Gina Perry's Blog

I am so pleased to share the above announcement. My next picture book, SNOW DAY WITH DADDY, will be published by Christy Ottaviano Books in early 2028. This will be my fifth author/illustrator picture book! This is a story that I’ve been playing with off and on for several years. I am so thankful that my agent, Sean McCarthy, gave me a gentle nudge to work on it again. It’s inspired by my father’s winter work as a snow plow driver and the amazing snow piles he left for me in our yard at the end of a big storm.

Life is imitating art here in New England, as we’ve had a true snowy winter with no end of snow piles and new storms on the horizon. I’ll be working on this book for the first half of 2026, surrounded by snow for at least part of that time.

I’m also filling up my calendar with school visits, a local author fair, KidsCon in Nashua, and one more big fun event that has yet to be announced.

I’ll be sharing more insight to the new book on Doodle Mail - that’s my free, monthly author/illustrator newsletter. I share a new drawing sheet each month, event news, behind-the-scenes work, and more. I hope to see you there!

I had a wonderful summer celebrating the release of THE KING OF BOOKS. I visited bookstores and librarians around New England, adding a few new favorite indie shops to my map. I left a little handpainted king (and signed copies) at Back Cove Books in Portland, Maine and Gibson’s Bookstore in Concord, NH. I enjoyed signing on a very busy Saturday at the Portsmouth Book Nook. One kid came quite close to guessing the total number of books in THE KING OF BOOKS at my home base, Water Street Bookstore in Exeter, NH. And I can’t miss sharing a visit to Silver Unicorn Books in Acton, MA! Plus two CLiF library events in Laconia and South Hampton. All good events, made better by family and friends new and old who joined me.

September: I am joining a small group of artists at the Currier Museum in Manchester, NH on September 18th for the ART OFF THE WALLS program. It’s an evening program with live drawing, book sales, and artist Q&A. The museum has free admission AND there is a new Tomie dePaola exhibit to check out.

October: I’ll be at the Warwick Children’s Book Festival in Warwick, NY on October 12th from 10-4pm.

November: I will also be returning to KidsCon New England in Portland, Maine on November 15th. Always a fun day!

Be sure to visit my events page for the latest information.

I was very lucky to take a family trip this summer to Switzerland. We visited Lucerne, Zermatt, and Grindelwald. We took all types of transportation up and down the mountains: car, trains, car-trains, gondolas, mountain sleds, and our two feet. My highlights: the goat parade in Zermatt, driving the mountain pass (which tested my normally fearless-driver limits), Trummelback falls, and the hikes from Mannlichen. The last part of our trip was my favorite, just sitting on the porch and watching the weather change across the valley and mountain, where waterfalls just appeared during the rainstorms. Magical, and it will stay with me always.

I have been making good efforts to make video content for Instagram and Tiktok, and actually having a bit of fun doing it too. The tools to create videos are SO MUCH EASIER now than when I went to school for animation. I am never going to be a super frequent poster, but I’m getting much more comfortable with my face and voice on video.

I spent some time updating my school visit webpage. There are a few updated testimonials, photos, and program descriptions. I am currently booking events for the 2025-2026 school year. Please reach out if you’d like to schedule a visit to your school or library. My email is ginacarey @ comcast . net

ONE LAST THING: I don’t post to my blog often, but I do have a free monthly author newsletter called DOODLE MAIL. Each month I share book news and a how-to-draw sheet for kids. You can subscribe here - I really only post once a month, I promise!

The King of Books is almost here! July 15th seems like ages away but it is coming up quickly. I’ve shared the front cover before, but this is the full wrap-around art. If you’d like to read the digital F&G (or ARC), it’s available through Edelweiss now. I’ll be sharing behind-the-scenes sketches and development from King as we get closer to publication day. But in the meantime, what have I been up to in the two years since my last blog post?

