We are thrilled to announce that Ramona Snowden has published the first book in her Finn and Brody Warm Beach Investigations early reader series. It is titled The Mystery of the Missing Meow. We are especially excited because Ramona is the first member of our Create Your Children’s Picture Book in a Year cohort member to have a book published. Here’s the story.
Create Your Children’s Picture Book in a Year cohort
In January 2021, the first Create Your Children’s Picture Book in a Year cohort first met via Zoom. I started this cohort to stay accountable to completing my I Remember… children’s book series and to share lessons learned over the years writing, illustrating and publishing children’s picture books. The cohort met the first Monday of each month via Zoom. Each month we would go over one of the twelve steps of the journey from imagining to printing, promoting and selling the book cohort member’s dreamed of. My friend Daniel Snowden heard about the class. His mother Ramona had been writing stories since she was a young girl but had never shared them. He encourage her to join the cohort. Ramona did and for the first time shared one of her stories. It was really good. Ramona worked hard through all the steps. But she ran into a roadblock: she didn’t have a graphic designer.
Read reviews of that first cohort experience here
Graphic Design Pilot Project
Two things became clear to me: first, many cohort members were going to need help with the graphic design to prepare their book for printing; second, I did not have the time to do that work. I spoke to my son Jacob who has helped me with our own book design projects on InDesign. He said he was willing to do the graphic design/layout of a couple of books. We decided to do graphic design of two cohort member’s books as a kind of “pilot” project: Ramona’s was one. Ramona chose to go through Gorham Printing in Centralia WA. We’ve worked with Gorham on projects before and appreciate their service. It was super exciting to get a unbound proof copy of the book.
The Mystery of the Missing Meow Printed
I was hoping that Ramona’s The Mystery of the Missing Meow would be printed in time for her to sign it for guest at the opening of the Camano Island Studio Tour over mother’s day weekend May 6-8. It wasn’t. But, it was completed before the Encore weekend! Ramona made the drive to Centralia and picked up the books in time for her to sign on Saturday, May 14th. It was so great to see her smile as her dream of creating a book came true!
And was really fun to see her sign books and share about her story on Saturday. You can see a video of that time here:
https://www.facebook.com/jason.t.dorsey.1/videos/3206324846308801
Interested in Purchasing a Book?
If you live in Stanwood/Camano Island you can pick up a book at Elger Bay Grocery.
Learn More About the Children’s Book Cohort here
It’s too late in the year to join the 2022 cohort. But if you are interested in joining the 2023 cohort you can learn more FAQs here:
