“Sax captures the middle school experience with sharp accuracy…” — School Library Journal

Sarah Sax grew up in St. Louis on Uncle Scrooge and Sailor Moon comics. She studied storytelling and sequential imagery at Hampshire College and worked in education and gaming in the Bay Area before starting her publishing journey. She is the illustrator of the first three books (Escape This Book: Titanic; Escape this Book: Tombs of Egypt; and Escape This Book: Race to the Moon) in the inventive, interactive Escape This Book series, which has been translated into eight languages. Picture Day, her first of four graphic novels in the Brinkley Yearbook series, was published in June 2023. Tryouts, the next graphic novel in the series came out in May of 2024. School Dance will be released in August of 2025. Sarah lives and works in Portland, Maine with her husband and a small menagerie of pets.

Sarah's Featured Titles

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Creating Takes Courage - How I Make Writing Less Scary and More Fun!

This talk covers Sarah’s journey from a kid who loved to draw and read comics into an adult who still loved comics but wasn’t sure she could tell her own stories. Sarah will share how she developed the creative confidence to tackle her inner critic and start writing. Focusing on her work in the Brinkley Yearbooks series (PICTURE DAY and TRYOUTS) Sarah will share the improvisational technique she uses to develop her graphic novels via an interactive drawing demonstration. Time will be reserved for an audience Q&A.

Audience Size: Any from small group to large assembly
Ages: Grades 4th-6th

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Facing the Fear of the Blank Page

Based on her own creative practices, Sarah will lead a class through a series of interactive creative exercises designed to give you a starting place when you just don’t have any “good” ideas. We will then discuss how those concepts can be applied beyond making art or telling stories.

Audience Size: Classroom-sized groups
Ages: Grades 4th-6th

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Making Comics Beyond the Panels

Sarah will share her comics making process and the tools she uses to build a sustainable comics and art-making career. The talk will cover the practical elements used to make comics (digital/physical tools, process and workflow, workspace building) to the more abstract skills that are important to a long-term career in the arts (project planning, timeline estimation, receiving feedback, communication skills). Great for art classrooms and/or classrooms studying graphic novels.

Audience Size: Classroom-sized groups
Ages: Grades 5th and up

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Imagining History in Escape This Book!

In this presentation, Sarah walks through the process of creating the illustrations for the Escape This Book! series using visual examples from Titanic, Tombs of Egypt and Race to the Moon. This presentation covers the illustration process from initial sketch to creating the final art with an emphasis on drawing inspiration from historical sources and creating engaging art that encourages creativity and invites readers to play along.

Audience Size: Any from small group to large assembly
Ages: Grades 3rd-5th

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The Character Lab

In this interactive workshop, Sarah will guide students through the character development process with fun, fast-paced drawing improv games. We’ll explore the ways in which visual details can reveal a character’s personality, backstory, and inner world.  Along the way, students will develop their own original characters and begin to build the foundation to write their own comics. This workshop is a great introduction to creative ideation, visual storytelling and character design.

Audience Size: Classroom-sized groups
Ages: Grades 3rd-6th

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Sarah’s Portfolio

Honors, Awards & Recognition

The Bank Street Best Children’s Books of 2025 List
2025 Little Maverick Graphic Novel Reading List
2024 Little Maverick Graphic Novel Reading List
Junior Library Guild Selection 2024
Starred Reviews from Kirkus Reviews
Starred Review from The Horn Book

Media Kit

By clicking the link below you will be directed to a Google Docs Folder
where you can download author photos and cover images.

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