Wonder Initial Sketches - Penguin Books - Competition Brief

I began by sketching initial ideas for the book cover, considering particular scenes, themes and quotes. Ideas:

• To create faces out of the type for 'Wonder', adding hand drawn elements over the top to link to the 'school work' aspects of the book. August's face could be highlighted with a different colour over the top but it would also mean that other characters could also be included too. Which was something I set out to communicate.
• Another idea was to create 3 rows of shapes, to make up the 12 people in Auggie's class, and have them each different colours but all the same shape apart from one. This would be to indicate Auggie's slight difference from the others, but to also highlight how he is also the same. In some ways this felt like he was being painted as more different than he actually is and so the idea may need further development.
• The use of paper chains was also considered, to indicate kindness, naivety, connection and equality. Each person cut be cut slightly differently to again reference the other characters in the story. 
• Additionally, referencing a quote from the story, I thought it might be interesting to play with imagery involving masks - to suggest each character is wearing a mask of some kind and its what's underneath that counts. However, the few sketches I did of this came out quite sinister so it didn't seem appropriate for a children's book.
• Finally, considering another scene in the book where the children lead their parents around an exhibit in the school hall in the dark, I thought it might be interesting to have just the eyes of each child and parent visible - in a classic cartoon style. This would show everyone being viewed the same, which is what the book is all about. It would also mean that other characters would also be acknowledged - unlike the previous cover by Tad Carpenter.