Hello, lovely readers! Hooray for you ― you're back at the Oasis and it's so great to have you visit again! This is the place to refresh your spirits, recharge your creativity, and get a literary mood boost! Now, stretch your smiles even wider and get comfy and cozy for a delightful chitchat because today we have another awesome creative on the KidLit Oasis series... Children's author Marcie Wessels is here to share some wisdom, insight, and inspiration with us! (Plus, check out my promo gift offer at the end of this interview.) Welcome, Marcie! Thank you for joining us on the blog. Please briefly describe your journey to publication. A: Thank you for inviting me, Rosie! I used to teach Spanish language and literature at the college level. In 2006, I left academia for motherhood. In 2011, I decided I needed a new challenge. I’ve always loved books. But could I write one? I set out to find out. My first stroke of luck was discovering the Writing for Children’s Program at UCSD Extension. I enrolled in the first of three classes, formed a critique group, and joined SCBWI. After attending SoCal SCBWI’s Editor’s Day in 2012, I landed an offer for my first picture book! Pirate’s Lullaby: Mutiny at Bedtime, illustrated by Tim Bowers, was published by Doubleday Books for Young Readers in 2015. My second book is my first work of nonfiction. The Boy Who Thought Outside the Box: The Story of Video Game Inventor Ralph Baer, illustrated by Beatriz Castro, will be published by Sterling Publishing on April 14, 2020. Like my first book, Boy was inspired by my son. A bit of a reluctant reader, he fell in love with Whoosh: Lonnie Johnson’s Super Soaking Stream of Inventions (Charlesbridge, 2016), written by Chris Baron and illustrated by Don Tate. The book was so kid-friendly, it inspired me to look into the history of other toys and games. Like most boys, my son loves video games. “Who invented the video game?” I wondered. As I conducted research, I discovered the unpublished memoir of Ralph Baer, the inventor widely regarded as The Father of Video Games. It was a crucial discovery that helped me connect with the project in a completely different way. I wrote many drafts and then my agent sent it out on submission. While we were waiting to hear back from editors, I happened to read Laurie Wallmark’s Grace Hopper: Queen of Computer (2017), illustrated by Katy Wu. I noticed it that it was a part of Sterling’s People Who Shaped Our World Series. I thought my manuscript would be a great fit for Sterling’s list so with my agent’s blessing, I submitted my story. A few months later, it was picked out of the slush pile and I had an offer. Q: What do you find most challenging in this business, either on the creative or publishing side of things? What do you find most rewarding? What helps you stay motivated? A: I’ve written about my fear of the blank page on a different occasion (read here) so I’ll just say it’s all challenging! Coming up with an original idea, figuring out how to tell the story, then finding someone who believes in your story as much as you do, such as an agent or an editor. Luckily, the kidlit community is one of the kindest and most supportive. I feel blessed to have so many creative and inspiring friends. As far as motivation, you definitely need to be persistent and patient. Hearing how much someone loves your book (especially a kid) is one of the things that keeps me going. Q: Could you share any craft tools or techniques that you find most helpful to you when working on a project? What does your revision process look like? A: My revision process is messy but one of the best tools I have in my writer’s toolbox is the story board, a technique I was introduced to in Illustrating Children’s Books at UCSD Extension. Visually laying out a story often reveals problems with the narrative and helps you correct pacing. All picture book writers should storyboard - even if you can only draw stick figures like me! For more revision tips, please check out this post. Q: What's coming up for you next? Please tell us about any new releases, exciting news, upcoming events or anything else you'd like to share with our readers? A: The launch party for The Boy Who Thought Outside the Box: The Story of Video Game Inventor Ralph Baer will be on Sunday, May 3, 2020 at 1 PM at the Barnes and Noble (Mira Mesa) in San Diego, CA. Thank you, Marcie. Wishing you all the best on your journey! Dear readers, please support our featured authors/illustrators by following them on Twitter, requesting their book through your local library, posting reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, and of course, purchasing their books. I hope you enjoyed this post — comments and shares are appreciated. Thank you! Connect with Marcie: Website: www.marciewessels.com Twitter: @MarcieDWessels Marcie Wessels loves to play games – especially board games like Scrabble. She tinkers with words and invents stories including PIRATE’S LULLABY: MUTINY AT BEDTIME and THE BOY WHO THOUGHT OUTSIDE THE BOX: THE STORY OF VIDEO GAME INVENTOR RALPH BAER. She lives in San Diego, California. You can find her online at www.marciewessels.com.
