Stephen Player, Fantasy/Sci-Fi Illustration - Stephen Player

Fantasy Illustration

You may use this text as the basis of any type of illustration you like.

John Wyndham's

The Midwich Cuckoos

YOU MUST RESEARCH THIS STORY PROPERLY BEFORE STARTING YOUR VISUAL. FEEL FREE TO WATCH THE MOVIE VERSION TO BE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND THE PLOT. IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO BE ACCURATE.

The Author

John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Benyon Harris was born in 1903, the son of a barrister. He tried a number of careers including farming, law, commercial art and advertising, and started writing short stories, intended for sale, in 1925. From 1930 to 1939 he wrote stories of various kinds under different names, almost exclusively for American publications, while also writing detective novels. During the war he was in the Civil Service and then the Army. In 1946 he went back to writing stories for publication in the USA and decided to try a modified form of science fiction, a form he called 'logical fantasy'. As John Wyndham he wrote The Day of the Triffids and The Kraken Wakes (both widely translated), The Chrysalids, The Midwich Cuckoos (filmed as Village of the Damned), The Seeds of Time, Trouble with Lichen, The Outward Urge (with Lucas Parkes) and Chocky. He died in March 1969.

'And God said,"' quoted Mr Leebody, '"Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." Very well, then, what are these Children? What are they? The image does not mean the outer image, but the inner image, the spirit and the soul. What, then, are they?' (back cover blurb)

The village of Midwich near London is cut off by a mystery force field that lasts for about a day. Then, just as mysteriously, the force field disappears. The inhabitants have been to sleep for the duration and although they refer to the scientifically inexplicable event as the 'Day Out', village life quickly returns to normal. Except that several weeks later the women of the village all find that they are pregnant. The children are duly born and are as strange as their portents. Although generally looking human, their golden eyes, and the psi-powers of their hive-mind are not. Their mothers do their best to care for them, but they are hardly needed. The children grow at an incredible rate, becoming adolescents in a few years, and they learn even faster. As the villagers grow more afraid the men march on their house to try to destroy them

We are looking for an original and arresting illustration for the re-publishing of this 1957 Sci-Fi classic: The Midwich Cuckoos. The full color jacket should to appeal to the modern Sci-fi reader without directly contradicting the period of the piece. We would like you to concentrate on the unsettling nature of the central concept without giving away too much plot.

Image area: 5" by 7.5", portrait -. Full color, half inch bleed. Leave at least 3” suitable for text overlay.