© Freya Blackwood, illustration from Amy & Louis, text by Libby Gleeson, Scholastic Press for Scholastic Australia, 2006. Watercolour on paper, courtesy of the artist.

Illustrator Freya Blackwood describes how she created the world of Amy and Louis:

'I love creating characters and having them live with me for while. I enjoyed creating the little suburb that Amy and Louis lived in, with its beach and shops and lovely houses. I like the challenge involved in solving each page. There are so many solutions to each problem, but finding the appropriate one – the one that fits with the story, all the other pages, the style of the book – sometimes it takes weeks to solve these problems, months.'