This week, I’m reconnecting with a fellow student from Storyteller Academy. Maritza and I were both selected for the Storyteller Academy Manuscript Showcase in 2023. It was such an exciting time, and leading up to the showcase, we were all in contact almost daily! But after the showcase ended, we lost touch. It’s been a joy to chat again through this interview. Maritza is an artist. But she doesn’t just write and illustrate. She embroiders. She paints. She sews! She keeps her creative juices flowing in a variety of ways. I also love to craft! (I may or may not own two hot glue guns.) I don’t do it enough, but I think there’s something to be said for stepping away from screens and/or notebooks, and getting lost in… something else! I thought it would be interesting to talk about that. What are the benefits of outside creative projects? Do they fuel your writing?

Let’s meet Maritza!

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MARITZA RUIZ-KIM (she/her) is a California artist and writer who makes books for kids. Her forebears include migrant workers and plumbers, entrepreneurs and storytellers, makers and builders, all of them Mexican Americans who came from north & south of a US/Mexico border that did a lot of changing through the years.

She grew up down the street from Disneyland until her parents moved the family to the middle of nowhere, aka Southern California’s Mojave Desert. Later, Maritza moved herself up north so she could attend the San Francisco Art Institute, earning a BFA in New Genres. She’s lived in the Bay Area ever since, settling in the Diablo Region with her husband, two sons, and two smoosh-faced dogs. She has exhibited fine art in gallery shows across the US, and through 2020, she was a preschool art teacher. Now, she is an author-illustrator whose current works include picture books, a young reader graphic novel, and a hybrid illustrated middle grade novel.

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Q: HELLO, MARITZA! WHEN DID YOU START WRITING/ILLUSTRATING PICTURE BOOKS?

It was 2019! I know this because I found a couple posts on my website blog that mentioned making books.

Q: WHY DID YOU START WRITING/ILLUSTRATING PICTURE BOOKS?

I’ve always enjoyed writing and making art equally, and I worked for years as a kids’ art teacher. When I was in art school, I took several bookmaking classes, so the idea of making books has been on my mind for a long time. I wish I had connected all the pieces sooner: Writing + Art + Kids = Children’s Book Author/Illustrator. I’m here now, though!

Q: WHAT DO YOU WRITE/ILLUSTRATE?

I create all sorts of kidlit stories. Some have offbeat humor, and others are lyrical and reflective. I work with watercolor, and I make comics digitally. I write picture books, I have an early reader graphic novel, AND I have a hybrid prose novel (middle grade? YA?) in the works.

OMG. It’s a lot!

Q: WHAT IS YOUR CURRENT FAVORITE PICTURE BOOK? WHY?

TIGER VS. NIGHTMARE by Emily Tetri. It’s a picture book/graphic novel that has a delightful main character in Tiger. She’s drawn so sweetly, and her expressiveness is tender and understandable. When Tiger has to face down her nightmare, you can feel her overcoming it in the way it’s colored and paced in the panels and page turns. I highly recommend it! Tetri has a new book coming out in Fall 2026… her first since TIGER VS. NIGHTMARE was published!

Q: YOU USED TO EXHIBIT FINE ART BEFORE YOU SWITCHED TO MAKING BOOKS FOR KIDS. TELL US ABOUT THAT TRANSITION!

I’d been exhibiting art in galleries and non-profit spaces. I worked with themes that came from my own interests, and I didn’t have to think about the audience so much, since they’d be adults and maybe not so different from me. Although I still enjoy making art, I became disillusioned with how my work went out into the world. A lot of fine art is not affordable for the average person, especially when it’s one-of-a-kind and set apart on walls, on pedestals, or in installations. I wanted my art to be affordable and interact-able.

I started creating books for kids by focusing on expressing myself. Although it’s true that our best storytelling can originate from personal experience, I had to be reminded that my stories would resonate more with kids if I had them in mind as I crafted the story. At the end of this creative process, if the books aren’t for the kids and the stories don’t resonate with them, can I really say I’m writing for children? I had to think about the audience in a different way, and that was the biggest mindset shift.

Q: DO YOU STILL PAINT?

I do! Most of my painting lately has been watercolor, sometimes in my sketchbook and sometimes on larger sheets. I really love the texture of the pigments swirling in the water. When I’ve been working digitally for a while, I have the need to get my hands busy with the kind of art that I can feel.

Q: YES! BUSY HANDS BRING US INTO THE PRESENT MOMENT. TELL US ABOUT YOUR OTHER CREATIVE PURSUITS!

I love to upcycle clothing into new pieces. One time, I “harvested” fabric from an old silk dress and dyed it a new color, then I cut it up and made a quilt patterned top out of it. I’ve made curtains and used the leftover fabric to make little wallets with snap closures. My online scrolling is mainly seeing crafts of all kinds being created, like reverse appliqué embroidery! It’s a fun way to rehabilitate a stained sweatshirt.

I believe that when I’m doing creative work that isn’t directly on a book project, the “work” is still percolating inside. I need to give my stories time to breathe. When I’m being creative in these ways, I get to hold the results of creative work in my hands. I need that since the road to publication is a long one!

Q: IT CAN CERTAINLY BE LONG. WHAT’S BEEN THE BEST PART OF THAT JOURNEY SO FAR?

I’ve met great people at book launch parties and dinners, retreats and casual meetups, in-person conferences, online communities, and webinars. This industry has so many networks that bring people together, where we learn from experts and each other. 

