Books and Characters

Welcome to my portfolio of my character and picture book based work.

I work digitally on Procreate and mostly hand draw and render my pieces. I like my characters to be fun and full of life.

If you would like to contact me about creating illustrations for a picture book then please click on the contact section of my website.

Illustration character sheet, a girl character and her leopard friend sleep comfortably together, exchange a hug, dance, look scared under a blanket and shed a tear together

Illustration showing Leopard buried in the sand and given a sand mermaid tail, girl eats an ice cream in her sun suit and star sunglasses. A seagull is by them.

Illustration of girl character doing sums with an abacus and her leopard friend, flower arranging with beret, fish bag and colourful bangles

Illustration of a girl, who is dressed up as a caterpillar and her leopard friend is dressed up as a butterfly, jumping and trying to fly

Illustration of the girl and her leopard friend swinging on the swings in the playground. They are wearing ice cream and ice lolly themed outfits on. The girl has a strawberry hat on, a pink dress like a scoop of strawberry ice-cream and her yellow leggings with the check pattern is like the cone. The lopard has on a fab lolly style dress with three striped layers to it.

Illustration of a girl and her leopard friend lieing in a flower meadow holding hands. They are wearing their most flowery outfits. The leopard has a flower waistcoat, sunglasses and necklace on and the girl has a flower shaped straw hat, shirt with flower embelishment on the arm holes and flower denim shorts on.

In the illustration, the girl, Fi is crying at her desk and her leopard friend, Lexi is crying in the garden. Fi's bedroom has a bed with a lopard print duvet on, a leopard cuddly toy on and a pretty net over it. Her bookshelves are full of rainbow coloured books. On top is a pot plant, a heart shaped box and a leopard figurine. On the wall is a photo of Fi with Lexi and their hand and paw prints in another frame. There is a noticeboard on the wall too. There are two bean bags.

This illustration is a book cover. The girl, Fi, and her friend, Lexi Leopard, have their arms around each other and they are wearing their heart and star sunglasses on

In this illustration the girl, Fi, is hula-hooping, dresed up as a clown juggling, having a tea party, and on a see-saw on her own. She appears sad without her leopard friend.

Fi and Lexi Leopard- Best Friends

This is a picture book idea about two unlikely friends, a girl and a leopard.

Fi and Lexi have so much fun together. They are the best of friends. But Fi's Mum doesn't think a leopard is a suitable friend for a little girl. What will happen to the two friends when they are kept apart?

In this illustration Frisk and Skip, the squirrels slide down the tree with a spider joining in, and they roll down a hill in the moonlight with a ladybird

In this illustration, Frisk and Skip, the squirrels, have built a sandcastle, then they decorate it with shells and seaweed

In this illustraton, Frisk and Skip, the squirrels, are sitting in the door or their sandcastle and a crab stalks over

Frisk and Skip's Adventurous Night

Here are some pages from my picture book idea, 'Frisk and Skip's Adventurous Night'. The book follows two brother squirrels, Frisk and Skip, as they sneak out of their oak tree home to have a nighttime adventure.

In this illusration, Lucy, the girl, flies on a swan's back above the clouds through a starlit sky

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, sits on the ground with a young bear cub wearing a blossom crown and underneath blossom trees

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, is watching a fairy fox parade on the path, daffodils and tulips bloom on the grass

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, is on a boat going dow the river, a rainbow arcs above her and fish jump across the water mirroring the rainbow arc

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, meets a red dragon on a tropical island, surrounded by the ocean and with coconut trees

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, rides a whale through the ocean and the sing together

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, dives down to see a underwater garden and house owned by two seahorses

In this illustration, Lucy, the girl, rides in a sleigh throught he starlit and moonlit sky pulled by seven moths

Whimsuary 2025

Featured are my whimsuary pieces that follow the character of Lucy through a fantastical journey through the seasons and meeting a range of wonderful characters. Lucy gets to fly on a swan's back, make blossom headbands with a friendly bear cub, follow the flow of the rainbow river, sing with a whale, go barefoot with a dragon, deep dive to visit a seahorses' garden and be pulled through the night sky in a moth drawn sleigh.

This work shows the whimsical side to my illustration style. It shows me follow a character through a range of scenes and situations, and also creating a myriad of side characters for her to meet with on her journey.

Mouse character shet showing a range of emotions and poses

MAgpie character sheet shwoing a range of poses and emotions

Thimble character sheet, thimble interacting with mouse in a range of poses and showing different emotions.