Going back even further in time… In November of 2022 I started a free monthly author newsletter called Doodle Mail. Each month I share a how-to-draw sheet with fun facts for a cute and unique animal. This month, for ethical reasons, I moved my newsletter from Substack to Beehiiv. The content remains the same and if you were a subscriber you will continue to receive emails (like yesterday’s post!). I still enjoy picking a new animal to feature and learning about them so I can share with all of you. You can find all of the animal sheets on my printables page here as well!

I am currently on submission with one picture book and working with my agent bit by bit to go on submission with another. I love the magical building time with picture book dummies, not so much the submission time! These are two very different projects, but I love them both and they each are deeply personal. I can only share one very vague (but favorite) sketch from the one in progress. And ask for a little luck and magic that I get to make them into real books in the near future!

I’ve also been busy with lots of fun illustration assignments from Highlights. Below is a small sample. Sometimes I’m working on magazine pieces, sometimes I’m creating art (usually hidden pictures) for their many products and books. Everyone I work with there is lovely and it feels great to work with such a beloved American institution. And as a lifelong puzzle-nerd, I do enjoy hiding the objects!

I am thrilled to see Bluesky emerge as the strong replacement for Twitter. Social media has had a rough few years and I know it’s exhausting to start anew. But there is a great children’s book community on Bluesky, and KidLitArtPostcard thrives there on the first Thursday of each month. If you are at all involved with kidlit, now is a great time to join us!

School and library visits continue to be an important (and fun!) part of my work. You can read more about them here. I’m also excited to be a speaker at the Derry Author Fest on April 5th. I’ll be giving a talk about making picture books: From Your Lightbulb Moment to the Bookshelf. It’s a free event and the lineup for the day looks wonderful. Read more about it and register to attend here.

I’m back with a second post and it’s still 2023. I know, I know - blogging is not what it used to be, right? It’s been hard to figure out what role my blog serves among the hearty stew that is social media. I think since most of my other shares are shorter and more to the point, this is a place where I can go deep. I can take a bit longer to share my feelings about the book news, events, and other creative happenings.

ONE

I am beyond excited to share the announcement for my new author/illustrator picture book, THE KING OF BOOKS. Coming in Spring 2025 from Feiwel & Friends. One morning in the summer of 2020 I woke up with a character’s voice and a full plot in my head for a book. This had never happened before! Thank goodness I ran to get paper and a pen. The story changed many times over the course of two years before sending it out on submission, but if I hadn’t jotted it all down and taken a silly idea seriously, it wouldn’t be on its way to being a real book. So the moral is: write it down and allow yourself to play with silly ideas. I’m really looking forward to spending the fall immersing myself in this book and working with my editor to make it the best it can be.

TWO

It has been a busy summer celebrating the release of the two Mini Doodle books. I had a book launch at Water Street Bookstore, a workshop at the Plaistow New Hampshire Library, a talk at the Weymouth Tufts Library in Massachusetts, and I just came back from the Camden Maine Book Fair by the Sea in Maine. To wrap up the summer, I’ll be at Exeter Library’s Fantasy Faire this Wednesday from 11am-1pm (August 23rd). It’s nice to take a minute and reflect on where I am now compared to when I started doing events. I love having a range of books to share with families - from drawing books, to picture and chapter books. It’s also nice to feel really comfortable with large or small groups and knowing that something will inevitably be a surprise, but I can roll with it.

THREE

What the heck is going on with social media and what does it mean for #KidLitArtPostcard? I don’t really have the answer to this yet. I do think that Instagram has always been the strongest home for the postcard event. I preferred the feedback and action on Twitter (pre-X), but I think realistically, more Art Directors are looking on Instagram. Threads would be the ideal middle-ground if they could make it searchable and have a desktop version. BlueSky is still too new. Substack doesn’t quite have the right flow. I think we’ll just have to stay the course for September and see how things shake out. If anyone has ideas on how to evolve the idea, please let me know here or email me at ginacarey @ comcast.net !

