Hello everyone, and I'm back with a couple new announcements! I have illustrated the fourth and fifth Heroes to Zero books for Worldreader, a series of short stories for children aged 10-12 about climate change by Weslie Lechner, titled Heroes to Zero #4: More Clean For More Green and Heroes to Zero #5: Any Way You Slice It!
Shortly before I finished the third book in January 2024, Worldreader sent me the manuscripts for the fourth and fifth books in the Heroes to Zero series. As you already know, the first three books focused on Millie Brown, Lucas Sanchez and Lakshmi Gupta, and now, the fourth and fifth books focus on Amelia Evans and Asher Odinga! As with the first three books, I really liked the stories, and I couldn't wait to work on them. The end result was two books released on BookSmart that you can check out now! Below are the covers to the fourth and fifth books and their synopses:
Amelia Evans isn't one to take no for an answer, so when her proposal for electric school buses hits a roadblock, it's time to get creative! Will the Heroes to Zero climate club find the funds needed to give her proposal the green light? Buckle up for an unforgettable journey filled with unexpected turns.
When trouble brews at Woodrow Wilson Middle School, Asher Odinga's love for pies, pie charts, and peace offerings might just save the day. With the help of his friends, Asher cooks up a plan to convince the school to switch to electric buses. But will their efforts result in a sweet victory or a sour outcome?
On top of this, I've added links to the books' pages on BookSmart to the Heroes to Zero page, which you can check out here or access through the Books page. You may be wondering why the fourth and fifth books are much shorter than the first three books, and why I'm not announcing their releases in their own separate posts. You see, Worldreader has a challenge to release all of the books by the end of March. To make sure they get them done on time, the word and image count of the last seven books in the series are being reduced. However, there is a bit of crossover in these next two stories, including images that both stories share or are only slightly different between them.
You may also be wondering why Asher has been redesigned. You see, he featured quite heavily in the illustrations for the second book as a background character, but it made him look quite active in the club. However, as you read in the fifth book, he just starts warming up to it now. I wondered if Asher needed to be removed in the second book's illustrations or replaced with another character. Worldreader discussed it internally, but I had already colored everything in by the time they got to the first draft of his book. So, Worldreader asked me if I wanted to slightly change Asher's design instead, so that the "Asher" we've been seeing so far could be retconned as another student that looks like him.
But I felt that in order for readers to not think that the Asher that appears before Book 4 and the Asher that appears in Book 4 onwards are the same person, he would have to be redesigned much more significantly, which I wasn't willing to do at first. But then Worldreader explained that making changes to previous books would require further production time and costs. It would also create a new link to the book, breaking any previously shared links that Worldreader can't easily track and update internally or externally. But things like this sometimes happen in book publishing, particularly when developing a series with a separate author. But for all intents and purposes, the fourth book is Asher's actual first appearance, and I hope you like his new design! His updated official artwork can also be viewed on the Heroes to Zero page.
Are you interested in checking out what our favorite entrepreneur and baker are up to? If so, I'm currently working on the sixth and seventh books with Worldreader, though they're still in the early stages of development. So, be sure to stay tuned for when our aspiring environmentalists' next adventures are released!
Until then, stay enlightened, educated and entertained by all the solar panels and pie baking, folks.