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Hello, lovely readers! It's great to have you back at the Oasis! Remember, this is the place to refresh your spirits, recharge your creativity, and get a literary mood boost! Now, stretch your smiles wide and get comfy and cozy for a delightful chitchat because today we have another awesome creative on the KidLit Oasis series... Children's author and illustrator Jaimie Whitbread is here to share some wisdom, insight, and inspiration with us! Welcome, Jaimie! Thank you for joining us on the blog. Please briefly describe your journey to publication. I was pretty sure about wanting to be a picture book illustrator about half-way through college, and started plowing towards that goal single-mindedly as soon as I graduated. I was just going to be an illustrator. I would tell people I was going to illustrate books and, oh yeah, maybe I’d write one someday, too. How short-sighted that turned out to be! In my head I had all these stories and characters that I’d been drawing for years, with a secret wish to see them out in the world someday with their stories fully fledged and ready to fly, but somehow it just didn’t occur to me that what I really wanted to be was a writer. After about four years of single-mindedly trying to become an illustrator - skill-building, sending out postcards to art directors, looking at art reps, all that - I realized my mistake. I was aiming for a career in illustration, no writing in sight, but I kept telling people I wanted to write someday. I knew how disciplines worked - if I wanted to write “someday” I’d better start writing right then and get those awkward growing years out of the way as soon as possible. So at that point I circled back and really started focusing on my writing. I put off my attempts to get my foot in the door with my illustration, since if I was going to debut, I wanted to do it as a writer and an illustrator. It was such an exciting time! Writing out the stories I’d always had in my head was completely new and felt momentous. And yet it felt strange and scary. To give so much of my time up to writing that had previously been focused entirely on art. I had felt like I was “almost there” with illustration and now I was starting this whole new thing that would need its own time to grow. But boy I really liked writing, so there was no turning back. In 2017, about 8 years after setting publication as my goal, I won the Don Freeman work-in-progress award from SCBWI for a dummy book I’d written and illustrated about a tiger searching for her stripes. The same dummy helped me find my agent, Jamie Weiss Chilton of the Andrea Brown Agency, and eventually sold to The Innovation Press. It will be my debut book, and, I hope, the first of many! Everything took a long time, but I think that’s because art takes a long time. Every discipline takes time to develop. Until my writing and my illustration had gotten to a certain level, I didn’t see much traction - which I think was a good thing. I’ve only just now gotten to the point where I’m absolutely proud of the work I am able to produce. What do you find most challenging in this business, either on the creative or publishing side of things? What do you find most rewarding? What helps you stay motivated? I think the uncertainty of whether a project will ever find its feet out there in the world is the most difficult thing I struggle with. Each project takes such an enormous amount of effort and thought, and my hopes are always so high for each one - and yet it’s such a highly saturated market, and an uncertain industry. It can be hard to keep tangling with a difficult manuscript, knowing how many potential pitfalls stand between it and being published even if I do get it written. It’s always tempting to self-reject. I just try and remember that bringing each story to life is its own reward. That each untangled manuscript will make me a better writer, whether it sees the light of day or not. But also that no amount of potential future rejection can un-write it – a finished story with all the characters in place and doing and saying all the things I imagined them doing and saying is a gift to myself. That’s become my litmus test for whether a project deserves my time or not. If I would want to see it written whether anyone else ever reads it or not, then it’s worth my time. I am the only guaranteed reader of any story, so I better be in love with it, proud of it, glad to have written it. Whatever happens after that is out of my hands. Could you share any craft tools or techniques that you find most helpful to you when working on a project? What does your revision process look like? Because I’m an illustrator and a writer, I go back and forth a lot between the two, using one to inspire the other. I love to draw characters and scenes from manuscripts I’m working on, and to brainstorm stories based on my one-shot illustrations. The back and forth between the two keeps everything fresh and exciting through the long drudgery of getting something written and revised. I do a lot of work in revision. I think one of my gifts is in seeing what a story should be – the dramatic, comedic, poetic potential – and being bothered when it’s not up to snuff. I get so frustrated when a manuscript feels under-cooked, I end up with pages and pages of notes on character and plot and theme and how I can make it all better. Then it’s just a matter of keeping at it until it really, deeply satisfies my inner lover of great stories. What's coming up for you next? Please tell us about any new releases, exciting news, upcoming events or anything else you'd like to share with our readers? My debut book, A Tiger Without Stripes, is out March 3rd! It’s a thoughtful, modern fable about a tiger searching for her stripes, which touches on self-identity and self-acceptance. I’ve been doing a weekly over-view of the creation process for A Tiger Without Stripes on my social media, called Tiger Tuesdays, so check it out! Thank you, Jaimie, this was an amazing chat! I love your attitude in regards to the many uncertainties in this business and what you said here is a good reminder for all of us: "I just try and remember that bringing each story to life is its own reward." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Readers, please support our featured authors/illustrators by following them on Twitter, requesting their book through your local library, posting reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, and of course, purchasing their books. I hope you enjoyed this post — comments and shares are appreciated. Thank you! Connect with Jaimie: Website: jaimiewhitbread.com Twitter: @jaimiesomething Jaimie Whitbread is a writer and illustrator living in Texas. She loves to work outdoors, and gathers her inspiration through the time-honored traditions of petting cats, being crawled on by bugs, and getting very excited about birds and clouds. A Tiger Without Stripes is her first picture book, and (she is proud to say) has a cat on every page and several very pretty clouds. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you'd like to support my work, please order one of my books and/or invite me to your elementary school for an author visit. Hello, ravishing readers! Hooray, you found your way to the Oasis ― it's great to have you visit! This is the place to refresh your spirits, recharge your creativity, and get a literary mood boost! Now, get those smiles ready and get comfy and cozy for a fantastic chitchat because today we have another spectacular creative on the KidLit Oasis series... Children's author Christy Mihaly is here to share some wisdom, insight, and inspiration with us! Welcome, Christy! Thank you for joining us on the blog. Please briefly describe your journey to publication. A: Thank you for inviting me, Rosie. I love your blog's name—I can just picture all these lovely kidlit people chatting around the watering hole—and I'm happy to share my path to publication. But I have to warn you, there's no blockbuster drama here, just many small steps. Although I always loved to write, when I was in college I didn’t think of writing as a career. I went to law school. Then I got busy being a lawyer for a couple decades. After I had kids, I started dreaming of becoming a children's writer, but I didn't have time. Getting Started Fast forward to 2011. My husband, 12-year-old daughter, and I moved to Spain for a year (he had a teaching gig there). I decided to use that year to write. I'd taken a course with the Institute for Children's Literature, so I pulled out old stories I'd drafted for the course, revised them, and started sending them out to kids' magazines. Rejections rolled in. I kept subbing, and one day, I sold a story. For $5! I was SO EXCITED. But wait. A month before my story was to be published, the magazine went out of business. I never got paid, and that story remains unpublished. And so it goes… I made more submissions, received more rejections. Needing new material, I found story inspirations all around me—we were living in an unfamiliar country, after all! I wrote a story based on my daughter's experiences at school in Spain. I sent it out, and at last, someone accepted it. My story, "Hola, Amiga,"was published in a kids' online magazine.They didn't pay, but I had a writing credit. Woo! What else could I write? I really like nonfiction, so I investigated the children's nonfiction magazines that announce themes for future issues. I began pitching ideas. Again, many were Spanish-themed. After some rejections, "AppleSeeds" liked one of my pitches and sent me my first assignment. I researched and wrote, and in 2012 the article was published. A few months later, I received an actual check. Yay! Upping My Game At the end of our year abroad, I was committed to writing. I wanted to be a working writer—making enough money that I could quit my day job. That meant I had to up my game. I signed up for SCBWI and other writing organizations, joined a critique group, attended workshops and conferences and took online courses, made kidlit friends,and read hundreds of kids' books and magazines. I drafted and polished manuscripts: picture books, middle grade, proposals for longer nonfiction. I helped start a group blog (GROG) to blog about kidlit. Work for Hire I also learned about work-for-hire writing. I sent out