Local Leschi Author Wins National Awards

I Know How to Draw an Owl

Many people have heard of the annual Caldecott Medal for the best illustrated American children’s book. But did you know there is a national award for the best written children’s book? It’s called the Charlotte Zolotow Award for Outstanding Picture Book Text and Leschi’s own Hilary Horder Hippely won it in 2025 for her book I Know How to Draw an Owl. This book tells the story of a girl and her mother living in their car, watched over by an owl. It was inspired by Hilary’s real-life experience in Leschi. One morning, as she was driving to her school where she taught, she saw a woman with her daughter putting blankets into the trunk of their car and understood they were unhoused. Then she realized she recognized both of them because the young girl was a student in Hilary’s class, although she had had no idea the challenges this student was facing. This had a profound impact on Hilary and inspired her to portray a family experiencing housing insecurity in an empathetic and age-appropriate way. Her focus in the book is not on the social service perspective but rather on exploring how the mom kept hope alive for her daughter during this difficult time. It was important for Hilary to honor and acknowledge what these families experience.

Ballad of the Broom

Hilary also won a national award in 2024 for Ballad of the Broom which she self-published. The Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators Spark Award recognizes excellence in independent publishing for children in the picture book category (out of more than 4,700 children’s books). This book tells the story of a young girl in the San Juan Islands in the early 1900s who discovers something unexpected in an abandoned house near her home. Hilary subtly inserts into the story the San Juan Islands’ role in smuggling Chinese laborers after the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. When it came time to find an illustrator for the book, Hilary conducted a national search which led her to someone actually based in Seattle, Hillary Moore. Although Hillary hadn’t illustrated a book before, she was eager to bring the story alive through her artwork.

Hilary wrote three books 25 years ago and then took a break from writing until she retired from teaching preschool. Hilary lives in Leschi with her husband and continues to write and enjoys spending time with her four children and three grandchildren. Learn more about Hilary and all of her children’s books at hilaryhorderhippely.com. You can purchase Ballad of the Broom and I Know How to Draw an Owl while supporting a great local bookstore at Madison Books (madisonbks.com).

~Nikola Davidson