I was so lucky to catch up with up-and-coming author-illustrator Angie Kang about her debut picture book Our Lake. I hope you enjoy taking a look at this beautiful, sweet book with us and how it came together!
About the book:
Today, Brother is taking me up to swim in the lake like Father used to.
I want to thank him for bringing us here, but I can’t find the words.
Instead, I loop my arms around his torso, and he does the same back.
Here, in our lake, the water holds us close.
On a sweltering hot day, a little boy mirrors his brother as he takes off his shirt, stretches, and walks toward the edge of the tall rock, ready to dive into the cool lake waters glistening below. Only this time, Father is not here. And the water looks so far away. How can he take the plunge?
Peek underneath the dust jacket:
And check out the endpapers:
Let's talk Angie Kang!
LTPB: Where did the idea for Our Lake come from? Why did you choose to tell this story?
AK: Our Lake actually began as an exercise! Sometimes before writing, I warm up by drafting quick, no-pressure ekphrastic poems based on paintings I like. One day, I came across the painting "Quarry Bathers" by Milton Avery. I dashed off a quick narrative poem that began with “Brother takes me to go bathing in the quarry”—similar to the opening of the book, but not quite. It was a totally different piece then: My poem told a fairly straightforward story of two that culminated in the speaker diving into the water and thinking his reflection is another person reaching out toward him. Retrospectively, what was interesting about the poem is how I had excised an entire character from the piece upon which it was based—Avery’s painting features three figures, but my poem only had two. I really had no intention of doing anything with the poem, but I shared it with my husband after I had finished, and he told me I should try to turn it into a picture book. It wasn’t there yet, he clarified, but it had the bones of something promising.
I had been working on several picture book manuscripts at the time, but nothing felt right. Looking back, I realize that I had been subconsciously changing my register when approaching text for children. While keeping an audience in mind is important, I was writing what I thought children’s books sounded like without staying trusting to my sensibilities or voice. Only when I wrote without expectation did something come out that felt true. Maurice Sendak said it best: “I don’t write for children. I write, and someone tells me ‘That’s for children.’”
When my husband told me that I had finally hit on something, I returned to revise with renewed inspiration. In editing, I started paying attention to the figure that I had removed from the story. What if his absence was itself a presence? At the time I wrote this poem, someone in my life had lost someone important to them. I don’t think I was consciously writing about their loss, but grief was certainly on my mind. There are so many things that can shape art, and so much of it is unconscious—only visible in retrospect.
In the subsequent draft of this book, I decided that each brother would have separate experiences with grief. The book is told through younger brother’s point of view, so we have more insight on his emotional journey and understand that his newfound fear of the lake stems from his sadness. Conversely, I wrote older brother to be a boy who hides his pain. Throughout the story, he attempts to stand in for Father—he guides his younger brother to the lake, models the rituals of disrobing, stretching, and diving, and encourages his brother to come into the water after him. He literally wears Father’s hat! While he acts as solace for his younger brother, he is still hurting in private. It isn’t until later in the book when little brother realizes his older brother might be grieving as well do the two come together and offer comfort to each other. Grief is heavy, better shared together.
In addition to adding the layer of Father (and his absence), I also later changed the quarry into a lake as quarry swimming can be quite dangerous. Many details ended up different from the initial poem, but in the end, the brothers were still brothers, the dive was still a dive, and the reflection at the end of that first poem began to carry more meaning in the final book.
LTPB: Can you talk a little bit about the visual evolution of the book? As you got to know the characters and found the right tone for the book, how did your illustrations evolve?
AK: I think what enabled me to find the voice for the story was ironically what held me back in the visual art. Because I was inspired by Avery’s painting, I envisioned the lake as a similar sort of place—a sharp landscape with a steep cliff edge. When I sketched it out, there was hardly any foliage around the lake—just a bald stone and deep water. I was really attached to that nonexistent lake. And when it came to fleshing out the location, I tried to find a lot of reference for this lake I was imagining. But of course, there was nothing I found that was quite right. I eventually had to let go of referencing a literal place and give myself permission to make the space up completely. And in doing so, I felt more free. I started adding foliage here and there, designing trees with unusual colors and having fun with the process.