my resume and writing samples to educational publishers and book packagers, which hire people to write on assignment. That's how I wrote my first published book—under contract with a book packager in 2015. Though that book doesn't have my name on the cover, my name was on the checks! I kept working to improve my writing, created more stories, and collected rejections—too many to count. I also kept doing work-for-hire. This gave me the opportunity to team up with great editors, learn best practices for research and nonfiction writing, and get books published. More Books I also continued attending conferences, bringing my manuscripts for editor critiques. I started submitting to agents. I teamed up with a critique partner, Sue Heavenrich, to write a nonfiction book proposal. Eventually, at conferences, I connected with two different editors. The first made me an offer for a picture book manuscript in 2015, which I accepted. In 2016, I signed with my agent, Erzsi Deak, and that same year signed a second book contract. In 2018, my first picture book,Hey, Hey, Hay! (A Tale of Bales and the Machines That Make Them) was published by Holiday House (illustrated by Joe Cepeda). Later that year, Lerner published the nonfiction YA that Sue and I co-wrote, Diet for a Changing Planet: Food for Thought. My second illustrated picture book is coming soon, and I've got some manuscripts in the pipeline. Meanwhile, I still like work for hire. In fact, that's what has allowed me to quit my day job. I've written more than twenty books for the educational market. I'm particularly proud of the recent series "Shaping the Debate," which helps middle- and high-schoolers analyze the complexities of topics such as Human Rights, Climate Change, and Freedom of the Press. So that's where I am on my kidlit journey—so far! I'd be happy to answer questions if you leave them in the comments. I know I wouldn't be here without a lot of support and help from other book creators, editors, and mentors all along the way. Q: What do you find most challenging in this business, either on the creative or publishing side of things? What do you find most rewarding? What helps you stay motivated? A: My big challenge: The Wait.The Wait comes in many versions… When I have submitted a manuscript: The Wait to hear back. If a picture book manuscript sells: The Wait for an illustrator. If good news arrives: The Wait for an announcement. Once a book is completed: The Wait for book reviews, The Wait for publication, The Wait for the sales numbers. Sigh. I am working on patience. What's most rewarding: School visits. This surprised me, because I used to believe nothing could be better than research and writing. But I've learned that visiting schools and talking to kids about books makes this book creation work we do even more meaningful. And I love seeing kids read (or listen to) my books. What helps me stay motivated? Deadlines! I may be weird here, but I love due dates. I'm at my most productive when juggling multiple deadlines on different projects: I might be working to complete a magazine assignment, a pitch, a school presentation, revisions requested by an editor, and an outline for a new book. Honestly, without deadlines, I get anxious. In fact, if I am not facing an editorial deadline, I'll set one for myself: Send book proposal to Erzsi by next Friday—or else! There's nothing like a good deadline to produce a surge of writerly adrenaline. Q: Could you share any craft tools or techniques that you find most helpful to you when working on a project? What does your revision process look like? A: You've probably heard that revision is the heart of writing. It's true! Your first draft gets words onto paper, but it will need work, usually a great deal of work. My advice: Have fun with revising. Let your self play. Experiment! (Also—ahem—save all your drafts and revisions. You never know which version you'll want to return to.) When revising, it's important to re-think big issues, so you're not simply polishing the language. One trick I use to bring a new vision to revision is to rewrite from a new point of view. Perhaps change your POV character, or shift from third person to first person. You may not keep these alterations. But when you rewrite from a different point of view, you'll see new aspects of your piece that may help you improve it. Q: What's coming up for you next? Please tell us about any new releases, exciting news, upcoming events or anything else you'd like to share with our readers? A: March will be a big month! March 1 is the release date for my picture book, Free for You and Me: What Our First Amendment Means. This book introduces young readers to the five freedoms protected by the First Amendment (freedom of speech, religion, and the press, the right to peaceful assembly and the right to petition the government), using poetry, historical vignettes and a contemporary story. It is illustrated by Manu Montoya and published by Albert Whitman. I'm looking forward to seeing FREE out in the world and sharing it with kids around the country during this election year. I'm also helping organize amid-March bookstore event, Celebrating New Nonfiction