children's book shop

I have recently discovered a speciality children's book shop just round the corner from where I live. I decided to go to one of their monthly meetings and that week they had guest speakers who are employees at Walker books also a member of our group already published by Walker, (you may recognise such titles like, Where's Wally? and Going on a Bear Hunt). It was really exciting for me, I wasn't expecting so much information on how to break into the children's book industry and learning about how much effort and labour of love that really goes into making them. One book which had highly detailed drawings throughout took 7 years to complete and publish. I was relived to find out that deadlines were not an issue with them as they would prefer that the book was the best it can possibly be.
The thing I love the most about children's books is the variety of different artistic styles and clever use of simplicity, especially when it comes to the younger clients that may not be able to read just yet and so need a simple picture that reads well and is not too much information to take in. It made me feel like I stand a really good chance of being a successful children's book illustrator/writer because I feel my strong point is my characters they can be very expressive and can easily be related to by people of all ages. My backgrounds/ scenery may not be very good or practised but from what I have learnt so far backgrounds are not so important, a lot of books I have seen don't have a background or scenery on every page in fact the plainer pages tend to illustrate more of what the character is feeling and thinking more intimately with the reader.
I feel so privileged to have a place so enthusiastic about children's books so close to home I can see that I will learn a great deal from them and can't wait for the next meeting!