I dedicated El Deafo to my parents, because they are awesome. They drive me crazy, but I’m crazy about them.
They’ve been married for over 50 years. They met at UVa. My mom felt sorry for the shy boy who was sitting at a table at the cafeteria all by himself. So she married him.
One of the trickier things about illustrating El Deafo was that I had to age the main character as she journeyed through elementary school. Luckily, the main character in the book is me, so I had some good photo reference to use.
I featured a couple of these photos in a previous post, but here they are again, with their matching comic-Cece interpretation:
Preschool Cece, before illness and hearing aids and subsequent superpowers (unless you’re counting the superpowers of snot and cuteness)…
…and preschool Cece in the book.
The beginning of my book El Deafo is about my 2-week stay in the hospital while I recovered from meningitis. My hearing loss was a direct result of this illness. I spent a lot of time drawing during those two weeks. My parents claim that I drew the same thing over and over and over again, and that by the time I got to leave the hospital, I had done over 100 drawings. My parents only kept three, probably because it wasn’t really a time they wanted to remember. Here’s how I imagined I looked as a kid drawing in a hospital bed:
El Deafo is about hearing loss, of course, but it’s also about my family. Here’s an early scene from the book:
Sarah, Dad, Ashley, me, and Mom (1975)
During the less-than-two-weeks-away countdown to El Deafo, I’ll be sharing some of the behind-the scenes stuff, like these covers that never saw the light of day:
Only two weeks until my graphic novel/memoir El Deafo is released! September 2nd is gonna be a good day. The book is about my experiences as a deaf kid trying to function in a hearing world, and it is also a celebration of the technology that I was using in school during the mid-seventies and early eighties. That technology was called the Phonic Ear, and here it is in all its glory in the book:
El Deafo is coming out soon! Mark your calendars for September 2nd, to be exact. In the meantime, I have had the pleasure of reading some very generous and kind early reviews. The book has even gotten a couple of stars, one from Publishers Weekly and the other from Kirkus. Our old friend Jerry Bee likes the buzz:
Actually, he looks a little bit wary here…
What’s hot for summer and fall? Wearing too many layers, for one thing. The blog Robot6 (for Comic Book Resources) has deemed EL DEAFO pretty hot, too! And that’s kinda cool. Read what they have to say about the book here. What a treat to be on the same page as Lucy Knisley, who is unbelievably talented.
Also, if you have a little extra time, check out my conversation with Phil and Erin Stead on their new blog, Number 5 Bus Presents: Conversations with Book People. We talked about our favorite kids’ book authors and illustrators, about what it’s like to write and illustrate Early Readers, about spousal jealousy (!), and a little bit about EL DEAFO, too. We even compared stacks of books by our favorite authors/illustrators, and I think the Steads won. I had a great time typing with them!
Hey Kids!
Want more sneak peeks of EL DEAFO, plus a few other sneak peeks of my upcoming picture book I YAM A DONKEY? Check it out here at Julie Danielson’s amazing blog, 7 Impossible Things Before Breakfast!
