As the daughter of a publisher and an avid reader, I have been surrounded by books my entire life. When I was young, I would spend hours paging through Richard Scarry’s illustrated books about Busytown imagining what it would be like to drive in a pencil car and hang out with Huckle the cat and Betsy the bear. My mind would watch the passing of the seasons as I thumbed through Virginia Lee Burton’s The Little House, and would head on adventures with James Marshall’s best friends, George & Martha. As a preteen, I soaked up the magic in The Chronicles of Narnia, fretted over teen troubles with Judy Blume and bawled my eyes out while reading Where the Red Fern Grows.

While at college, I embraced Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and dove deep into Warhol’s 1960s New York scene through Edie: American Girl. I also had my first foray into creative writing taught by a flamboyant bohemian who loved to teach while crouched on top of a desk. Grad school introduced me to Flannery O’Connor and brought me back to one of my favorite classics, Alexandre Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo which I reread so I could design a proposed opera set for the famed Château d’If.

Fast forward to today and you will find me not only in two bookclubs but also surrounded by books, from my extensive collection of illustrated books and travel stories to a wide variety of present day fictional novels. It’s safe to say books have been and are a huge part of my life, so when I have been given the opportunity to write and illustrate my own books for publication, it truly has been a dream come true!

Below is an overview of my published books, as well as books I contributed to as an illustrator and samplings of my own writing and stories.

“Travel far, pay no fare… a book can take you anywhere.”

-Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Discover a unique way to really getting to know a city with my book series, Wanderlust Guides, published by West Margin Press. These colorfully illustrated books are a tour guide and travel journal all in one. They offer a creative way to get to know a city by highlighting historical facts and revealing creative prompts – from sketching to photography. Explore tourist spots and individual neighborhoods with a creative eye, and gain a new perspective you may never have seen otherwise.

Wanderlust Guide Book Series

• Wanderlust Los Angeles

• Wanderlust San Francisco

• Wanderlust Seattle

• Wanderlust Portland

“JUST THE TICKET: New Travel Books Offer Guidance for Every Step of the Journey — Betsy Beier set out to create a set of guides that educate visitors and deepen their engagement with the locale. . . Beier wanted travelers to get off their screens and into their surroundings. The result is West Margin’s new Wanderlust series.” ― Publishers Weekly

Anywhere Anytime Art: Illustration – An Artist’s Guide to Illustration on the Go is one in a series of art how to books published by Quarto Publishing Group. This book provides high level information about the field of illustration, in all its nuances, and contains 12 different art-on-the-go projects with step by step guidance to encourage people of all art abilities to be creative whether at home or traveling.

• Anywhere Anytime Art: Illustration

“Covering different techniques, styles and equipment. This is a wonderful book for anyone who has ever considered sketching on the go, and for some who hadn’t thought of it could certainly be convinced to give it a go!” – Reader Review

I contributed an illustrative map to the book 50 Things to See and Do in Northern New Mexico’s Enchanted Circle by Mark Williams and Amy Williams. The map provides a jumping off point to the rest of the book to orient the reader with locations mentioned. This book is published by West Margin Press.

I illustrated a detailed map of Calabria, Italy as well as spot illustrations used throughout this beautiful cookbook, Summer in Calabria by Natalina Cherubino. This book is published in Australia.