About Us

  • About the authors

    We’re Elspeth and Rowena, sisters who believe in a world where all children learn to read with confidence and have the chance to discover the pleasure of being lost in a good book. We’ve joined forces to create the Meg and Greg books.

     

    Elspeth Rae was diagnosed with dyslexia at age 8 and received Orton Gillingham instruction during her school years. As a certified teacher, she now uses this structured literacy approach to help K-3 children of all learning abilities become confident readers, spellers, and writers.

    In her classroom, Elspeth has plenty of flashcards, worksheets, games, and other activities to introduce her students to new phonograms. But she struggles to find high-interest stories that focus on a single phonogram at a time without including spelling exceptions or more advanced phonograms. So, Elspeth and Rowena began collaborating on this project to help fill the hole in Elspeth’s teaching materials, and we hope also to fill a hole for other teachers and families looking for suitable materials for the learning 6-9-year-old reader in their life.

    Rowena Rae is a children’s writer in Victoria, BC. As well as co-writing the Meg and Greg stories, she is the author of several nonfiction books for middle grade readers, including a biography of Rachel Carson, an exploration of how land and water connect in watersheds, a dive into the world inhabited by salmon, and others. For more information about her nonfiction books, visit Rowena’s website.

    About the illustrator

    Elisa Gutiérrez is an award-winning book designer and illustrator in Vancouver with expertise in children’s book design. Several of the books she’s designed have been honoured by The Alcuin Society, which recognizes excellence in book design in Canada. She is also the author/illustrator of two picture books: Picturescape (Simply Read Books, 2007) and Letter Lunch (Owlkids, 2014). Picturescape was shortlisted for the BC Book Prize and honoured by The Alcuin Society. Elisa has illustrated several other children’s books, as well as stories for Chirp and chickaDEE, both in the OWL Magazine family.

    Elisa has a passionate interest in language, literacy, and education and is really excited to be working on the Meg and Greg project! 

     

    About Orca Book Publishers

    Orca Book Publishers is an independently owned Canadian children’s book publisher of award-winning, bestselling books in a number of genres. With over 1,000 titles in print and more than 80 new titles a year, Orca prides itself on publishing Canadian authors and bringing them to a wider market.

    Orca publishes everything from beautifully illustrated board books and picture books to middle-grade and young-adult fiction. We strive to produce books that illuminate the experiences of people of all ethnicities, people with disabilities and people who identify as LGBTQ+. Our goal is to provide reading material that represents the diversity of human experience to readers of all ages. Orca aims to help young readers see themselves reflected in the books they read. We are mindful of this in our selection of books and have a particular interest in publishing books that celebrate the lives of Indigenous people. Providing young people with exposure to diversity through reading creates a more compassionate world.

    • Thank you for creating the Meg and Greg book. My grade 5 student loves the layout of the book and most days will choose to read the pages with more print. He looks forward to the reading component and we usually go over time as he wants to finish the chapter.

      Karen
      Orton-Gillingham Practitioner in Vancouver