Mischief Makers Jackie Morris and John Mitchinson In words & Pictures

Join Jackie in conversation with her publisher and friend, John Mitchinson while she summons one of her magical creatures into life on stage

Jackie Morris is an author and illustrator. She lives in a small house beside the sea in Wales, with cats and dogs for company. She studied illustration at Hereford College of Art and Bath Academy and has illustrated many books, and written some. The Lost Words, co-authored with Robert Macfarlane won the Kate Greenaway Medal 2019. In the same year she published The Unwinding with Unbound, and they have committed to re-issuing and re-designing her backlist beginning with Song of the Golden Hare (Sep 2020) and East of the Sun, West of the Moon (Mar 2021) and The Wild Swans (Mar 2021).

Accordion Books are an exciting new series created by Jackie Morris and published by Unbound.

An Accordion Book doesn’t open, it unfolds. One side is filled with beautiful watercolour images of an animal: sometimes in motion, sometimes at rest. The other is filled with text – poems, descriptions, invocations – inspired by the same animal.

Together they work as spell to summon the animal’s spirit. Jackie has painted them using antique watercolours, some from boxes which haven’t been opened for over 150 years, woken from their slumber with a single drop of water.

Beautifully produced at 152mm x 103mm, and printed on 440 gsm card, with foiled paper board covers foiled and a sleeve to hold the book snug, they have been designed by Alison O’Toole, who has worked with Jackie on all her recent books, including The Lost Words and The Unwinding.