Illustrator Mentorship with Kerry Martin, Creative Director at Holiday House
Sep 21, 2025 - Mar 13, 2026
Online event
The Illustrator Mentorship is open to Unpublished SCBWI Members to work directly with Kerry Martin, Creative Director at Holiday House. Registration is open for SCBWI San Diego Home Region Premium Members. If mentorship spots are still available, Non-San Diego Home Region Premium members may register on September 24. (If SCBWI San Diego is not your home region and you register before September 24, you will be removed from the mentorship program.)
Kerry Martin, Creative Director at Holiday House and Peachtree Publishing Company
Kerry Martin is the creative director of Holiday House and Peachtree Publishing Company. She designs and illustrates picture books, novels, graphic novels, and illustrated nonfiction for very young through young adult readers. Kerry is interested in looking at portfolios for picture books and novels. She lives in Queens, New York with her husband and son. When not designing books or watching her son ride a skateboard, she is swimming, drinking strong coffee, or listening to audio books.
The mentorship provides illustrators or author/illustrators the opportunity to work directly with Kerry Martin. The mentorship is appropriate for those interested in illustrating picture books, book covers, or art for chapter and middle-grade books. Participants submit a dummy, portfolio, or book cover for a first-round review. Kerry will return a Gold Form with comments, offer one-on-one fifteen-minute Zoom critiques, and give an hour-long talk after the first round (anonymously) about common things that were well done or needed improvement in the work.
For the mentorship, Kerry will accept: PB, rhyming PB, CB, biography, graphic novels (text+art), dummies, portfolios.
Round 1: Mentees will submit a portfolio, OR dummy, OR 2-3 book covers, OR character design. For graphic novels, Kerry will accept a one page synopsis and ten pages of just script (Word doc) plus 3-5 pages of spreads or just single page illustrations (PDF or jpeg), though not all need to be polished.
Kerry will return a Gold Form with comments, offer one-on-one fifteen-minute Zoom critiques, and give an hour-long talk about common things that were well done or needed improvement in the work (anonymous).
Round 2: Based on the feedback received, mentees will submit a revised dummy, portfolio, or book cover. Then they will receive a second Gold Form and a final fifteen-minute Zoom critique.
Kerry will be accepting submissions of portfolios, dummies (picture book or other), or book covers.
Prices are as follows:
Mentorship without SD SCBWI Season Ticket is $190
Mentorship Season Ticket Holder is $170
Illustrator Mentorship Timeline (Dates and times may be adjusted if needed by faculty):
Round 1: October 10, 2025: Mentees receive a link to a Google Folder, where they will submit their work and receive the Gold Forms. Mentees will receive the sign-up sheet for BOTH rounds of Zoom Critiques
October 18 by noon: Mentees submit work via Google Folders
November 17-20: Round 1 Zoom critiques and recorded presentation. Monday-Wednesday begin at 4:00 p.m. (PT) with Thursday beginning at 5:15 p.m. (PT)
November 18: Zoom Presentation 5:00-6:00 p.m. (PT) (will be recorded for those unable to attend)
Round 2: February 9, 2026 by noon: Mentees submit 2nd round of work via Google Folders
March 9-12: Round 2 Zoom critiques, Monday-Wednesday begin at 4:00 p.m. (PT) with Thursday beginning at 5:15 p.m. (PT)
You MUST have a GMAIL account to submit to the folders. No other email will be accepted. You can easily sign up for a free gmail account here: https://support.google.com/mail/answer/56256?hl=en