By all accounts, and by his own estimation, Mark Teague has a nice life. With his wife, Laura, and two daughters--Lily, age seven, and Ava, two and a half--plus a few cats and 11 chickens, Teague lives and works in a late-19th-century Victorian home in a small town in New York's lush Hudson Valley. It is a long way from San Diego, where he was born and raised, and, likewise, Teague's career has come a long way since his first book, The Trouble with the Johnsons, was published back in 1989.

A polished hardwood staircase leads to the second floor of Teague's home, where his studio is situated near the family's bedrooms. Bookshelves line one wall of the simply appointed space, which also holds a computer and Teague's drawing table, placed in front of a window that offers a sweeping view of the Hudson River. Drawings by Lily and Ava are hung throughout the sunny and uncluttered room, as are Teague's sketches, steps in his working process.

The peaceful setting seems ideal for honing his craft, and even though Teague's roots are on the West Coast, he is firmly settled in his mostly working-class village of 2,500. "I would've imagined a life of moving around more," he says, "but we really like it here, and ended up staying."

The youngest of seven children, Teague moved to New York City in 1986, after graduating from U.C. Santa Cruz with a degree in U.S. history, and eventually got a job doing window displays for Barnes & Noble. While at B&N, Teague became intrigued by the children's books he was working with. "When I was a kid, most of the illustrations were pen-and-ink with one- or two-color overlays--that was my idea of children's books," he recalls. "But I was inspired by what I saw at the store, especially books by Chris Van Allsburg, Richard Egielski and William Joyce."

Although he didn't have any formal art training, Teague developed an idea for a book of his own--about a boy and a cat homesick for the life they had before moving to a big city--and showed his sketches to the children's buyer at B&N, who introduced him to Jean Feiwel at Scholastic. Feiwel liked the book and published it, and Teague has been with Scholastic ever since.

In 1988, Teague and his wife left the city for upstate New York. They got jobs in Albany, about a half-hour drive from their home, but Teague soon quit and went back to working freelance for B&N and Scholastic (where he illustrated several books under the pen name Elroy Freem). After his picture book Pigsty was published in 1994 and was "pretty successful," according to Teague, Laura was able to quit her job, too. "Since then," he says, "my book work has been consistent."

So far, Teague has written and illustrated 11 books of his own, and has illustrated more than 30 books for other authors. This month, Scholastic Press will publish Dear Mrs. LaRue, a picture book that he has been working on with senior editor Tracy Mack for the past two years. "I was noodling around with an idea for a story about summer camp and the mournful letter home," Teague says. "Somehow it got transferred into a dog story, and summer camp became obedience school." The book's humor stems from Ike the dog's perception of his surroundings ("a prison") and reality (a rather cushy, spa-like setting). "I had to be mindful of the audience," Teague explains. "I had to be sure they would get the discrepancy between what the dog is writing in his letters to his owner and what is really going on."

The writing part took a long time, he says. "The problem was the narrative in the form of correspondence. I had an easy time writing funny letters, but a hard time making it into a story." Teague and Mack went back and forth on the manuscript for more than a year, during which, he says, it "went through a couple of major overhauls and four or five rewrites. When the manuscript was in order, then it was a lot of fun; the illustrations came easily. Tracy was very helpful, and I'm really satisfied with the way it turned out." Teague also credits Scholastic art director David Saylor for guidance during the book's development, and he dedicated Dear Mrs. LaRue to Mack and Saylor (and to Earl and Ali, a pair of inspirational canines).

Bookseller interest was sparked at this year's BEA, where Teague was warmly received at a reading and presentation he did about the book's development. Scholastic reports that the book is moving briskly and has 75,000 copies in print on the eve of publication.

To promote the book this fall, Teague will appear at the Mid-South, NCIBA and PNBA regional bookseller shows, and will make bookstore visits in Louisville, Lexington, New Orleans, San Francisco and Portland, Ore. "It's a lot of travel for me," he says. "It's taken me a while to get comfortable with public speaking, but I enjoy seeing the kids--they're really funny."

Methods of a Self-Taught Artist

On the drafting table in Teague's studio is an early version of a drawing that shows his process (the picture is a scene from Shakespeare's The Tempest that he is working on for a forthcoming illustrated collection for Scholastic). Teague typically begins a piece of artwork by drawing in pencil, "then I do a burnt-sienna underpainting. Then I paint gesso on with thick brush strokes to give it texture. And the paint goes on in layers."

Sometimes creating his artwork is a matter of trial and error, Teague says. "My greatest strength and my greatest weakness come from the fact that I'm self-taught," he observes. "But it always looks like my stuff. I didn't set out to create a 'look.' It was organic--I didn't have anyone teaching me, so it became mine effortlessly."

There is a down side to his lack of art-school experience, though, he admits: "There is still a lot I don't know, and some stuff that has taken me years to learn that I could have picked up in the first semester of art school."

His style has changed over the years, Teague says, primarily because of the artistic media and techniques he has familiarized himself with. "It's not something I've set out to do. I think my work has evolved." Lately, and for Dear Mrs. LaRue, he is working with acrylic gouaches, which he likes because they are not too bright and they reproduce well in the printed book.

Teague continues to find inspiration in works by other children's book illustrators, citing David Shannon, Kevin Hawkes, Mary GrandPré, Paul O. Zelinsky and Stephen Johnson. "Most of the people who are influential to me are using more substantial styles and heavier paint application, which appeals to me," he says. "With some artists, I couldn't tell you how they do it, but I like the effect."

Juggling a Full Schedule

Teague says he generally wakes up with Lily at six o'clock and gets her off to school, then works in his studio until evening. "It's not a hardship for me to sit down and work all day--I enjoy it," he says. "But it's sedentary, so I like to get out and run, play soccer, stay active."

Teague divides his time between writing and illustrating his own books and illustrating books for other authors, often working on more than one project at a time--an arrangement he finds ideal. "I like working with authors," he says. "It is exciting to see a good manuscript that allows me to go in great directions. It pushes me in areas I wouldn't think to go myself."

Generally, the book's editor will share Teague's sketches with the author to get feedback and suggestions, although he says he rarely has to make radical changes as a result. "I absolutely want to honor what the author wants to do," Teague stresses. "I try to be a careful reader, and I listen to any vision they have for the artwork. We're pretty much separate during the course of the project. I met Jane Yolen after How DoDinosaurs Say Good Night? was done, when we were doing a signing together."

Which does he prefer, writing or illustrating? "Writing is more frustrating when I'm working on it, but it's really satisfying when it comes together," Teague answers. "Illustrating is more meditative, and at the end of the day I don't feel like my head is all screwed up, like I do when I'm writing."

Despite any frustration, Teague figures that his hard work over the years has paid off. "I have a general sense of progress," he says, "and I feel like I always have better work ahead." He has several works on the horizon: he is putting the finishing touches on the manuscript for a sequel to Dear Mrs. LaRue, called Detective LaRue, and is working on three collaborations: one with Yolen on How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon?, a sequel to their previous book (which has over 360,000 copies in print); another with Cynthia Rylant, on a new Poppleton book; and the third with Shana Corey, on the next book in the First Graders from Mars series. Teague happily piles projects onto his plate, making the most of his chosen profession. "The diversity of children's books is great," he says with a grin. "You can try all kinds of things and get away with a lot."