Nic Yulo ’18 Publishes New Picture Book

Film alumna Nic Yulo ’18 has published a new picture book with Penguin Random House.

Published on July 25, 2023, Out of the Blue is Yulo’s second published picture book as an author-illustrator. She previously published Patch of Sky in 2022.

In Out of the Blue, a girl and an octopus unexpectedly connect over feeling small in a big world. Coral has big dreams about grand adventures—but it’s hard to go after these big dreams when you’re the smallest in the class and feel completely invisible. During a school trip to the aquarium, Coral finds a kindred spirit in Kraken, a small octopus who knows that being invisible isn’t always a bad thing. When Coral finds herself in the aquarium after everyone else goes home, she learns that being seen isn’t always about how big you are

As Yulo shared in an interview with Story Monsters Ink, she inherited her inclination towards storytelling from her family:

“[My great-grandmother] used to tell me stories as a nighttime ritual, and when I didn’t like the direction one was going, she let me change it on the spot,” Yulo said. “She was teaching me how to write without even realizing it, and it didn’t take very long before I started trying to record what we would come up with on paper. Ever since then, I’ve been writing stories almost reflexively,” she says. “It was a way for me to escape, to make sense of the world, and to explore.”

According to Kirkus Reviews, in Out of the Blue, “Yulo distills a difficult, relatable concept—even the small and seemingly unseen have a light to shine.” 

Order your copy of Out of the Blue here.

Nic Yulo is a children's book author and writer-director whose work spans from picture books to AAA video games. She is a BAFTA Newcomer, a Chinonye Chukwu Emerging Writer Awardee, a juror for the 2022 BAFTA Games Awards, and winner of the Athena List's Inaugural Disney Development Grant. Her work has received an Alfred P. Sloan Screenwriting Award, an Adobe Design Achievement Award, and has been recognized by the Sloan Film Summit , NYWIFT, SeriesFest, and Shondaland.