Hello!

I am Emily and I write and illustrate picture books. Welcome to my website!

Picture books are very special to me. I still remember the awe I felt the first time I read Where the Wild Things Are and Max’s walls grew into a jungle! And I was pretty scared of The Rainbow Goblins, but the illustrations were so wonderful—I couldn’t look away! There was one about a kid who wanted to run away (but took his whole house with him) that made me laugh until I cried! And I reread Bill Peet’s rhyming books until I could recite them by heart. Later, I fell in love with Beatrix Potter’s work and practiced painting by copying all of her illustrations. Even when everyone else was moving on to kissing books, I was still admiring artwork, learning lines by heart, and wandering into the worlds of picture books.

How I Started

I loved library time at school. We had a particularly cozy library upstairs in the attic space of our public school. It had angled ceilings and little nooks and crannies with pillows. I’d tuck myself into these fun little spaces to read. For me, the library was like a magic castle book party!

My dream to contribute to the book party started when I was 8 years old and an author came to our school for a visit. We sat around him in a semicircle on our tiny library floor and listened to him read. I was completely starstruck. It had never occurred to me that people actually wrote and illustrated these books in real life! I knew I loved to draw and tell stories, could this be something I could do?

I made several picture books in elementary school. Our teacher was kind enough to laminate those originals and put them on the shelves of our class library. My first publications!

When I was 16, I spent my summer illustrating someone else’s book—a free job I’d landed through my school art teacher. Although that project never went anywhere, a year later, in 1994, it lead me to a conversation with a Caldecott-winning author, and then a letter to his editor, who viewed my work and set up a meeting with me at her Houghton Mifflin office in Boston. It was an impactful meeting for me, and she gave me some good advice: “Don’t team up. Submit your portfolio as an author, an illustrator, or both. But don’t come teamed-up; that’s the publisher’s job. And take your time! You’re just a kid! Develop your own style.”

My first book

I decided I wanted to do both—write and illustrate. I made lots of stories and sketches. (I also finished college and started working as a schoolteacher.) About ten years later, I completed my first full-length picture book about a little girl who lives in a yurt with her grandpa and pet turtle. I made a couple hardback dummies of it and read it around the city (San Francisco) at different schools to get feedback. Kids loved it! One little kindergartener named Malcolm will forever hold a place in my heart because of his enthusiastic reaction that got him sent to the hallway for a time-out—where he sent echoes of “UNDERWEAR!” ringing throughout the school! So, with Malcolm’s encouragement, I started researching agents.

The next year, in 2006, by a shining stroke of luck, I got the exact agent I wanted, and we signed a contract. (I remember putting down the phone and whooping, “Yesss! I’m in!”) But it wasn’t instant publication. My agent shopped my book around for years. We got offers from smaller publishing houses, but she was holding out for one of the Big Six. In the meantime, I made other stories and art, held various jobs, traveled, moved, and started a family. Finally, eight years after printing the first dummy (and after editing and re-illustrating it!), my very first picture book, Joone, was published by Dial Books for Young Readers (an imprint of Penguin, one of the Big Six!) in 2013.

And in a marvelous coincidence, the president of Dial Books in 2013 was the same person who viewed my work in 1994 when she was an editor at Houghton Mifflin! When I met with her in New York as my publisher, she couldn’t recall our meeting from nearly two decades before, but she did say, “That was some good advice I gave you! I’m glad you took it!”

Where I am today

My two sons are now teenagers. We’ve been happily homeschooling together since second grade. I love discussing the wonders of life with my boys. We talk about big things and little things. We explore nature and science and stories and art. I especially enjoy pondering how we are all interconnected: from a tiny drop of water to the stormy skies above us and starry space beyond. Learning about the little things that make up the big things is a beautiful way to start learning about who we are in this great big universe. It’s awesome to be part of something so intricate, balanced, cooperative, and mysterious!

Homeschooling has given me a new perspective on children’s books. Picture books are where reading begins, and they are often a child’s first introduction to a new subject. Big concepts can be taught through picture books. And if I can help facilitate big thoughts from developing minds, then I have done my job! And, oh, what a wonderful job to have!!

Drop and Puff

My rainy life was the inspiration behind DROP. I live in southern Florida, where big storms come and go all the time. Our skies here are very busy! (See photo below of my boys at the beach on a typical summer afternoon.) I love catching raindrops and wondering where they wandered before joining me. For years, I wondered how I’d make a story about the journey of rain. And then one day, while playing around with splatter paint, I drew a smiley face on a perfect little ink drop. There was Drop, ready to show the world the ways of water!

Now Drop’s bestie, Puff, is coming out with his own book to show us what a breeze it is for air to take care of life on Earth!

PUFF: All About Air comes out March 19, 2024.