From the January/February 2010 issue of The Horn Book Magazine

Bubble Trouble

by Polly Dunbar

’m thrilled that Bubble Trouble has won the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award for picture book. What an honor! It is a shame that I am not with you today to join the celebration. Instead, I’m blowing you a great big bubble all the way from Brighton, England. I imagine this bubble bursting over you right now, full of thank yous!

My first thank you is to Margaret Mahy for all those beautiful words. When I first read the story, I felt so excited, as though I had been given a glorious gift. I know a good story when it gives me butterflies. I tried to tackle the pictures with as much joy and gusto as Margaret had obviously put into the writing. As I drew each character, the words floated around and around my head — it’s a real brain twister. I found myself pulling the most extraordinarily worried faces as the text got more hilarious and the predicament of the baby more serious. You can’t help but be swept along with this story.

Thank you also to Janetta Otter-Barry and Judith Escreet at Frances Lincoln who published the book in the UK. They gave me the freedom to illustrate this book with exactly the happy abandon it needed. I would also like to thank Jennifer Wingertzahn from Clarion for publishing Bubble Trouble in the States.

Last but not least, a huge thank you to the Boston Globe–Horn Book committee, who picked our book for this award. Hooray!

So although I’m not with you, I will be raising a glass of bubbly and hoping you will, too, and maybe we will all cause a bit of bubble trouble in a bibble-bobble way!

From the January/February 2010 issue of The Horn Book Magazine