Magpie and mouse book page. Mouse sneaks towards the peanut butter, which is guarded by magpie on a wooden shelf with jam and syrup on it as well.

An illustration of Mouse's Emotions Game which is a emotion memory card game with pictures of Mouse showing different emotions on one card and the name of that emotion on the other card to make the match.

Mouse and Thimble book page. Mouse uncovers Thimble unexpectedly, Thimble is a bit cross. There is a storage case with objects on like cotton reels, pin cushion, shells, seaglass, handkerchiefs and toy bus. There is a wooden box and a shell shaped dish of keys.

Dancer, Mouse and Thimble book page. Dancer is in the wooden box, Mouse and Thimble turn the key, and dancer starts dancing in different poses. The group hug when he has danced out of the box and onto the shelf.

An illustration of Mouse's House blind box toy. The case for the toy is a tin to look like a wooden skirting board with window and door in it. Three interiors of the tin are shown. One is a bathroom with mouse wearing a towel and a little tin bath tub in it and wooden duck. Mouse's bedroom and Mouse wears a night shirt, the wallpaper is a cheese design and the bed is a big match box with a stamp design. The thrird room is the music room with wooden chair, drum with beater made of wood, and Mouse wears a musical instrument waistcoat..

Dancer character sheet, showing the Dancer character in the music box and the interaction with Mouse and Thimble characters. Also shows Dancer doing some dance poses.

Emotions Race board game illustration showing 4 emotion cards, a spinner, character pieces of Mouse, Magpie, Thimble and Dancer characters with wooden holders. Object pieces of cotton reels, toy soldier, metal car and peanut butter jar with wooden holders. The board has interesting objects around it and a path to follow with different emotion spaces.

Emotion Race box with an illustration of the Mouse, Thimble, Dancer and Magpie characters holding onto a nut butter jar and showing different emotions. Some information about the game is handwritten next to it.

Make Art That Sells - Bootcamp Special: Character Play 2025

Here is my illustrations produced as part of this MATS course. There are character sheets for the characters in the story, Mouse, Magpie, Thimble and Dancer, showing different poses, emotions and character interactions.

There are three illustrated book pages, text written and copyrighted to Zoë Tucker.

For the toy and game section of the course, I created a emotional card game, Mouse's Emotions Game, which was a matching pair game and also can be played like a memory game. The event cards add extra fun and learning, see if the event would change the emotion from the emotion pair you found/made.

Then there was Mouses' House, a blind box toy. Featuring a tin container showing Mouse's House from the outside and hiding a surprise room in the inside, and three other surprises, one item of Mouse's clothing, one accessory and one furniture item. Rooms designed so far were the bedroom, bathroom and music room.

Finally, there is Emotion Race board game, a game path you move along by spinning the spinner and moving to that emotion space, then make that emotion and/or make up a story of why your character feels that emotion, first one to nut butter at the end is the winner. The board has details from the story pages on it and all the main characters can be played with.

A portrait of Betty Davis with her name and stars around her, wearing blue boots, brown trousers and black polo top and a funky floral coat

Portrait of Edmonia Lewis, with her name and her alternative tribal name of Wildfire too, with a native american bust with feathers coming to life of it and she's wering a hat with a feather and a coat with fringing and a long skirt with a slip

A portrait of Alice Coltrane, with her name, she's playing the white harp and waring a cool dress with blocks of colour

A portrait of Gwendolyn Bennett with her name, shadowy dancers doing the Charleston and she's wearing a drop waist dress with a pearl necklace

A portrait of Marian Anderson, with her name, and she'd wearing a green velvet floor length dress with a train and flowers across the bossom

Portrait of Elizabeth Catlett with her bame across the sun, created in the style of her work, she's in black and white but with a pop of colour red for her glasses and her lips, she's wearing a hat, blouse and sweater

A portrait of Betye Saar, with her name made from stars like a constellation, a night sky background with moon and star inspired by her work, she's wearing a heart t-shirt and earrings, also inspired by her work

A portrait of Lorraine O'Grady with her name, with white gloves like her white glove dress she wore, she's looking through a frame, this is inspired by her work, and she's wearing a black jacket, t-shirt dress and boots with flower detail

Rewriting Black History Work

Here are my portraits that I created for the Make Art That Sells course "Rewriting Black History". You could imagine them in a book about inspiring women with some information about them and their lives.

Books and Characters

Subscribe to our newsletter • Don’t miss out!