HERE WE GO ROUND
Shortlisted for IDI Graduate Awards 2022 in Illustration
Winner of Best Use of Illustration, TU Dublin, class of 2022
When you give things time, things will get better again. This is the idea at the centre of Here We Go Round, a simple story about learning life’s ups and downs, through the eyes of a little girl and her schoolfriend. This book aims to show little children the cycle of nature and life, and that if things aren’t looking up right now, they will with time. The main target audience for this book is children from roughly 4 to 6 years old, and is a wordless story.
The story follows a little girl discovering a magnificent tree in the autumn time. She delights in playing around it, finding the different life-forms that use the tree as their home and engraving her initials into the bark. Excited about her discovery, she decides to show a schoolfriend what she’s found- only to find the tree has by now lost all its leaves and seems to have lost its magic. As the winter passes, the little girl no longer goes to play by the tree. Oblivious to the arrival of spring, her schoolfriend beckons her to come with him to see that the tree has once again blossomed. The story ends with the two friends finally able to play together under their beloved tree.
The leporello format of the book was chosen in order to complement the cyclical nature of life. Technically, a child could begin to read from any point in the story and go from there and end up back where they started. This still works with the message of the story- that nothing, good or bad, is permanent, so things will work out eventually. It is an unusual format, especially for children’s books, that helps it stand out. The illustrations play off of the format in ways that wouldn’t be possible with a standard book format- for example, when the children are running from school to get to the tree, the characters seem to break free from the layout by literally running across the pages. This makes the experience of reading the book especially engaging for children.
