Sinking the Sultana: A Civil War Story of Imprisonment, Greed, and a Doomed Journey Home by Sally M. Walker

Interior & jacket design for middle-grade nonfiction title


SINKING THE SULTANA needed to be accessible to a middle-grade audience without losing the scale of the disaster. Archival photographs and sidebars were carefully paced throughout the text. Commissioned maps and diagrams required extensive art direction to ensure accuracy (including the translation of three-dimensional scale models of the steamboat into two-dimensional diagrams). Period appropriate typography and ornamentation is used throughout the book, especially on the jacket, which effectively evokes the danger and fear of the event.

I also worked on Sally Walker’s BOUNDARIES in 2014 and UNDERGROUND FIRE in 2022.

SINKING THE SULTANA | ON SALE: 10/2017 | TRIM: 7.4375″ x 9″ | AGES: 10+ | EXTENT: 208 | TYPE: BULMER

Copyright © Sally M. Walker. Map copyright © Karen Minot. Published by Candlewick Press, Inc. All Rights Reserved.