FOUR

While this summer was really busy with a number of illustration assignments, events, and of course being a mom of two kids, I have found pockets of time to play with art. I often slip into routines where the only art-making I do is for work. I love my work, but if I don’t break out to make art without purpose I tend to get too rigid or even a little bored with my style. A few months ago I found Beth Spencer’s Introvert Drawing Club through Substack. To join a quiet Zoom for 60-90 minutes and draw timed prompts has been wonderful for me. Beth has also built up this community of really sweet and talented folks. I’m trying to stay loose and play with different materials, rather than just sketching.

I also was able to go hear Isabelle Arsenault speak up in Portland, Maine earlier this summer. She’s one of my very favorite book illustrators and her talk was so inspiring. And, I just enjoyed a day trip to Peaks Island, Maine for a workshop with Selina Alko. I’ve never seen a process for making a picture book quite like hers! She shared her collage sketchbook for I is for Immigrant and then we all sat and worked making our own letter-based collage pages. Sitting alongside lots of other artists was a treat - to chat and share techniques. And not to be missed, I was there with two dear friends who were in the very first children’s illustration class I took back in 2002/2003 and my first critique group. So nice to spend the day with Patty and Ann Marie! Big thanks to Scott Nash and Nancy Gibson-Nash and everyone at Illustration Institute for bringing such amazing talent to Maine and making it available to everyone.

FIVE

To wrap things up, I often like to share what I’ve been reading, watching, and listening to. Some of this is what keeps me going when I’m working.

Reading: Above are the picture books I picked up at the Camden Book Fair. Author Fran Hodgkins’ IN A PATCH OF GRASS. I love the illustrations by Dan Tavis and it’s an energetic, dramatic read-aloud with fun bug facts (and informative bug back matter!) THE LOBSTER LADY by Alexandra D. Hinrichs, illustrated by Jamie Hogan. I was holding out all summer so I could get my copy signed by author and illustrator. It’s even better than I hoped - beautifully illustrated, a sweeping story of living a big, authentic life and finding purpose. And A IS FOR APPLE UNLESS… written by Tom Llewellyn and illustrated by friend Mark Hoffmann. Mark’s illustrations are dynamic and cute but definitely appeal to the kids looking for a little bit of ‘ewww’ humor from A to Z. Love that cute monkey!

Watching: KILLING IT, on Peacock. I don’t know how I missed this until the second season aired, but it’s hilarious. Claudia O’Douherty is a scene stealer but it’s a fun ensemble cast. Gruesome Warning - the story revolves around killing snakes competitively.

Listening to: Sounds Like A Cult (podcast) - it’s light and pop culture focused. It’s been out for a few years so I skim for themes that interest me. I enjoyed the episodes on Coachella, Montessori Schools, PTA Moms, and Real Housewives.

I’m thrilled to share that I have two drawing books coming out in June from Bushel & Peck Books: Let’s Draw Dinosaurs and Let’s Draw Magical Creatures. Mini Doodles are smaller and shorter than most drawing books - easy to pop in a backpack or purse, short enough and themed so kids don’t lose interest and leave half a book unfinished. Inside, kids will find a mix of how-to-draw and guided prompts. I had so much fun coming up with ideas and characters to spark the imagination. I can’t wait to see what kids create from these books! You can preorder from anywhere books are sold (more info here).

My Etsy shop was long overdue for some new items. A few weeks ago I spent time painting and cutting up papers to create three new vinyl stickers: Crabby Crab, Moose, and Raven.

I love the quality of these stickers - they hold up really well on water bottles and cell phones. All three are shiny and transparent, so no white edges, and they are maybe 80% opaque when placed on colored objects.

Last year I finished the art for the fourth Aven Green chapter book series, written by Dusti Bowling and published by Union Square Kids. Soccer Machine comes out on April 4th and I know a lot of kids will get a kick (har har) out of seeing Aven and friends come together as a team and work through some good sportsmanship challenges.

