Petr Horacek

Original picture book artwork by Petr Horacek is available for purchase from Children’s Book Illustration.

The Mouse Who Reached the Sky is currently shortlisted for the Independent Bookshop Week (IBW) Book Awards 2016. Announcement on 17th June 2016.

The Mouse who Ate the Moon was shortlisted for the 2015 IBW Book Awards.

Puffin Peter shortlisted for the 2012 Kate Greenaway Medal “A dramatically beautiful picture book full of movement. Layers of colour and texture capture the movement of water, and of light, and of Peter and Paul themselves. A thrilling visual adventure for children, with a tender message.”

Petr grew up in Prague in the Czech Republic. He always wanted to be an illustrator, preferring to look at the pictures inside books rather than to read them. He would listen to the story or watch a film and then fill up his sketchbook with pictures and images from the story.

He studied at the Academy of Fine Art in Prague where he painted and drew for six years. Every autumn the students were taken to the countryside where they were left for a few weeks to paint and draw the landscape. This instilled in him a love of the season and the outdoors. One day an English girl came into his studio and before he knew it, he was living in England. They married and now have two daughters who are the biggest inspiration for his work.

His first books, Strawberries are Red and What is Black and White?, received the Books for Children Newcomer Award 2001 – the last recipient of this award. Since then he has written and illustrated numerous books and received many awards, including Picture Book of the Year 2008 in Holland for A New House for Mouse. Silly Suzy Goose was also on the 10 book shortlist of the award. A New House for Mouse was also selected for the 2008 Book Start pack which distributes 150,000 copies to new parents throughout the U.K. Butterfly, Butterfly was listed first in the Sunday Times list of summer reading in the 0-3 category, July 1st 2007. Silly Suzy Goose has also earned Petr this fabulous review in The Washington Post, April 9th 2006 ,”Czech artist Petr Horacek is one funny guy, as well as a natural-born teacher and a whiz with a paintbrush. Put him down as the thinking tot’s Eric Carle.”

View his fascinating blog about the creation of The Mouse Who Ate the Moon here