Take one look at the illustrations in Footsteps in Bay de Verde and you can see how much work Jenny Dwyer put into creating them. She devoted hours and hours to research as she created the beautiful photo-realistic artwork. In conversation, she discusses how she integrated symbolism to heighten the eerie mood:
"I used the smoke as connecting devices between each page to show how children interpreted storytelling and how it differed from how the adults interpreted storytelling. The men were smoking pipes and the lamp was lit. It was a smoke-filled room. The kids were really scared but their imaginations were running wild."
And not surprisingly, her illustrations are receiving lots of praise. Trilby Kent, in her review published in Quill & Quire writes, "Jenny Dwyer's shadowy illustrations provide a suitably spooky complement to Cotter's words. Faces appear luminescent against dark backgrounds, expressions by turns wary and terrified."