I managed to squeeze in nine visits for World Read Aloud Day this year. My favorite kid question was what is your favorite snack while working (potato chips, of course!). I also had a great time visiting the Eliot Elementary school in Maine a few weeks ago. I met with the 2nd and 3rd graders in coordination with their Similarities Awareness program. I shared my research process for illustrating the Aven Green series and drew some really wild characters with each group. I’ll be visiting a few more schools this Spring. It’s been wonderful to reconnect with kids in-person. Read more about my school visits here.

The turmoil of Twitter has forced me to join approximately 57 new social media sites. You can now find me on Mastodon, Post, Spoutible, Hive, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkdIn. It’s exhausting and I’m not sure how it will all shake out. Some of these sites are nearly unusable or too quiet or too dull. I started to share my handles here, but even that was exhausting! Aren’t we all just tired of it? I think I like Mastodon the most of the new crop, in the way that Instagram used to be a place to discover new artists and not a place to get blasted with videos or buy scarf-sweaters or hydration powders. My observation is that the #KidLitArtPostcard event is still the most successful on Twitter and Instagram. First Thursday of each month!

Also, adjacent to social media, is my new newsletter… Doodle Mail! I’ve wanted to start a newsletter for ages. Recently, I figured out what that looked like for me. I wanted to make a monthly newsletter that would share book and event news but also provide educators with fun and useful materials for their students. Each month you can download and print a how-to-draw sheet (cute and weird animals!) with five fun animal facts, and a writing/story sheet. Sometimes I add relevant book recommendations. I started in November and have already covered puffins, axolotls, fennec foxes, and sun bears! FYI, I will have good giveaways coming up in the next few months for subscribers. You can subscribe here (it’s free).

If you’ve made it this far, hooray! I hadn’t posted on my blog since last May. I started a post about a really awesome local exhibit that featured TOO MUCH! NOT ENOUGH! but then lost track. It was fun! I hope some of you went. I’ll try (try) to not let another eight months go by before I blog again!

Next month’s #KidLitArtPostcard marks one full rotation around the sun of beautiful illustrations, new friends, new connections, stronger portfolios and 12 fun filled days of celebrating illustration for children’s books. Thank you so much to everyone who has jumped in with both feet - sharing, creating, and marking their calendars for the first Thursday of each month.

If you are an SCBWI member, you can read my article in May’s Insight here.

And anyone can read this fantastic piece written by Nancy Goulet here.

I haven’t wanted to complicate the monthly event with any restrictions, but it would be extra cool to see birthday or party-themed illustrations for June 2nd.

Mark your calendars (make a wish!) and don’t forget the hashtag!!!

I was honored to illustrate the banner for the 2022 NESCBWI Spring Conference. I’ve attended this for too many years to count - starting back in the Nashua, NH days! While I wish we could all safely smoosh into the ballroom, I’ll settle for a zoom experience. I’m most excited about Marcie Colleen’s workshops but I expect to walk away full of inspiration and new ideas from lots of lovely authors and illustrators. I also really had fun with the theme “Find Your Star, Let it Shine” - and making art that slants a bit towards middle grade.

I’ve been busy re-launching my Etsy shop with all of my new collage work. I started experimenting with collage in 2021. I had no idea how much fun it would be to hand-paint papers and design illustrations with scissors and glue. There is so much playtime in this process - just moving shapes around and around. I’m trying to add one or two new prints each month, and hopefully greeting cards by the summer. I’m not sure if it will expand as a business or just be a small side project, but with more time on my hands (thanks for getting bigger and more independent, kids!) and the state of kidlit being a molasses spill, I thought it was time to diversify. More on that molasses below…

Now here is where I get real. I’m sad. I want nothing more than a fun new kidlit project, but I’ve had no such luck for a long time. I generally don’t talk about this type of stuff openly, but I’m not sure it’s fair to keep the heavy things quiet. I wasn’t expecting to struggle so hard to find my place after already having several books published, but here I am. Publishing has never been easy. But it’s gotten so much harder in the past few years. I’m super grateful for the school visits, my kids need mentors class, my steady and smart agent, my ultra-supportive illustrator friends. I know tons of us are in the same boat. But I’m still sad. I keep debating about the need for a ‘break’ of sorts. But that sounds a little like giving up, which isn’t my style. I have a picture dummy that I love immensely going out on submission soon. Another one waiting in the wings. Lots of new ideas brewing. I’m still springing along. But it’s not easy.

