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Because he is part Italian, one might suspect that children's book writer Tomie dePaola based his beloved character Strega Nona on his grandmother.

The classic children's book character is kind and forgiving. And when the young people in her life get hungry, Strega delights them with delicious home-cooked foods.

"Of course, I had an Italian grandmother, but she wasn't quite as benevolent as Strega Nona. She was a little tougher," dePaola says during a telephone interview. "In fact, the joke in our family was if you were a child, you didn't get a meatball with your spaghetti until you got a job."

The writer-artist first drew Strega Nona ---- whose name means Grandma Witch in Italian ---- on a doodle pad while sitting in a faculty meeting in Massachusetts where he was an art professor.

Visually related to the classical character Punchinello, the round-nosed, long-chinned friendly witch first appeared in "Strega Nona," the book that earned dePaola the Caldecott Honor in 1976. Strega Nona then went on to star in nine more of dePaola's books, the latest one being "Strega Nona's Harvest," released this month.

"I get to meet people throughout the country who have been reading my books for years, and teachers who read them in their classroom, and, of course, there's always the great kids who show up," dePaola says. "And they see that they've just met the characters or they love the characters, and they look at me, they say, 'Oh, he really is real!' or 'Oh, he really does exist!' and that's a lot of fun."

Like the vegetables in Strega Nona's garden, dePaola says the ideas for his Strega Nona books grow organically. "Strega Nona's Harvest" chronicles the Grandma Witch's annual gardening ritual where she plants seeds, rotates her crops and uses a little white magic to ensure a bountiful harvest. And just like in many of the books of her series, Strega Nona's apprentice Big Anthony attempts to duplicate her magic but has unintended results. His folly turns into a blessing: The magic he so incorrectly copies from Strega Nona causes the crops in his garden to grow into enormous sizes. The gargantuan veggies are then served to the people in his town with underwhelming harvests.

Because of his familiarity with the characters, the way they look and their color palettes, dePaola says the Strega Nona books are usually the ones that take less time to write and draw because he knows and understands the characters so well. But even then, because he is one of a minority of children's book illustrators who doesn't take shortcuts with computers, the creation of a children's picture book takes nearly half a year.

"With the Strega Nona books, they're pretty fast, but it usually takes three to four months just to do the pictures for a children's book ---- if not longer," dePaola says.

He says he would have no problem investing this time to create another Strega Nona book, but the decision to make another one is not really up to him.

"You never know," dePaola says. "This is the 10th one, and she always comes to me with an idea."

Contact Joe Scott at movieshowjoe@gmail.com