 [This giveaway is now closed!] We're thrilled to give away 2 copies of "Stress Can Really Get on Your Nerves" books written by Trevor Romain courtesy of Emily Dawson, who serves as a board member for the Clear The list Foundation.
To Enter, you MUST: -Leave a comment on this blog post on why you deserve to win this book! For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry -- that's 6 chances to win! Entries must be received by 5pm CT on Sunday, September 20, 2020. [This giveaway is now closed!] The winners will be contacted via email on or around Monday, September 21, 2020 and will need a response within 48 hours to claim the prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. Winners must reside in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age or older. While we are on the subject of books, take a browse of our entire book collection written and illustrated by Trevor Romain in our Back-to-School sale of books here.
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 [This Giveaway is now closed!] We're thrilled to give away 2 copies of ‘The Other Side of the Invisible Fence' books written by Trevor Romain courtesy of Emily Dawson, who serves as a board member for the Clear The list Foundation.
To Enter, you MUST: -Leave a comment on this blog post on why you deserve to win this book! For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry -- that's 6 chances to win! Entries must be received by 5pm CT on Sunday, September 13, 2020. [This Giveaway is now closed!] The winners will be contacted via email on or around Monday, September 14, 2020 and will need a response within 48 hours to claim the prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. Winners must reside in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age or older. While we are on the subject of books, take a browse of our entire book collection written and illustrated by Trevor Romain in our Back-to-School sale of books here.  [This giveaway is now closed!] We're thrilled to give away 2 copies of ‘Cliques, Phonies, & Other Baloney’ books written by Trevor Romain courtesy of Emily Dawson, who serves as a board member for the Clear The list Foundation.
To Enter, you must:
For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete: Each comment counts as a separate entry -- that's 5 chances to win! Entries must be received by 5pm CT on September 7, 2020. [This giveaway is now closed!] The winners will be contacted via email on or around September 8, 2020 and will need a response within 48 hours to claim the prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. Winners must reside in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age or older. [This giveaway is now closed!] While we are on the subject of books, take a browse of our entire book collection written and illustrated by Trevor Romain in our Back-to-School sale of books here.  [This giveaway is now closed!] We're thrilled to give away 2 copies of “True or False? Test Stink” books written by Trevor Romain and courtesy of Emily Dawson, who serves as a board member for the Clear The List Foundation.
To Enter, you must: 1. Leave a comment on this blog post on why you deserve to win this book 2. Subscribe to the Trevor Romain Company newsletter. 3. Subscribe to The Trevor Romain Podcast For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete: Each comment counts as a separate entry -- that's 7 chances to win! Entries must be received by 5pm CT on August 30, 2020. [This giveaway is now closed!] The winners will be contacted via email on or around August 31, 2020 and will need a response within 48 hours to claim the prize or another winner will be chosen. [This giveaway is now closed!] This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. Winners must reside in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age or older. While we are on the subject of books, take a browse of our entire book collection written and illustrated by Trevor Romain in our Back-to-School sale of books here.  [This giveaway is now closed!] We're thrilled to give away 2 copies of ‘How to do Homework Without Throwing Up’ books written by Trevor Romain courtesy of Emily Dawson, who serves as a board member for the Clear The list Foundation. To Enter, you must:
