The Listening Heart is a project I have been carrying around for a long, long time. First I have to applaud the characters that have been patiently waiting in my imagination for so long. Thank you all for sticking around. After a few false starts back when I was doing all of my art analogically (if that’s even a word) I decided to shelf the project because of the extremely daunting logistics of publishing a book. I did not have a computer nor did I have the agency to carry out a project of what I thought would take me a year to finish without a clear end in sight. After putting a few thousand miles on the publishing shoes I felt confident enough to dust off The Listening Heart and put it out into the world.
In the beginning, when the ideas for the book were just little sparks of possibilities floating around in imagination I felt like there was really a story to tell here. I was have been inspired by so many people, places and things in my life but this story definitely touched on particulars. First time I went to New York was mind blowing! Especially for an eight year old. I feel like that trip which was only a couple of weeks filled years in my head. The trains, museums, crowds, the zoo, coney island, chinatown, broadway, central park were breathtaking! And the sounds were amazing and everywhere. There was no quiet. Even the museums were noisy. Every time I thought of the little girl in the story (She did not have a name until I met a friends daughter—you know who you are!) I thought of New York and the huge impact it had on me. There would be a place for the cities influence on me in this story, I knew. But I also wanted this story to have a singular fantastic element that would embody all the experiences of New York and of another city I fell in love with much later. Austin Texas.
You can read the Full Story and access everything the in Listening Heart Studio on my Patreon page. Become a member and .in doing so, you become a part of this book and it’s story. Help make it possible and thank you for taking interest, Jim.
Original Pen and Ink Images
Emma’s City
Emma’s city is an inspired and heartfelt mix of my two favorite cities in the world: Austin, Texas and New York, New York.
Sketching out a Story
wherever I go I take a sketchbook with me. This is a sketch with a few story ideas intertwined. This is how most of the pages for the book start out.