I shot a lot of still photos and home movies as a kid and eventually got into making short film adaptations of children’s picture books as a profession. I’ve always been passionate about books and one day fell into writing them. I still have many books from my childhood. These four must have influenced me.
The first photo-illustrated book I made was Frog Face: My Little Sister and Me. Photographer Janet Delaney gave me access to all of her photos and I wrote the story to correspond with the ones I selected. Busy Penguins came next. It started out as a 32-page photo book for 4 – 8 year olds, but with some keen insights from a publisher turned into a successful 20-page board book for babies and toddlers. I love board books and was happy to publish one.
Thirteen more books in the Busy series were published and collectively have sold over half a million copies. I worked with wildlife photographers in the United States, Australia, Brazil, England, and South Africa.
Molly came up with the idea for The Babies and Doggies Book. We looked at hundreds of thousands of stock photos from photographers all over the world, building collections of paired images and trying different rhymes. Little did we know that we’d have the opportunity to make Kitties and then Bunnies. Countless hours of photo research and rhyme writing. Crazy at times, but we love it.
I live in an Oakland, CA neighborhood filled with colorful murals and graffiti. Text and images everywhere!
My books
