Sara Michaels has agreed to illustrate our 4th customizable book, “Ruler of Space”!  Sara completed “A Day at the Park” in record time, and is ready for this next project.  Of course, it’s all hush-hush, but word has it that she will be experimenting with a new style of illustration to shake things up.

“Ruler of Space” follows in the same ego-maniacal vein as “If I Were Big”, to explore all the things your child would have and do if they were the King or Queen of Space.  Coming up with a gender neutral title buggered us for a little while, but we found it!  There are a lot of space sports, including shooting hoops with Colossus (the asteroid droid), playing baseball with a comet and crane, and mountain climbing on Mars.  Of course there will also be Spaceballs (or “parties”, if you prefer) and riches galore.

Writing this story was extremely fun for me because I am a big nerd who loves space and sci-fi.  More importantly, the fantastic nature of the infinity of space unleashes extremely fun (im)possibilities for our heros and heroines to enjoy.  Part of writing this and all my stories has been an experiment in trusting my wild and crazy ideas and allowing them to make it to the page.  I have consciously avoided my inner censor who insists,  ”that’s ridiculous, Jeff.  Everyone knows that whales cannot possibly breath in the vacuum of space, let alone be harnessed to pull a space chariot.”

I’m excited to see the sketches Sara comes up with and maybe a few will be leaked onto this blog by an unscrupulous editor…