Sue Lowell Gallion - June 2026 Featured Author

Sue Lowell Gallion’s books include the PUG MEETS PIG picture book series and the nonfiction OUR WORLD board book series. The OUR WORLD series was chosen as Oprah’s Favorites 2024 and highlighted on “Good Morning, America.” Sue’s a former SCBWI regional advisor.

Congrats on your recently released nonfiction board book, OUR PREHISTORIC PLANET: Dinosaurs and Other Creatures of the Past, which released in March 2026. Tell us a little about it.

OUR PREHISTORIC PLANET is the fifth book in a series of large globe-shaped nonfiction board books illustrated by Lisk Feng and published by Phaidon Press. The idea for this series began in at the 2017 SCBWI regional conference here in KC at a workshop on novelty board books led by Ariel Richardson, Chronicle editor. We brainstormed ideas with paper and scissors, and that’s when I came up with the concept of a globe-shaped book with rhyming text about Earth’s geography. The first book, OUR WORLD: A First Book of Geography, was sold in 2019 and released in July 2020, which was early COVID. I feel incredibly lucky that the book sold well and got a lot of recognition, which opened the door for more books.

The prehistoric book was the hardest one to write out of the five (the other three cover the underwater world, the galaxy, and the seasons of the world.) The research was challenging, partly because new dinosaur discoveries are changing the science very quickly, and also because we wanted to cover the prehistoric world from the first signs of ocean life through the early mammals – more than three billion years. I also did a lot of visual image research for these books, and of course, there are no photo references! We had a paleontologist advisor who reviewed the text and illustrations throughout the process, which was extremely helpful.

How did you get started? Did you always want to be a children's author?

My background is journalism and PR, so my work always included writing. I got serious about writing picture books for kids 20+ years ago. I became involved in SCBWI and local critique groups, began my continuous loop of library holds to study new picture books, and attended all the workshops I could. I sold my first picture book, PUG MEETS PIG, to an editor at the LA summer SCBWI conference in 2013 through a manuscript critique. You just never know what will happen in this business! PUG MEETS PIG turns 10 this August. OUR PREHISTORIC PLANET is my 12th book to be published.

Do you have a critique group? And if so, how has that group been beneficial to your career?

My critique partners have been key to my career, and I would never have stuck with this business without their encouragement. I have been in a small critique group with two local authors, Ann Ingalls and Jody Jensen Shaffer, for about 15 years. I critique with other authors around the country, whom I’ve met through SCBWI, the Highlights Foundation (now Boyds Mills) and other craft workshops. I attended retreat workshops led by Jane Yolen and Heidi Stemple in 2016 and 2018, which were game changers for me. I’ve stayed connected with many authors I met through that network.

What is the best advice you've ever been given about writing?  What advice would you give to someone who is just starting out?

Some of the best advice I’ve ever heard was from Linda Sue Park at a conference: read at least 1,000 books (less than five years old) in the genre you are writing before you start submitting. Read picture books or board books out loud. Study them carefully. Write or type out the text of ones you particularly admire, marking the page turns. Study reviews of current books you are reading in periodicals like Horn Book, School Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly. Find other writers who want to improve their craft and study books in your genre together.

Look at the resources available online, such as SCBWI regional webinars, the Writing Barn workshops, Boyds Mills online or in-person workshops (formerly Highlights Foundation), 12x12, Revise and Shine, and any others you can find. Attend anything you can in person! I think our community is still recovering from the isolation COVID imposed. There is nothing like connecting with other writers and illustrators in person.

What are you currently working on? Anything else upcoming you'd like us to know about?

I’m always working on picture book and board book manuscripts, mostly fiction right now, and I have several different manuscripts out on submission by my agent at any time. I do have a contract in process now for a picture book, but I can’t share anything about it yet. And I get lots and lots of rejections – that is just part of this business. It’s a tough market right now.