My Strange Shrinking Parents: An Evening with Zeno Sworder
Zeno Sworder will chat about his newest picture book, My Strange Shrinking Parents,with fellow children’s book illustrator Phil Lesnie.
They’ll cover creativity, story telling, art processes, their favourite pencils and finish with a drawing activity!
My Strange Shrinking Parents is a heartbreaking and heart-warming story of the sacrifices parents make for their children.
It goes without saying that all children believe their parents to be strange.
Mine were unusual for a different reason…
One boy’s parents travel from far-off lands to improve their son’s life. But what happens next is unexpected. What does it mean when your parents are different? What shape does love take? And what happens when your parents sacrifice a part of themselves for you?
In this heartbreaking and heart-warming story, CBCA award-winner Zeno Sworder reflects on his own migrant parents’ sacrifices to create a universal story about what it means to give to those you love. Drawing from the sacrifices his Chinese mother made to raise her young family in a small country town, Sworder’s drawings are full of beautiful detail and fairytale settings that explore his own journey from child to parent.
With humour and pathos, Zeno reflects on the strange nature of giving and receiving love and celebrates those parents who embrace a hard life for themselves in the hope of a better life from their children. Full of depth and generosity as well as insight and candour, Zeno brings this gorgeous fable to life.
7pm arrivals for 7:05pm start.
RSVP in store, by phone: 02 9262 7996, email or via Eventbrite.
Fitted face masks are highly recommended when attending author events in the bookstore. If you are in need of a mask, one of our staff members can provide you with one.
Zeno Sworder is a writer and artist who lives in Melbourne, Australia. He is a husband, and father of two very creative daughters. He was awarded CBCA New Illustrator of the Year in 2021.
He has worked as a window washer, journalist, English language teacher, consular officer, tribunal advocate for refugees and immigrants and a jewellery designer. But he is most at home sitting at his desk drawing pictures and making up stories.
He is a lover of all stationary but has a particular soft spot for pencils.
Phil Lesnie is a Sydney-based illustrator of children’s books. They are also a children’s bookseller. It remains unclear if this is a conflict of interests. They often work in watercolour, and sometimes on an iPad; occasionally, without thinking, they will tap two fingers on a wet painting to undo it. Their picture book Feathers was short-listed for the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards, and their first three books were CBCA Notable Books in 2015, 2016 and 2018. But their first cat, Cassidy, is notable all of the time.