Mila and BeeWee, aka Meep and Beep, check out the children’s book that Vicki Cantu and her daughters, Emma Cantu and Jenna Neilson, published about them.
By: Kara Szymanski | Shelby-Utica News | Published January 21, 2025
SHELBY TOWNSHIP — Vicki Cantu and her two daughters recently published their first book as a team, “The Everyday Adventures of Meep & Beep.”
The 27-page children’s book is inspired by their dogs, Mila and BeeWee, aka Meep and Beep, and their interesting adventures together every day. Children might find it easy to read and adorable.
Meep is a 1-year-old Australian shepherd and Beep is a 12-year-old Maltese/Shih Tzu mix. According to Cantu, it definitely was an adjustment for Beep when Meep arrived.
Cantu and her daughters just this month received the author copies of the finished book.
Cantu said they created everything on their own, including the illustrations.
“This is a rhyming children’s book that’s good for young readers. My youngest daughter, Emma Cantu, and I wrote the book, drew the illustrations, and all but one picture was taken by us. My oldest daughter, Jenna Neilson, was a huge help with the technical side of things. It was truly a labor of love and we are so very proud of the result. It’s available on Amazon,” Vicki Cantu said.
The book costs $9.99 on Amazon.
“We’ve sold a few, but really are just getting started with promoting it. We only just recently got copyright and then self-published through Amazon KDP,” Vicki Cantu said.
They started writing the book in the spring of 2024.
Vicki Cantu said she thinks children would like the book because it’s a fun story and will be enjoyable to read.
Emma Cantu said she had a lot of fun writing the book with her mom.
“We couldn’t have done it without Jenna’s help. We based it off of our dogs, Mila and BeeWee. They go on adventures together and we wanted to bring those to life. I am so happy for this book to be available on Amazon,” she said.
Neilson said she enjoyed helping with the technical aspects of the book and using her talents to help bring it to life.
“We wrote this book for young children, and it is fun and upbeat. We based our book on our two dogs. This is a story of two dogs who become friends and have adventures together. I helped my mom and sister upload their images, place their drawings on pages, and I helped them apply for copyright. I really enjoyed my part in making this book come to life,” she said.