Adding picture book text is part of the illustrating. The text must fit into the illustrations, be a part of them, yet be separate.
How much text will be included depends on the book. Those for older readers often have lots of text telling a story. Examples include “Redcoats and Petticoats” and “The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship”.
Those for younger readers have none to only a few lines. An example would be “Wolf in the Snow” where the text is only names of sounds like howl. “Waiting For Fairies” has a couple of lines of text on each page.
Choosing a Font
There are lots of fonts to choose from. In picture books the aim is to be simple and easy to read.
My preference is Georgia as I find it easy to read and pretty with the serifs. Since I use it on my website and for writing, it was a natural choice for my picture books.
Another aspect is the color of the font. Black is the most common.
Placing the Text
Adding picture book text is part of doing the illustrations. The illustration must leave space for the text. It is often placed at the bottom of the pages.
When I did “The Little Spider” the text became part of the illustrations. This spider is trying to get to a high perch. When the spider goes up, the text goes up. When the spider goes down, so does the text.
Making Text Readable
Black is popular as it shows up well against most backgrounds. There are times when black does not show up well.
On a few pages of “The Little Spider”, this was the case. The text was against brown and disappeared into the background. I created a light yellow oblong and used brown text preserving the ground effect, but making the text readable.
Adding picture book text takes time and thought. The font must reflect the purpose of the book and be readable. The text must fit into the illustrations. Then the picture book becomes a picture book.