Chula Vista artist Jen Hodge has received many accolades for her debut children’s book “The Grumpy Unicorn.”
Among the honors the 64-page, 450-word book received are six five star national Dragon Fly Awards.
But her most recent achievement hits home for the native Chula Vistan.
On Aug. 9 the Chula Vista Cultural Arts Commission recognized “The Grumpy Unicorn” as a McCandliss Arts Literary Award winner. The award, named after former Chula Vista Mayor Gayle McCandliss, recognizes individuals and groups who have made a substantial contribution toward the arts in Chula Vista.
Hodge said being recognized by her hometown was quiet a moment.
“This is my first book so being that it gets any sort of recognition is kind of exciting,” Hodge said. The children’s book is also winning the interest of the people.
“The Grumpy Unicorn,” a book about a boy pink, fluffy unicorn who is upset that he is not a scary mythological monster was made possible last year through a successful Kickstarter campaign.
Hodge started her Kickstarter campaign last year and was able to raise $13,778 with the help of 221 backers for the self-publication of 750 copies of the book.
“It’s nice to know that people were interested in it,” she said. “Everybody wants reassurance that what they’re doing is good. “The fact that somebody wants to buy something that you produced is always a very rewarding feeling.”
Hodge said it was a lot of work to crowdfund, especially dabbling in areas she is not familiar with.
“I did that just to kind of test to see if I wanted to sell them on my own and be like an independent distributor and I realized I didn’t like doing that,” she said. “It’s just a lot of business interaction; I’d rather just do the creative part.”
The campaign eventually became a success that it sold out of all the 750 available copies.
Hodge said she had been getting requests hearing a demand from customers for more copies of the books so she recently launched a new crowdfunding campaign through Indiegogo to raise a minimum of $3,000 for the self-publication of a second hard copy edition of “The Grumpy Unicorn.”
With five- days left before the end of the campaign, the Indiegogo page has not had much of the success as Kickstarter but Hodge admits she is not doing much work.
Hodge said this may be her last crowdfunding effort because she wants to focus on the artistic side of making a book, not the business aspect. She said it’s a lot of work crowdfunding because she always has to promote the Indiegogo page, mail out books, mail out prizes for the amount of money donated and other business related aspects.
She said with her next book venture she may consider hiring an agent to handle the business side of things.
Throughout the book the unicorn goes on a mission to be anything but a big, pink, sparkly unicorn and then throughout the book he learns that it is important to be himself because he is the only one who can be a big, pinky sparkly unicorn, Hodge said.
The book was originally written for her niece when she was born, but decided to try the crowdfunding right to make the book available for anyone who wants it.
Hodge said the message of the story is about the importance of being yourself.
“I just wanted to write something in regards to explaining about appreciating your own unique qualities,” she said. “Then I thought that nobody ever thinks about angry unicorns,”
