Dragon spotted in British Columbia

I just received a beautiful  BC Book Prize certificate from Canadian author, Dan Bar-el.

Front cover.

Dan wrote Not Your Typical Dragon, which I illustrated for Viking Books.  Our title was one of five "outstanding illustrated works for children", selected as a finalist for the Christie Harris Illustrated Children's Literature Prize. 

Sketch for back cover of book.

Thanks to Dan Bar-el for a great story, Viking for bringing it to readers and the BC Book Prize judges for selecting Not Your Typical Dragon for this award.

Sleeping Bears, Ninjas and Bowers, oh my!

I just returned from a book signing at the IRA 59th Annual Conference in New Orleans. Many thanks to my friends at Sleeping Bear Press. Amy and Audrie were in high gear to pull everything together during the show. 

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I finally met author, Denise Brennan-Nelson, who joined me to sign Maestro Stu Saves the Zoo. Denise is very funny and overflowing with great story ideas. I hope we connect on another book project in the future.

Before my book signing, I went undercover into the Scholastic Book area and managed to meet two of my Ninja brothers, Dav Pilkey and Dan Santat. Its pretty obvious that Dav and Dan have had more experience in Ninja action posing...I'll have to ask them for a few pointers. 

The flight home was a bumpy ride. Storms were popping up all over but above the clouds was a beautiful place to be. I  shot a few pics of the amazing clouds, escorting us back to Ohio.