For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry -- that's 7 chances to win! Entries must be received by 5pm CT on August 24, 2020. [This giveaway is now closed!] [This giveaway is now closed!] The winners will be contacted via email on or around August 25, 2020 and will need a response within 48 hours to claim the prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. Winners must reside in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age or older. While we are on the subject of books, take a browse of our entire book collection written and illustrated by Trevor Romain in our Back-to-School sale of books here.  Graphic Courtesy By: The Trevor Romain Company CHICAGO — As the SIGGRAPH 2020 North America conference goes to a virtual format starting on 17 August, 2020, the 3rd annual installment of ACM SIGGRAPH’s Diversity & Inclusion Summit welcomes best-selling children’s author and illustrator Trevor Romain as its virtual keynote speaker. In addition to going virtual this year, the Summit will also span across two days from 22-23 August in alignment between the two week conference in the Pacific Time Zone (UTC/GMT-7). After 28 August, access to the conference content will be available until 27 October, while the ACM SIGGRAPH Diversity & Inclusion Summit will be permanent on SIGGRAPH.org and ACM SIGGRAPH Facebook page courtesy of the ACM SIGGRAPH Diversity and Inclusion committee. Romain, who serves as the president of the Trevor Romain Company based in Austin, TX, established a career spanning over 30 years as a successful children’s book author, illustrator and featured in the award-winning Comical Sense animation series shown on PBS affiliate stations around the United States. Today, he has sold over a million copies of his books and published in 22 languages. Previously, Trevor served as the past president of the American Childhood Cancer Organization and known for his work with the Make-A-Wish Foundation, the United Nations, UNICEF and the USO. “The ACM SIGGRAPH Diversity & Inclusion committee is truly honored to have Trevor Romain to keynote the 3rd annual Diversity and Inclusion Summit for SIGGRAPH 2020. In honor of this year’s ‘Think Beyond’ theme, we are excited to engage into Trevor’s fresh perspective from South Africa, and spotlight the importance to inclusive storytelling from his life, career and how it’s essential moving forward.” said ACM SIGGRAPH Diversity and Inclusion Chair Tony Baylis, of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. For the keynote session, Romain will share his upbringing in South Africa, intentions from behind the scenes of creating Comical Sense and the importance of inclusive storytelling to give virtual attendees insight to a hopeful future today. Romain will also do a fireside conversation with Daniel Ramamoorthy, commonly known as Dan Ram, on Exploring Empathy & Creativity to Tell Inclusive Stories on 23 August at 9:45 a.m. PDT. Romain shared, “I am honored to present at ACM SIGGRAPH’s Diversity & Inclusion Summit at SIGGRAPH 2020 to discuss the importance of inclusive storytelling. The Trevor Romain Company creates materials designed to help kids to become happier, healthier and more confident through a variety of resources. We are excited to share our work and the thinking behind our interactive communication strategies at the 3rd Annual Diversity and Inclusion Summit.” – Trevor Romain, President at The Trevor Romain Company. The 2020 ACM SIGGRAPH Diversity & Inclusion Summit keynote session will be streamed virtually on Saturday, 22 August at 12 p.m. CDT (1 p.m. EDT, 10 a.m. PDT). Access to this keynote is available to the public and available through the ACM SIGGRAPH Facebook page. This event is open to all, but registration for SIGGRAPH 2020 is highly encouraged at s2020.SIGGRAPH.org/register. The Summit’s diverse programming also includes presentations from Buzzfeed Animation, Women in Animation, Google, Industrial Light & Magic as well as discussions on the topics of Black Lives Matter, COVID-19, Unconscious Bias, Homelessness, Deafness and Working from Home. RSVP to Trevor's keynote streaming free on Saturday, August 22, 2020 starting at 10:00am PT here. RSVP to Trevor's session with Dan Ram on Sunday, August 23, 2020 starting at 10:30am PT here. ### About ACM, ACM SIGGRAPH and SIGGRAPH Conferences ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, is the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society, uniting educators, researchers, and professionals to inspire dialogue, share resources, and address the field’s challenges. ACM SIGGRAPH is a special interest group within ACM that serves as an interdisciplinary community for members in research, technology, and applications in computer graphics and interactive techniques. SIGGRAPH Conferences, held in North America and Asia, are the world’s leading annual interdisciplinary educational experiences showcasing the latest in computer graphics and interactive techniques.  Photo Courtesy By: Trevor Romain Read the entire transcript from the latest episode from the Trevor Romain Podcast, Under the Big Sky. In response from a fan who was going through a creative crisis, you can now read the transcription while listening to the podcast.
