The Little Indian Runner Children’s Book
I had the great privilege and honor to illustrate this children’s book for a Native American author from the Comanche Nation. It’s a sweet and lovely story that all young kids can enjoy!
The book is titled, “The Little Indian Runner” and features a young Native American boy, who just LOVES to run! It follows his journey of running from place to place in his village.
As with every book I illustrate, I always start with character style sketches for the main character, to show a few different looks for the book. I wanted to be particularly sensitive to the depiction of the characters in this book, as so many cartoon depictions of Native Americans in the past have been inappropriate. I spent a lot of time talking with the author and asking him about his Tribe and his preferences in cartoon styles. These are the 3 style sketches I presented to him for consideration.
And this was the author’s favorite choice. Option 1 with some adaptations of the patterns of his outfit to fit more closely with the Comanche Nation.
After the author approved the final character sketch, then of course, I finalized the boy in color. I made sure to use the colors he requested to best represent the Comanche Nation. I decided to keep a little bit of a sketchy look to the linework for this book.
After establishing the main character, then I start prepping my art files with the interior text and begin planning out interior pages. Since this book had minimal text, there was more left open for interpretation for the illustrations. I suggested that perhaps the boy is running from place to place within his villiage. And we see him getting tired as he heads back from the farther parts of the camp, leading up to him falling asleep on the final page, as written. The author loved that and I was able to rearrange a couple stanzas to fit that illustrative storyline more.
Here is another example from the interior sketches. The little Indian Runner running alongside a painted horse in the corral. I purposely left the author’s text off of these, but when actually working with the client, I have the manuscript placed on each sketch so the author or publisher can see it as a whole.
And here’s just 1 more sketch example. This is closer to the end of the book, when the Native American boy is getting sleepy while walking back home, with fireflies (or lightning bugs) in the night sky.
After getting the entire book sketched out and approved by the client, then I start finalizing the illustrations with color and shading. Here’s the illustration of the Little Indian Runner in his tipi, hugging his mother with his siblings close by. With all the pages of this book, I took great care in researching proper items to include and every page was reviewed and approved by the Native American author. It was very important to me to give great respect and honor to him and his heritage.
This might be one of my favorite pages within the book! I loved drawing this painted horse!
This is another special page to me, as this is where the boy runs to visit his aunt and uncle. It made me think of all the wonderful visits we have with our own nephews and nieces! Plus, it was fun to draw the canoe in particular.
I suppose almost all of the pages within this book are special to me, haha! I thought a lot of my grandmother with this spread. I am not Native, but my grandparents really admired Native American culture and invested a lot in purchasing artwork from Native American artists. They also taught me a great deal about their culture and took me to many events celebrating their heritage. So naturally, there is a lot of heart in this interaction between the boy and his grandmother on this page.
And as I mentioned, as the book goes on, the sun starts setting and the Little Indian Runner gets more and more tired as he heads home. I loved illustrating the colors on this page with the sunset reflection on the water!
And sharing just one more page (it’s hard not to want to share them all!) Our boy is getting even more sleepy as he watches the lightning bugs in the night sky. It was really fun to draw all the fireflies and add the glow to them!
Here’s the cover of The Little Indian Runner. It’s a great wind-down book for reading to your kids at bedtime. And a wonderful way to introduce them to Native American culture if you are from another background. You can pick up your copy today on Amazon or Barnes & Noble, or wherever you buy your books online.
Oh! And one final update! This book has been doing GREAT online! It’s been the #1 new release in it’s categories on Amazon for quite a long time! I’m so excited that it’s being so well received! Hope you love it too!
And if you have a book that needs illustrating, I’d love to talk with you! I work with publishers and also independent authors. And unique, different stories are my favorite to illustrate! Feel free to click the button above and reach out to me.
