? It might be a subject close to your heart, inspired by your children or even your dog! By using an inexperienced illustrator, you’re not giving your book the chance to shine! By hiring a free or low-cost illustrator, you’re possibly getting someone with little to no experience illustrating books, or someone that cannot devote large amounts of time to your book.

3: Trust

Trust is so important when working with an illustrator. You need to know that all images used in your book are completely original so you don’t run into copyright issues further down the line. Can you imagine how heartbreaking it would be if you found out AFTER you published your book that half of it was clip art taken from the internet 🙁

4: Publishing your book should be fun!

You should be enjoying this journey with your illustrator, and you should be excited whenever you see an email or Facebook message! You should be doing a little hop and a dance every time you see a sketch or concept idea.  You definitely should NOT be pulling your hair out and crying into your wine.

5: I’m really sorry, but you really Do judge a book by its cover.

I know we all say we don’t, but we do, of course we do! That’s why it’s my job to make your book look all important and interesting when sat on the shelf at the book shop! But if you have a book where your audience can’t read the title, or it looks unloved and rushed, then how can you expect them to pay their hard-earned money for it? For your audience to love it YOU have to love it too!