Are you ready? Here are the dates for #KidLitArtPostcard for 2022:

January 6 / February 3 / March 3 / April 7 / May 5 / June 2 / July 7
August 4 / September 1 / October 6 / November 3 / December 1

This first year of #KidLitArtPostcard was wonderful. I am so thankful to all the artists who’ve participated. Together, we’ve created a positive spotlight on our work each month. I’m also thankful for the support and enthusiasm from editors, art directors, agents, and authors. Below, I pulled a small sample of some of the amazing postcards the #KidLitArt community shared for December. I hope 2022 continues to bring new connections between our communities - and new books born from those relationships.

Artists as shown from start to end: Anna Florsdefum, Brian McLachlan, Courtney Pippin-Mathur, Elio, Elliott Grinnell, Laura Basky, Marie Hermansson, Matthew Rivera, and Mirka Hokkanen

Sometimes you get good book news that takes years to come to fruition. SMALL being published in China is one of them. I was just thrilled to receive these beautiful pictures from Fuling Deng - she had interviewed me about SMALL more than two years ago. It’s really wonderful to know that my 2017 debut is new again halfway across the world. (Photos by Fuling Deng. Published by CheerFly in China)

Two months down, and I would say #KidLitArtPostcard has been a big success! The initial post was updated with a few helpful tips after the first month’s experience. I appreciate that most people joining in for the second month really looked at those notes. It made yesterday a much nicer event for me - I enjoyed feeling more like a participant and my twitter notifications did NOT explode - hooray!

I would like to share a bit more about how the project has effected me personally. I really wasn’t expecting or looking for an extra large heaping of praise from artists - but you were all so quick to say ‘I love this idea’, ‘Brilliant idea’, ‘So smart’. Considering that I’m part stay-at-home-mom and part work-from-home-kidlit-author-illustrator this is well outside the norm of what I hear. So much of our work as authors/illustrators is in a little bubble - just us, our agents, our critique partners, sometimes readers (less so during the pandemic, for sure). To hear so many lovely things over the course of a few days was just plain awesome and overwhelming. So if you took a moment to thank me or praise the idea - it meant a LOT. Thank you.

I was pretty nervous to put this project into the world but just wanted to make things better (easier?) for our collective lives. As much as I absolutely love the work that I do and the people I work with, kidlit is a really (really) hard career. Covid has made so many things harder. There are some great conversations on twitter this week about agents, editors, and other publishing company pros feeling exhausted and burnt out. And explaining the backlog of books and work that has compounded their work and stress. I absolutely sympathize, but maybe we can have our own little corner to say how hard it has been as makers? That so many of us still managed to put together new proposals or portfolios or query new agents only to face even slower response times and even steeper odds to get a publishing deals - well, it’s enough to break you. Or to make you try something different. Something that didn’t cost a big membership fee or even a stamp.

What I would love to see next are the success stories. Did #KidLitArtPostcard help you get a new agent, a new book project? Did you connect with a new critique partner, boost your Etsy shop sales, find a new style you wanted to try? Did you chat with a new artist who connected you to a great book or class or art director?

For me (other than the huge confidence boost) I gained several hundred new followers between twitter and instagram - including a few art directors and editors I really admire! Please feel free to share any successes here or on twitter!

Again - thank you all so much for making #KidLitArtPostcard a really positive tool for marketing - if you can think of other improvements, let me know. Otherwise, I will see you and your shiny new art on August 5th!