I did two rounds of sketches—the first when I shared my dummy, and the second when I was trying to clarify important decisions like colors and value. Compositionally, I shifted things around too, but that wasn’t always for the better. Sometimes the sketches would go through several changes just to end right back where they started!
For the flashback scenes, I wanted the past to be tinged red—like how sun looks when you close your eyes. The past actually has more naturalistc colors than the present, which is infused with purples in the shadows and water. When she saw my color sketches, my brilliant editor Namrata Tripathi pointed out that shift can speak to how grief alters a landscape, and how it can make even a familiar landscape feel strange and unfamiliar. After hearing that, I really leaned into that!
Also, last minute, after all my paintings had been scanned, I decided I wanted to add a little red bird to accompany the boys on their journey to the lake. As red is the color of Father’s hat (and the color that tinges his past) I wanted this bird to show how Father would still be with them in these small ways: even in a hat, even in a bird. Last minute, I drew a sheet of red birds to digitally add into select scenes, notably the one where younger brother finally soars! (On the same sheet, I also drew a polaroid of the boys and their father, just for fun. It ended up appearing on the copyright page.)
LTPB: What did you find most difficult in creating this book? What did you find most rewarding?
AK: Going into this, I had a lot of preconceptions about what one “has to do” when making paintings that I had to unlearn. For instance, professors had told me that you “have to” paint larger so that when you shrink it down to print, everything looks tighter. I made a few paintings at 120%, but it was tricky for me to get the same marks, details, and feeling from my sketches. I like to work small in my personal paintings, and I felt I had to ask permission from my editor to do so (which I literally did. She said yes). I ended up working at 80%, which helped the art feel even looser and the texture more apparent. Later I was surprised to learn that what I had been doing wasn’t illicit, but rather a fairly commonplace practice for many artists! While putting together these illustrations, I realized there’s no right way to make a book—just whatever gets the best result at the end.
This may be less of an interesting process, but I also found the color matching to be difficult! In the beginning, the colors weren’t scanning right. Though I had committed to having a lake that looked nearly violet, the initial scans were looking far more purple than intended. My wonderful art director, Jasmin Rubero, was tireless in her efforts to get the colors just so. It was a lot of back and forth with test prints and edits, and I’m enormously grateful for her attention to detail and eagle eyes!
LTPB: What did you use to create the illustrations in this book? Is this your preferred medium?
AK: I used gouache, Caran D’ache crayon, and Prismacolor colored pencil for this book, which is what I typically use for other illustrations. I like having a mess of supplies all laid out in front of me so I can grab whatever I need at the moment. I also appreciate the texture of drawing utensils and how crayon in particular can melt into the paint. Gouache in particular is so portable, versatile, and dependable. These days, it’s my favorite medium to work in.
I used only paint in oils, but I have trouble scanning it properly, and both the drying time and fumes make it a bit prohibitive in an apartment-space. Maybe someday I’ll return to it, but for now I’m really happy with my toolbox as is.
LTPB: What are you working on now? Anything you can show us?
AK: I’m working on Navigating Night, a book written by the inimitable Julie Leung (Anne Schwartz Books)! It’s about a girl and her Baba who deliver food together at night and over the night, reach an understanding together. It’s a really touching story that makes me think of my own father and our many hours together in the car. I’m stretching myself with these illustrations. As the book takes place over the course of a night and largely in a car, it’s a departure from the imagined lake in the hot sun! I’m able to explore things I wouldn’t have naturally gravitated toward, and I feel so lucky to be illustrating this one. Hoping to share some work from this soon!
I’m also working on my next author/illustrator picture book with Kokila loosely based off of my life. It’s also a change from the fictionalized Our Lake, and I’m really excited about this new, personal direction.
LTPB: If you got the chance to write your own picture book autobiography, who (dead or alive!) would you want to illustrate it, and why?
AK: Wow, it’s tough to pick! I’d have to choose Lisbeth Zwerger, whose work was foundational to my understanding of composition and mood. I love how she can reimagine beloved texts (her versions of The Wizard of Oz, Swan Lake, and The Nutcracker immediately come to mind). I’d be fascinated as to how she might take my life and defamiliarize it to me as only she could—thereby making it seem more interesting and whimsical, I hope!
A lake-sized thank you to Angie for taking time to answer some questions! Our Lake publishes from Kokila TODAY!
Special thanks to Angie and Kokila for use of these images!
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