---------------------------------------- My first book with a major publisher came out a good number of years ago. I submitted that particular book to over 50 publishers, some big some small and was rejected by them all, before it was finally acquired by Harper Collins Publishers, in New York. The initial version of the book I had sent them was illustrated in black and white because I wanted it to have the feel of ‘The Giving Tree’, by Shel Silverstein. Harper Collins had different ideas. My editor, Simone Kaplan wanted it in full color. I was excited, but petrified because I was at the beginning of my illustration career and was afraid that I was going to make a mistake when painting the color pictures for the book. After freaking out for five minutes, I tensed up and painted the illustrations as perfectly as I could. The publisher wasn't happy with my efforts. They were rather blunt about not liking what I sent them back. I was devastated because I was so sure they were going to love what I did, but they didn’t. I actually felt down about it for weeks. I considered throwing the whole project in the rubbish bin. I reconsidered my dream to be a full time writer and illustrator. After I got tired of feeling sorry for myself, and wallowing in my own self pity, I tried again. This time I worked even harder to do the perfect watercolor illustrations for my treasured book. They still didn't like what I had done. I felt quite depressed to tell the truth. My big break was feeling rather broken. After a number of calls and discussions, the publisher decided to get, what they called, a colorist to do a sample illustration using my line drawings. I went through such mixed emotions at the time. Was I a terrible illustrator? Was I not cut out for the book business? Did that mean the whole projects was rubbish? Talk about self doubt. I actually even felt ashamed for a bit, because perhaps I oversold my ability. I felt like I let myself down and, in turn, let the team who accepted my book for publishing, down. A week later they sent me a sample page of the colorist's work. A person who, in essence, was going to nudge me out of my own book. Very gently, they suggested he do the coloring of my book. I was very disappointed to say the least. But, truth be told, which I wasn’t going to admit in public, I kind of liked the sample painting the colorist had actually done. Then, after siting with it for a few days and staring it his version of my pictures, I had a revelation . “ $#@*, I bet I could do that." I thought to myself. While having my weekly half-hour catch-up phone chat with my mother in South Africa later that day, I subconsciously messed with my paints and replicated the style the colorist had produced without even realizing what I had done. My bruised ego suddenly peeked out from behind the dark cloud. I marveled at my own creation. “Hmmmm.” I thought. “It looks really good.” I did a few more samples, and before any self doubting could creep back in, I quickly sent the new samples off to the publisher. Guess what? They loved it. And I was given the go ahead to illustrate my book. You can see the result in the picture attached. I’m really proud of the way it turned out. The book came out the next year and was translated into many languages. It even had the honor of being acquired by Yoko Ono for the Japanese market. Funnily enough, on the dust jacket of the book, to this day, is a picture of Yoko Ono, not me. I also heard a while back that Yoko Ono was considering turning the book into an animated short film. (No news yet but I’m hoping that will come to fruition.) The lesson I learned from the entire experience is that I was trying too hard to paint the perfect pictures instead of enjoying the process, having fun, and painting the way I normally paint. I was trying so hard to create what I thought people wanted to see, instead of doing what I love doing. The stress, angst, and pursuit of the perfect picture almost cost me the opportunity of illustrating my first major book with one of the biggest publishers in the world. I often hear of people self-sabotaging their creative work by setting up unrealistic expectations for themselves. I have illustrated over fifty books since Under The Big Sky and once I started enjoying what I was doing, instead of trying to meet expectations, my creative process changed and my craft became my career. Read along to the podcast episode #20 here. Purchase the 'Under the Big Sky' book. Watch the video ebook on our YouTube Channel here.  [This giveaway is now closed!] We're thrilled to give away 2 copies of 'Connecting With Kids in a Disconnected World' books written by Trevor Romain courtesy of Emily Dawson, who serves as a board member for the Clear The list Foundation.
To Enter, you must:
For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry -- that's 7 chances to win! Entries must be received by 5pm CT on August 10, 2020. [This giveaway is now closed!] The winners will be contacted via email on or around Wednesday, August 12, 2020 and will need a response within 48 hours to claim the prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administrated, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Instagram. Winner must reside in the U.S. and be at least 18 years of age or older. While we are on the subject of books, take a browse of our entire book collection written and illustrated by Trevor Romain in our Back-to-School sale of books here.  As a continuation to The Trevor Romain Company video ebook series, we asked the company's president Trevor Romain about the purpose, development and its origins as a writer and illustrator for one of his classics, Under the Big Sky. Read below on our conversation to how this story became a beloved fan favorite and why it became a video adaptation. Trevor Romain Company: 1. To get things going, with fans who may already be familiar with this Under the Big Sky (also available to purchase a physical copy), why did you want to tell this story as a video ebook? Trevor: I think this is an important story to share and wanted to do it on all platforms available to us. Trevor Romain Company: 2. As a best-selling children's book author, who inspired you to write your first book and why? Trevor: I was inspired by A.A. Milne who wrote the original Winnie the Pooh series. His book, The House at Pooh Corner was the first book I ever read by myself. Trevor Romain Company: 