Here's a Blast from the Past with an interview from Marla Frazee...
Marla Frazee and I attended Art Center together many years ago. She was then as she is now, funny, kind, generous and very talented. As an award winning illustrator/author, she fills her books with mirth and joy. This year at the SCBWI National Conference, Marla, with her editor, Allyn Johnston, gave an entertaining presentation on the process of creating a picture book. I am so pleased that she agreed to be interviewed.
When and why did you start illustrating and writing for children?
I've wanted to be a children's book writer and illustrator since I was a little kid.
Reading books and drawing pictures are both high on my list of things I love to do – and always have been – so I am very happy that I get to do this for a living. I also like drinking coffee, listening to music, and talking on the phone, and I have made those activities a big part of my job as well.
What is the most valuable advice you can give to a newly published writer?
Oh, I don't know. Keep working?
What is one of your favorite children’s books that you'd like to recommend?
I absolutely LOVE all the books by the Swedish couple Olof and Lena Landström. They are brilliant, funny, wise, and a little bit snarky. I especially adore their Will books:
Will Gets a Haircut
Will's New Cap
Will Goes to the Post Office
Will Goes to the Beach
What are you working on now?
I am putting the finishing touches on a picture book called A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever. It is about two friends who are invited to stay at one of the boy's grandparent's house at the beach and go to a week of nature Camp. The boys think Nature Camp is dorky, but they love their week away at the beach together. It will be out in Spring 2008, published by Harcourt.
It was inspired by a week my youngest son James and his friend Eamon spent together in August 2005.
What is your favorite dessert and why?
I hide milk chocolate in various pots and pans in the kitchen. Around 10:00 PM, I start thinking it would be a good idea to search some out. I bang around in the kitchen cabinets and pretend I am cleaning up the dishes and putting stuff away... but I am really sneaking chocolate.
Why is it my favorite dessert? Um, because it is illicit.
Marla Frazee is the author-illustrator of Roller Coaster, Santa Claus the World's Number One Toy Expert, Walk On! A Guide for Babies of All Ages, and the upcoming A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever. She is the illustrator of lots of other books, too, including The Seven Silly Eaters and Everywhere Babies and the NYT bestselling Clementine. She teaches children's book illustration at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA, and works in a small studio cabin in the backyard under an avocado tree.
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