These were pretty much the first sketches I did of all the different Graces and I just stuck with them. She was already pretty much formed in my head when I went to the drawing board so it wasn't that much of a challenge giving her visual life. What was challenging was making each of them distinctive yet have them look like the same person. With the 70-year old Grace, I pretty much just threw that out the window in lieu of goofy caricature. She did change quite a bit from conception to the cover though.The 70-year old Grace was particularly fun to come up with as I drew on my own halmoni (Korean for "grandma") for a lot of her characteristics. My halmoni has been smoking since she was 14. No joke. And that jacket she wears in the comic was lifted right off of my halmoni's back. One of my cousins spotted it right away. My halmoni is one of my favorite people. She's carefree, no nonsense, a voracious eater, and just generally seems to enjoy life. I hope to be like her when I'm her age.She always cracks me up too. Every time I see her, without fail, she'll nag me about getting married. In the grand Korean tradition. Just to get out of the conversation, once I told her jokingly that I couldn't because I just had too many girls to choose from. Without a pause, she shot back in Korean, "Bring them over to me and I'll pick one out for you!" Another time, I asked her what she would think if I married a Japanese woman just to see what she'd say. (In case you didn't know, Koreans of her generation are extremely prejudiced toward the Japanese having been occupied by them during the first half of this century. Hell, who can blame them after having lived through that?) She replied, "A Japanese woman is fine. They know how to treat a man right!" Err.... Speaking of the 70-year old Grace, one thing that I wonder about is how I'll percieve the book when I'm 70 myself. Unlike the other Graces, I haven't lived through her age period, so I was projecting more with that character than any other in "Good As Lily." Or in any of my stories for that matter. I wonder if I'll just think it was silly and presumptuous of me to think I'd ever know what it's like to be a senior citizen. I'm looking forward to finding out! Granted I live that long, of course.One last behind-the-scenes tidbit: The nicknames 18-year old Grace gives to the other three Graces -- Katie, Shana, and Jessica -- are the names of one of my uncle's three daughters, Katie being the youngest and Jessica being the oldest just like the Graces. I think one of the funnest parts of writing stories is breathing in bits of your real life into them.
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Tuesday, June 24, 2008
The Many Graces
These were pretty much the first sketches I did of all the different Graces and I just stuck with them. She was already pretty much formed in my head when I went to the drawing board so it wasn't that much of a challenge giving her visual life. What was challenging was making each of them distinctive yet have them look like the same person. With the 70-year old Grace, I pretty much just threw that out the window in lieu of goofy caricature. She did change quite a bit from conception to the cover though.The 70-year old Grace was particularly fun to come up with as I drew on my own halmoni (Korean for "grandma") for a lot of her characteristics. My halmoni has been smoking since she was 14. No joke. And that jacket she wears in the comic was lifted right off of my halmoni's back. One of my cousins spotted it right away. My halmoni is one of my favorite people. She's carefree, no nonsense, a voracious eater, and just generally seems to enjoy life. I hope to be like her when I'm her age.She always cracks me up too. Every time I see her, without fail, she'll nag me about getting married. In the grand Korean tradition. Just to get out of the conversation, once I told her jokingly that I couldn't because I just had too many girls to choose from. Without a pause, she shot back in Korean, "Bring them over to me and I'll pick one out for you!" Another time, I asked her what she would think if I married a Japanese woman just to see what she'd say. (In case you didn't know, Koreans of her generation are extremely prejudiced toward the Japanese having been occupied by them during the first half of this century. Hell, who can blame them after having lived through that?) She replied, "A Japanese woman is fine. They know how to treat a man right!" Err.... Speaking of the 70-year old Grace, one thing that I wonder about is how I'll percieve the book when I'm 70 myself. Unlike the other Graces, I haven't lived through her age period, so I was projecting more with that character than any other in "Good As Lily." Or in any of my stories for that matter. I wonder if I'll just think it was silly and presumptuous of me to think I'd ever know what it's like to be a senior citizen. I'm looking forward to finding out! Granted I live that long, of course.One last behind-the-scenes tidbit: The nicknames 18-year old Grace gives to the other three Graces -- Katie, Shana, and Jessica -- are the names of one of my uncle's three daughters, Katie being the youngest and Jessica being the oldest just like the Graces. I think one of the funnest parts of writing stories is breathing in bits of your real life into them.
