Kids' book author reaches deep for inspiration.

Byline: Carolyn Lamberson The Register-Guard

In Kurt Cyrus' latest picture book, deep, rich colors and intricate illustrations pop off the page, bringing readers a bit closer to the denizens of the sea.

The book, "Hotel Deep: Light Verse From Dark Water," tells the story of a lone sardine, separated from his school, and all the sea creatures that he encounters. The story is told in 21 short verses. `I don't even call it poetry," the 50-year-old Cottage Grove author and illustrator said.

Ripples of fear ... the flash of spear ... / Evasive maneuvers! A marlin in here! / Zig! / Now zag! / Now dart! / Now swerve! / A blur of sardines hurtles into the curve ... / They swivel around and go into a spin, / Then scatter like sparks / when the hunter swoops in / a quicksilver blizzard! / Look out below -

Where did everyone go? / One sardine. Apart. Alone. / Welcome to the Mystery Zone.

The words in this sequence become part of the graphic element, twisting and turning as they follow the flow of Cyrus' detailed oil illustrations.

In creating `Hotel Deep,' he consulted pictures and books about the sea that he's collected over the years, but he wasn't aiming for 100 percent scientific accuracy, he said.

`I wanted the creatures to keep their integrity. I didn't want to use a lot of gags.

`I did really put myself into that book," Cyrus said.

Cyrus and his wife, Linnea, live in a Cottage Grove home dotted with sea-related bits and pieces. His back patio contains two tanks of tadpoles, rescued from the hungry goldfish in the backyard pond. In his studio - a converted bedroom that's light and airy - there's a globe dotted with barnacles.

"The undersea world has always been pretty intriguing to me for years and years."

While Cyrus' name appears on several children's books that he's illustrated, "Hotel Deep" is just one of four books that Cyrus has written and illustrated himself. The others include "Tangle Town," `Short Train to Oxmox' and "Oddhopper Opera: A Bug's Garden of Verses."

"Hotel Deep" is one part of a busy year for Cyrus. He did the illustrations for the new picture book `Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story,' written by Anne Bustard. He made the inside drawings for the new juvenile chapter book "Whales on Stilts," a recent bestseller by M.T. Anderson.

Additionally, the 2002 book he illustrated, "The Bones of Fred McFee," written by Eve Bunting, is being released in paperback this fall. It's the first of Cyrus' books to go to paperback and is the biggest seller on his resume. With its spooky theme, sales of the book always pick up in the fall, Cyrus said.

He's already on board to do two more of the Anderson books, and he's working on a third collaboration with author Lisa Wheeler, called "Mammoths on the Move," which will be released next spring.

As a youngster in Hood River, Cyrus said he drew all the time.

"It was the highest form of fun for me when I was a kid,' he said. "It was always my hobby."

But it wasn't until he was 40, back in 1994, that he decided quit his decade-old job as a respiratory therapist at Sacred Heart Medical Center to pursue illustration as a full-time gig.

`My house was paid off, and I had some money saved up," he said. "It seemed like the time to take the risk."

The 50-year-old is able to make what he calls a "modest" living doing this work. His wife is a part-time bookkeeper. They don't have children.

A children's book author who doesn't have kids?

"There are kids in my life," he said. "There are a couple neighbor kids who are here all the time."

He also volunteers with the Start Making A Reader Today program, in which he reads with young schoolchildren. It's his contact with these kids that gives him perspective on what his audience wants to see in kids' books.

He's learned that children who read picture books - those age 8 to 10, and younger - like their books to have humor, rhyming and a story they can get lost in. They don't like black-and-white drawings. He's also had kids tell him they don't like books with too many words or books with too few words.

Picture books are, naturally, all about the pictures in many ways. A typical picture book is 32 pages and will feature 15 to 25 illustrations, Cyrus said. He creates detailed sketches before he begins work on the final product. Most of his own books have been illustrated in watercolors. He wanted a richer color scheme for "Hotel Deep" so he opted for oils.

The idea seems to have paid off. The book has earned some positive notices, notably from School Library Journal and Booklist. The Junior Library Guild, which provides new children's books to libraries at a discounted rate, bought half the initial run of "Hotel Deep."

`The publisher is getting behind it and promoting it more than they have done for any of my other books," Cyrus said.

And he doesn't seem to get bored. He's done books about cows, trains, people, bugs and sea creatures.

"I like the variety,' Cyrus said. "I like going from one subject to the next. That's what keeps it fresh."

CAPTION(S):

Kurt Cyrus of Cottage Grove has written and illustrated "Hotel Deep: Light Verse From Dark Water."