A lone cougar hides in the darkness of the penultimate page in the latest book partnership from a Victoria author and Tofino artist.
Sixth in the bestselling, award-winning book series from Harbour Publishing, A Flock of Gulls, a Chorus of Frogs, by Roy Henry Vickers and Lucky Budd shares vibrant art and a poetic tale weaving group names for creatures found on the west coast.
Rhyming text takes the reader on a journey with orcas in a pod, sea lions in bob and a galaxy of starfish, but for Budd, the writer in the endeavour, “earth of foxes” stands out, both because of the word, and the work Vickers came up with to illustrate the line.
“I’ve never seen him do anything like that, every time he came up with something new it was the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen.”
The journey started years ago for Budd, a Victoria historian and writer, and Vickers, a renowned Indigenous artist and storyteller who graduated from Oak Bay High. Sitting together at Vickers’ Hazelton home overlooking the Skeena River on an August evening, with eagles soaring overhead Budd wondered if they could share the beauty of the West Coast with the three young children playing on the lawn in front of him. Something they could take away.
They started in 2017 with Hello Humpback! which rapidly became a bestseller. They’ve followed up with several young reader books – A is for Anenome; Sockeye Silver, Saltchuk Blue; One Eagle Soaring; Raven Squawk, Orca Squeak – supporting both early literacy and children's awareness of the natural world.
The nationally best-selling series has sold more than 100,000 copies.
A Flock of Gulls, a Chorus of Frogs also features tactile, embossed pages to help bring acclaimed artist's west coast images to life. As Vickers frequently notes, the books target readers one to 100, and in this book readers discover flying geese make up a wedge.
“We’re all children and a lot of our healing has to come from where we go back to help the child we are walk through a healing door they haven’t been through yet,” Vickers said. “It makes it easy to relate to children, when your inner child is still active.”
Having already dipped into colours and numbers in previous books, learning about things like a group of sea stars being called a galaxy was an exciting endeavour for writer Budd.
“The deeper we went the more fun it was,” he said. “It was so unbelievably fun to figure out and learn all of these things.”
As the duo whittled down the 20 poetic lines and images, Vickers fought for elk and suggested the lone cougar, in part to honour his grandfather Henry Vickers who started teaching him the ways of the natural world more than 70 years ago. The elder Vickers evaded residential school and had no formal education, but raised a family of nine, fishing, hunting and trapping.
“His skill in the outdoors rubbed off on me,” the artist said.
Budd sees the impact on ever piece art Vickers creates, whether an obvious nod to the trapline, or the more ambiguous way the wind moves the water in an image.
“When you work with Roy, the joy of these things is an image will come and he has a deeper sense. There’s always something deeper embedded in the artwork,” Budd said.
The cougar in part comes from being a lifelong hunter and an outdoors person. Vickers once heard a sound that made him consider the stories of Sasquatch screaming in the bush.
“It was really weird and eery and scary … then I saw a huge cat – in heat,” he said. “It helped me to realize just how often cougars see people and people never see them.”
A Flock of Gulls, a Chorus of Frogs from Harbour Publishing is available in all the usual places.
