MORGANTOWN — Terra Alta native Ashley Belote is celebrating the publication of her first work as author and illustrator: the children’s book “The Me Tree.”
While she’s illustrated other works, this was her first illustrating her own story, she said. “It was super-exciting.”
The 2008 Preston High grad, now 31, lives in Charlotte, N.C., and was at a book signing when The Dominion Post talked to her by phone.
The Me Tree tells the story of a bear who isn’t enjoying the cramped conditions of the cave he shares with a clan of other bears. He rents what he thinks will be a quiet tree house, only to to find it occupied by a host of amiable but annoying squatters: squirrels, opossums, a sloth, a giraffe and many more.
But after evicting everyone, he grows lonely and realizes there’s something good about living with a family.
It’s published by Penguin under its Penguin Workshop imprint. Penguin Workshop books are bridge books, Belote said, meant to bridge the gap between picture books and early readers to help those emerging readers get through a book on their own, using several sight words along with visual cues from the illustrations.
The inspiration for the book came when she was teaching a group of kids at an art center in Charlotte, she said. “There’s always a couple kids in a group that look like they want to be by themselves,” just like her bear wants space.
She was working with the kids on an art project using cabbage leaves to make prints, and made one that looked like a tree, so she drew a little bear poking out of it. “That is when the line ‘Who is in my tree?’ popped into my head.”
She drew on personal background for the story, she said. Just as all the animals come together into a We Tree, she grew up in an extended family of people she wasn’t related to — the broader family of her parents’ friends who served as aunts and uncles. “I think a family can look a lot different than what is typical. A family can look however it wants to look.”
Belote is no stranger to publishing. Her mom, Cathy Teets, is president and CEO of Headline Books, the Terra Alta-based award-winning independent publishing company. “I’ve always been in the book business and loved it,” she said. She started going to book conferences and shows at age 9.
After Preston High, Belote studied art at Alderson Broaddus and took some more schooling after that.
Her first major publishing house job came as the illustrator of the children’s book Frankenslime published by Macmillan, Belote said. The author wanted someone who could draw an anthropomorphic slime character. They connected through Twitter.
From that job, Belote got an agent and submitted other works in progress that the agent shopped out.
The Me Tree resulted. It’s a tiny book, just 5 inches by 7 inches, 32 pages. The illustrations are bright and active, drawn on an iPad Pro in a program called Procreate.
Belote said she worked with a pair at Penguin Workshop after she submitted her original manuscript, engaging in a back-and-forth process to craft the finished book. “It’s a really fun concept” directed at multiple levels of readers. Some pages have jokes built into the illustrations that only parents will understand and chuckle at.
“A lot of the times the parents are reading these with the kids. You kind of have to satisfy them as well,” she said.
There’s a little gentle, discreet potty humor in the book. Bear discovers a sloth sitting on his toilet. We then see bear out in the woods partially hidden behind a tree holding a roll of toilet paper — a bit like the Charmin bears on TV — and after he’s cleared away his unwanted guests he has his bathroom back to himself.
Belote said potty humor is a sensitive area that doesn’t appeal to everyone. “I think it can be funny when handled appropriately.” Kids will often laugh at such things as little underwear jokes in picture books.
Belote’s next book will be “Listen Up, Louella,” published by Macmillan and out for sale in June 2022. It tells the story of a somewhat rude and self-absorbed elephant named Louella who attends a roller skating camp.
Her inattentiveness causes her to miss an invitation to a birthday party and teaches “the importance of what you miss if you don’t pay attention,” Belote said.
Belote wanted to express thanks to all of her West Virginia family for all of their support. And she wanted to pass a message to kids growing up in rural West Virginia.
“Some people think you can’t do big things coming from a small place.” But there are a lot of successful West Virginians. “I think it’s important, especially for kids, to know that you really can do anything that you want to, and know that your West Virginia family will support you in those dreams.”
The Me Tree is available:
Directly from Penguin, www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/673329/the-me-tree-by-ashley-belote-illustrated-by-ashley-belote/
From Amazon: www.amazon.com/Me-Tree-Ashley-Belote/dp/0593384857/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
And from the BookShop: https://bookshop.org/books/the-me-tree-9780593384855/9780593384824
TWEET David Beard @dbeardtdp EMAIL dbeard@dominionpost.com
