His debut book, How to Catch A Star, is part of a series of books where the main character is known as “The Boy” - again going for less over more detail. His trademark is for people to have pencil stick legs and their faces have no real details, just dots for eyes and long noses that begin above their eye line. The illustrations are mixed media, with changing fonts and art that incorporates painting, drawing, and collage. I didn’t know much about children or the books they liked, but being an emphatic lover of lists and feeling excited about my new responsibility to help kiddos and their adults, I began some picture book recon. At the time, I was living in London and working at the Selfridges department store, specifically as a kids’ book section supervisor. When I discovered Oliver Jeffers’ books 10 years ago, I hadn’t read a children’s book since my own childhood. Jeffers never shies away from life’s big questions or from an unbelievable premise and it’s his mix of wisdom and humour that has contributed to his success as an author and illustrator. For instance, in This Moose Belongs to Me, the main character, Wilfred, learns that humans cannot really own a wild animal, even if said animal is excellent at providing Wilfred with shelter from the rain. That’s a line he often walks, perilous as it is, but he maintains it steadily.

While wiping away my tears, I thought that the film beautifully demonstrated what I love about Jeffers’ books: they exist in a world that’s cute and whimsical, but also so insightful and filled with occasionally devastating earnestness.

Recently I watched Here We Are: Notes for Living on Planet Earth, an animated film based on Oliver Jeffers’s picture book by the same name.

How to Catch a Star by Oliver Jeffers