In chronological order, I became a member of SCBWI, did a year with Lilla Rogers’ Make Art that Sells, did a mentorship with Giuseppe Castellano’s Illustration Department and took the character design class with Kelly Light. I’ve been a part of Arree Chung’s Storyteller Academy. I’m a member of Janna Morishima’s Kids Comics Unite. I went to the Latinx Storytellers Conference in September 2025. I’ve taken classes with Mr. Tom Froese on Skillshare, and I became a Regional Advisor for my chapter of SCBWI, organizing events locally.

​I wouldn’t be able to make stories that I’m proud of without learning from so many great writers and illustrators. So, the cherry on top of it all is that because of this support, I get to have the quiet moments of victory and joy when I create characters and stories that make me want to say, “Hey, kids! I have a story for you!” 

That’s the best part.

Q: WHAT’S BEEN THE HARDEST PART OF THE JOURNEY?

Waiting. In my case, it has a lot to do with being an artist AND a writer. Although I’ve always been both, when I turned to kidlit instead of exhibiting fine art, I had to build skills while figuring out which one to zoom in on. I make art that is painterly AND line based. I write words that are lyrical AND in script/dialogue form. I love deep stories that resonate with kids, AND I love a silly brain teaser story. Oof! There’s a whole lot of effort that goes into getting my kidlit skills up to speed and I can’t work on all those skills at the same time. It’s taken me a long time not only to refine my craft, but also to choose which project I would include in my queries with agents and editors. It’s taken me about seven years. Waiting is hard!

Q: ANOTHER REASON CRAFTING IS SO GREAT. SOMETIMES, IT’S NICE TO HAVE A PROJECT YOU CAN FINISH IN A SHORTER PERIOD OF TIME.

WHAT’S BEEN YOUR MOST VALUABLE RESOURCE?

Feedback! I can be so serious in my intention to do my best work that sometimes (okay, maybe a lot of times?), I focus so much on improvement and skillbuilding that I lose connection with the heart of what I’m doing. I need time to have my work reviewed and reflected back to me, either through formal or informal means.

I’ve had feedback that comes from mentorships with published authors and illustrators, and I’ve also had buddies who know my work tell me what I seem most excited about when I’m getting lost in the weeds. But the most surprising vehicle for feedback actually came in the form of a “rejection.” It didn’t feel negative, strangely enough. It was a pass from an agent whose work I respect. He went into detail on what was working in my proposal, but shared that unfortunately he didn’t have the passion for the project he felt it deserved. I found it super helpful! I did a check for myself. How passionate was I about it? I realized I’d been focusing so much on all the components of putting together a graphic novel correctly, that my passion about the story wasn’t the focus anymore. That’s what I’m working on now, and I’m having more fun with it. That makes me smile.

Q: CELEBRATE YOURSELF! WHICH WRITING/ILLUSTRATING ACCOMPLISHMENT MAKES YOU FEEL THE PROUDEST?

Right now, it’s my characters Moose & Slushie! I’m having fun with them, and I’m proud every time I share them with people and I see that they get it. When they see what I see, that is so fun! 

Q: HOW DO YOU HANDLE REJECTION?

It’s never easy! The hardest is probably the rejection that comes boiling up from within. When I get the most impatient and start to get despondent that “nothing will even happen,” I start to see rejection around every corner. So, the way I handle it has a lot to do with my frame of mind at the moment. 

Q: WHAT KEEPS YOU WRITING/ILLUSTRATING?

There’s no guarantee that working on kid’s books will lead to agent representation and traditional publication. So, a good self-check question is: What would I keep doing even if I knew I’d never achieve certain career milestones? It’s especially important to ask myself this during times I don’t have outward facing accomplishments in exactly the way I want.

I know for certain that I would always be curious, and I’d keep making things for my enjoyment and the enjoyment of people around me. Now that I’ve been working on kidlit stories for a while, I can say I have characters I’m curious about. What is happening in their world? I want to know, and it’s fun to think about! And I didn’t feel this way about my characters when I first started working on stories for kids. Maybe the more I do this work, the more I let myself be a kid again, then the more I have a genuine drive to keep on keeping on. 

As an artist, I will always make things. I can’t help it! I really can’t. But to persevere in making books for kids, I need to keep my focus on the step directly in front of me. I can’t control the long-term results, but I can choose to take one important step at a time.

Q: WHAT HAS WAITING FOR YOUR “YES” TAUGHT YOU?

I’ve spent a lot of time and effort learning the craft of storytelling for kids, but being gifted this loooong wait for the “yes” (which doesn’t always feel like a gift!) has allowed me to relax and let childlike joy guide me more (when I let it!). Emotions are contagious, and so whether a book is about silly things or heavy things, I want to impart good things with my work.

This conversation reminded me that I started working through The Artist’s Way in 2023. I only made it three weeks before falling out of it. I’ve always intended to restart, but I haven’t. I mention this because, for me, the best part about it was the “Artist Date.” As important as it is to show up to write, it’s also equally important to do OTHER stuff. I know I’ve spent hours sitting at a laptop, unable to move my story forward… only to get up, start cleaning, and have a breakthrough! Ideas are always in our brains. But sometimes, they’re buried deep and need time to surface. However, I am not suggesting anyone clean! But maybe… take yourself on an Artist Date. This week! Or next week. I’m going to try to plan one for myself. Thanks for that push, Maritza!

If you want to keep in touch with Maritza, you can find her on Instagram as @marzkim_illustrated or on her blog, Cabinet of Curious-ness. This week, Maritza is giving away a 20 Minute Zoom AMA or a Picture Book/Graphic Novel Critique. She’d love to discuss the publishing industry, or go over something you’ve written! (But please limit longer works to the first five pages.) In order to enter, subscribe to the newsletter! Everyone who’s subscribed by 11:59PM PT on March 23rd, 2026 is eligible to win. (No purchase necessary. You must be 18+ to enter.)