An inside note from Jeanette, the author:

In 2006, my first book, Sundays with Matthew: A Young Boy with Autism and an Artist Share Their Sketchbooks, was published by the Autism Asperger Publishing Company.  It told the story of a remarkable friendship I shared with a young autistic boy named  Matthew.  

At the time, I was working and volunteering part-time as a Line Therapist for the Wisconsin Early Autism Project.  Matthew didn’t always have the words to express his thoughts out loud, but he loved drawing his ideas.  That’s how our conversations began, through shared pages and pictures.

Each week we kept side-by-side sketchbooks, trading pages filled with ideas, stories and imagination.  Those drawings bridged the gap between our worlds, and taught me how art can speak when words fall short.

That book is now out of print, but the experience helped inspire my new book, The Sketchbook Buddy, a collection of topics and sketchbook pages designed to help everyone unplug, connect, and communicate.   

To learn more about me and Jake, and the books we create from the heart, please visit www.LesadaPublishing.com.  Thanks for being a friend of the arts! - J'net