The "Storied Lives" panel with (from left to right): Lois Ehlert, Chris Raschka, Peter Sís, and Raina Telgemeier. (Moderated by Paula Willey, librarian from Baltimore County Public Library)

                    “This is your ‘I love me’ book,” author and illustrator Lois Ehlert supposed her late-mother would say to her about her latest book The Scraps Book: Notes from a Colorful Life (Simon & Schuster, 2014) during the SLJ Day of Dialog panel “Storied Lives” on May 28 moderated by librarian Paula Willey from the Baltimore County Public Library. Ehlert, who admitted to not liking talking about herself, said she had felt it was time to share herself with the younger generations, which was, in part, why she’d written the book. She also admitted that when younger writers asked her where she got her stories, her answer was, “If I knew where the ideas came from, I certainly would go to that spot more frequently.” Ehlert sat with three other panelists, all illustrator/authors, on stage—The Cosmobiography of Sun Ra: The Sound of Joy Is Enlightening’s (Candlewick, 2014) Chris Raschka, The Pilot and the Little Prince: The Life of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s (Farrar, 2014) Peter Sís, and Sisters’ (Scholastic, 2014) Raina Telgemeier.

The panelists wear hats made especially for them by the panel's moderator, Paula Willey, to reflect their creativity.

Participants shared stories of how their works came to be and insights into their work processes, including bits about family life and dynamics. Ehlert, who grew up in a household with a younger brother and sister, said she’d grown up without much money and in a town without an arts supply store. As a result, she used what was around her to create arts and crafts, reflected in her Scraps Book. Raschka, on the other hand, had been a fan of the wildly unconventional jazz musician, Sun Ra, and the road to publishing his book took years, with many rejections, until he finally he gave his current editor at Candlewick publishing a copy of his long, illustrated book without words—and with artwork made of water colors and torn bits of colorful paper; her response at the time was that she could not publish it. However, she asked if she could keep the art. He let her keep it, until one day, he asked for it back. That was when she said she would publish it. (However, she requested he do some additional work fleshing out the story of Sun Ra, first.) The Pilot and the Little Prince: The Life of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry came into existence because of an obsession Sís had with Antoine de Saint Exupéry that was born from partly from denial. Sis had asked the de Saint Exupéry family for permission to write about the Little Prince author, and he was told “no.” Sís, who grew up in what was once Czechoslovakia (and is now the Czech Republic), admits that “no” became an obsession, a challenge for him to overcome. And overcome it, he did.

Raina Telgemeier shares a story that appears in her graphic YA memoir Sisters.

Telgemeier, who told the audience she had always wanted a little sister, had published the graphic YA memoir Smile (Scholastic, 2010) where her antagonistic relationship with her younger sister had made an appearance. “Readers wanted to read more about that relationship,” shares Telgemeier, who says that in her follow up book, she writes about a story where she goes camping with her family and while berry picking, she steps on a dead snake—instilling a lifelong fear of snakes. Naturally, her younger sister then adopts a pet snake. Real life and its struggles can be great inspiration for art, as in the case of the "Stories Lives" panelists. To read more about SLJ's inspiring Day of Dialog, click here.