david cuccia

I've been drawing since the age of six. By my mid-twenties I attended an art school to learn to draw comic books, which I thought was my life's dream ... instead I was also introduced to the world of graphic design and advertising which would not only expand my artistic horizons, but gave me a different slant on how I approached my illustrations and assignments! I freelanced after college for many ad agencies and design firms, which convinced me to leave comic books behind altogether.

Although I created lots of illustrative work for them, my primary assignments were drawing television storyboards. That, coupled with my college training of narrative storytelling would help prepare me for life after commercial illustration ... and allowed me to realize a childhood dream to write and draw children's books!

There's A Crazy Dog Under the Palace is based on a Sicilian children's limerick which begins, "sotto un palazzo c'e`un cane pazzo"! My cousin Antonino Cuccia taught me this phrase and when I decided to begin writing mychildren's books, it launched the series of 3 adventures, featuring 4 main characters: Jasmine the black labrador (soon to become Princess Jasmine in the stories), Topo the wise little mouse who lived in a palace in Palermo, and Roxanne the Tibetan mastiff, and Prince Antonino's "official dog."

Even though each story evolves and becomes more complicated, the message is always the same: friendship, second chances and just being yourself, are the most important things to leave in your wake! I've had so much fun creating this series over the past 11 years and I'm honored and blessed to have readers all over the world! I hope that you enjoy them too! Grazie mille!

davide cuccia!