The first graveyard I ever drew looked like a row of garden ornaments, and it took me a while to work out why. I had drawn five headstones. All the same size, all standing perfectly upright, all...

Every spell book I drew as a teenager came out looking like a school exercise book with a symbol on the front. The reason turned out to be embarrassingly simple. I was drawing a rectangle. A book...

Most pumpkin decorating guides tell you what to buy and then leave you standing there holding a pen. This one is the opposite. It walks through how to decorate a pumpkin with markers as an actual...

Last October I ran a small drawing session at my local library. Eleven people, mostly beginners, one folding table, and a stack of copy paper. I gave them what I thought was a simple warm-up: draw a...

The first pumpkin I ever decorated with markers looked incredible for about four hours. I'd drawn a whole constellation across it with a set of regular felt tips, thin white stars over the orange,...

A student sent me a drawing two Octobers ago and asked why it wasn't scary. She'd done everything right on paper. Cobwebs in the corners, a bat crossing the moon, a ghost floating in an upstairs...