Stephen Michael King steps back from his growing number of artworks on a wall at Manning Regional Art Gallery in Taree.

This week he is working with author and friend Glenda Millard of Bendigo and together they are building a new storybook in a way they never have before – in front of an audience. 

“It’s been a nice opportunity to get started,” Stephen said, who has been working on ideas for the book for 18 months.

“It’s clearing out the millions of ideas in my head in a simpler place.” 

The project started when the pair were asked to tour the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne. The intention of the tour was to meet young cancer patients and their families to inform their contribution to a fundraising book with up to 32 other author and illustrators including Shaun Tan and Jackie French. 

But Glenda and Stephen felt emotionally stunted by the experience. 

“I just thought, these families are so incredibly brave – what have I possibly got to give them?” Glenda said. 

The pair contributed to the book, The Hush Treasure Book for the Hush Foundation, but they knew a bigger story was still circulating in their creative minds. 

It wasn’t until Stephen sent Glenda a song by Leonard Cohen that she was inspired to write a poem – the basis of the new book. The story follows the journey of a mother and child who are refugees, however as Glenda and Stephen explained this could be a metaphor for many things, including cancer.

“It’s about the journey to a place where they feel safe and loved,” Glenda said.

Stephen’s drawings complement Glenda’s lyrical writing style, such as:

 “I am the small green pea

you are the tender pod hold me.”

Glenda said, “the words and drawings are quiet, they leave space for interpretation and thought”. 

The new book is expected sometime in 2017. Their previous book The Duck and the Darklings was a recent winner at the Western Australian Premiers Literary Awards. 

MITCHELLS Island based illustrator Stephen Michael King has added another literary award to his collection.

Written by Glenda Millard and illustrated by Stephen, the book The Duck and the Darklings took out best Children's Book at the Western Australian Premiers Literary Awards. 

Stephen wrote on Facebook, ‘I couldn’t be happier’. 

“It's a great thrill when I'm painting a book and I watch it grow and grow into something more beautiful than I'd first imagined – artwork that surprises me even whilst I'm creating it,” he wrote. 

In Glenda’s speech she said, ‘the making of any picture book, is a partnership in which artist and writer seek to balance the visible with the invisible, to say more with less, to tell enough and no more, to respect the reader’s ability to imagine, resolve and satisfy’.

“From beginning to end, artist and writer teeter on a tightrope high above the safe, the explained, the practical and the acceptable, and the expectations and hopes of their editors, publishers and readers,” Glenda said. 

In an interview with the Manning River Times last year, Stephen said, ‘Glenda Millard is just fabulous with words’. 

He described her book as ‘playful and dark’. He said the darkness featured in the book isn't locked into a particular thing.

"It could be post apocalyptic or the dark could be in yourself,” Stephen said. 

In the book, the light shines through this book with cute characters painted on top of the darkness throughout.