3. Why do you think readers (and in this case viewers) will keep replaying this particular story over and over? Trevor: The story mirrors the journey of life and as you move on in life, different parts of the story will resonate with what you are learning along the way. Trevor Romain Company: 4. People may know you as a writer, but you also illustrate your books and for others, what sparks the passion for your creativity and why? Trevor: I have been rebelling against adulthood since I was a young child. I was born at a very young age so I don’t exactly remember when the rebellion started but I do know one thing, I am mischievous by nature and if I wasn’t creative and didn’t use my creativity I would probably get myself into all sorts of trouble. Trevor Romain Company: 5. What was your intention when you came up to the final decision to call the book, Under the Big Sky? Trevor: I needed to have a title that encapsulated the concept of all encompassing and while driving on a road trip near Joshua Tree in California, while I was writing the book, I noticed how big the sky was. Trevor Romain Company: 6. Which is your favorite season to write in, and why? Trevor: My favorite season to write is the writing season. Trevor Romain Company: 7. Where do you get your information or ideas to write and illustrate books and stories? Trevor: Under the Big Sky. Trevor Romain Company: 8. What do you like to do when you are not writing or drawing? Trevor: I love to run. Trevor Romain Company: 9. How many books have you written? We know this is hard for an author to choose, but do you have a favorite? Trevor: I have written over 50 books. Asking an author to name a favorite book is like asking a mother to name her favorite child. Not gonna do it just in case I hurt the feelings of any of my other books. Trevor Romain Company: 10. What would you like readers to take away from reading and watching, Under the Big Sky? Trevor: You will find the secret of life, under the big sky. Now It's Storytime: Watch the video, share your reactions here, and subscribe to our channel to be notified for more videos. We would love to hear your thoughts and suggestions directly below about your experience with this particular book. Purchase the physical book: Under the Big Sky  In the latest installment of the Trevor Romain Company's video ebook series introduces "The Keeper of the Dreams". Find out in this special Q&A session with Trevor on how he became also known as Doctor of Mischief and if he's a dream-maker or a dream-keeper. Then watch the book and share your thoughts, feedback and observations about this story below. Trevor Romain Company: 1. To kick things off, why did you decide to share about "The Keeper of the Dreams" and how does it make you feel? Trevor: I decided to share the Keeper of the Dreams because it deals with facing fear and because of COVID-19 people are quite fearful at the moment. Trevor Romain Company: 2. This book talks about the power of dreams, can you share with us what is a bucket list dream you want to achieve, but haven't yet? Trevor: I am very lucky that I have reached many of my dreams, but my biggest dream right now is to create a trust fund for the Botshabelo Orphanage in South Africa to cover their operating costs for many years to come. There are over 200 children living there and some months they struggle to keep food on the table for the kids. Trevor Romain Company: 3. If you had to choose, would you think of yourself as a dream-maker or a dream keeper, and tell us why? Trevor: I am neither really. But I sure am a dreamer. Trevor Romain Company: 4. Does writing energize or exhaust you? Trevor: Both writing and illustrating energize me more than anything, even espresso coffee. Trevor Romain Company: 5. With an interview with Austin Family you mentioned about this book and we know that this book holds a special place in your heart for many reasons. Can you share with your readers why in more detail? Trevor: This book was created to support children with cancer. It holds a special place in my heart because its creation led me to proudly serve kids with cancer and be a board member of the American Childhood Cancer Organization for many years. And for a two year stint the board president. Trevor Romain Company: 6. If you had the opportunity to place one message on every billboard around the world, what would it be and why? Trevor: The change in your pocket can change a child’s life. Trevor Romain Company: 7. Are the characters in "The Keeper of the Dreams" based on real people or imaginative? Trevor: They are based on real people. And I’m not going to tell you, who because they don’t know I created my characters around them. :-) Trevor Romain Company: 8. What is the most difficult part of your artistic process? Trevor: Deciding when to stop working on an illustration or a piece of writing. It’s difficult to figure out when something is done, or if it needs a little more work. Sometimes overworking a project can mess it up. Trevor Romain Company: 9. How long on average does it take you to write a book? Trevor: My self-help book series took about a month to write and a month to illustrate. Picture books are shorter and obviously things like a book of short stories or my memoirs of growing up in South Africa took years to write. I work on more than one project at a time so it is quite hard to calculate really. Trevor Romain Company: 10. Do you plan on sharing more stories as video books, ebooks, physical books, audio books in the near future? And if so, which platform to tell your stories do you prefer most? Trevor: Yes I do plan on sharing more work. I must say I am really enjoying the audio platform at the moment. Having The Trevor Romain Podcast allows me to share a story way faster and more efficiently than the time it takes to create, write and publish a book. Most of the time, a book will come out eighteen months to two years after it has been written. I will continue to write and illustrate children’s books, but look forward to using new technology to tell the stories I am creating. Now It's Story Time: Watch the video, share your reactions, and subscribe to our channel to be notified for more videos. We would love to hear your thoughts and suggestions directly below about your experience with this particular book. |
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September 2020
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