Kids' Books, with my local indie bookseller Bear Pond Books. We'll share some exciting new and forthcoming NF books. At the end of the month, I'll be heading to KidLitCon 2020 in Michigan. I'm on a panel with author Keila Dawson and poet Shawntai Brown of the Detroit organization Inside Out Literary Arts. We plan to share techniques for bringing poetry and picture books into classrooms. What else? I'm open to ideas, inspirations, and assignments. And if you're still reading this, thank you—may you find success on your own journey. Thank you, Christy, it was great chatting with you! Readers, please support our featured authors/illustrators by following them on Twitter, requesting their book through your local library, posting reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, and of course, purchasing their books. I hope you enjoyed this post — comments and shares are appreciated. Thank you! Connect with Christy Mihaly Website: www.christymihaly.com Twitter: @CMwriter4kids Instagram: @christymihaly Christy Mihaly writes for young readers because she believes that our best hope for the future is raising kids who love to learn. Her 2020 picture book, Free for You and Me: What our First Amendment Means, illustrated by Manu Montoya, celebrates the First Amendment with poems and stories. Christy co-authored the YA nonfiction Diet for a Changing Climate: Food for Thought, with Sue Heavenrich. Her picture book Hey, Hey, Hay! (A Tale of Bales and the Machines That Make Them) tells the story of how hay is made. Christy has published more than 20 nonfiction books on topics from free speech to food to fashion, as well as articles, stories, and poems. She lives in Vermont, where she loves walking her dog in the woods and playing the cello (though not simultaneously). ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you'd like to support my work, please order one of my books and/or invite me to your elementary school for an author visit. Kaitlyn Sanchez is the winner of Vivian's PB critique and Shari Sawyers is the winner of a copy of Making Their Voices Heard. Congratulations to the winners! Hello, radiant readers! Hooray, you found your way to the Oasis ― it's great to have you visit! This is the place to refresh your spirits, recharge your creativity, and get a literary mood boost! I know you're already smiling, but stretch your smiles even wider and get comfy and cozy for a delightful chat because today we have another awesome creative on the KidLit Oasis series... Children's author Nancy Churnin is here to share some wisdom, insight, and inspiration with us! Plus, in celebration of her book's birthday, Nancy is giving away a signed copy of Beautiful Shades of Brown! Welcome, Nancy, and Happy Book Birthday! Thank you for joining us on the blog. Please briefly describe your journey to publication. NC: I was a longtime journalist when I promised my friend, Steve Sandy, who is deaf, that I would write a picture book about the great Deaf baseball player, William Hoy. I thought I would write it quickly as I do my newspaper stories. But I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I made the promise in 2003 and kept revising and getting rejected until I realized I needed, classes, critique groups and support groups. I got my agent, Karen Grencik, through Julie Hedlund’s 12X12. She sold The William Hoy Story and it came out in 2016, 13 years after I made that promise! I have now sold eight picture book biographies, two of which are coming out this year. Q: What do you find most challenging in this business, either on the creative or publishing side of things? What do you find most rewarding? What helps you stay motivated? NC: Every story presents its own unique challenges as you try to bring a life or story alive in a way that will resonate and find a special place in the heart of young readers. It can be difficult when you know you’re on the road to something good, but you haven’t quite figured out how to bring it across. The most rewarding part is when it all comes together and the story lives and breathes on its own and you have confidence sending it out into the world knowing that it will be a friend and support to a child. I love doing author visits where I share the book and can see a child’s eyes light up and feel a heart brighten. At a recent school visit, a child asked me if I could please write five new books this year. I said I would do my best. That is motivation! Q: Could you share any craft tools or techniques that you find most helpful to you when working on a project? What does your revision process look like? NC: I spend a lot of time thinking about what my character’s dream is – what he or she wants more than anything – what the challenges are and the actions my character takes to achieve that dream. I find it helpful to make a book dummy to make sure that my scenes are changing and moving and that there’s enough tension and forward movement in the story to make a child want to turn the page. In revision, I try to trim to the essence, to stick to the essentials. That’s a lot harder than it sounds because when you fall in love with your character, you have to fight the urge to go on and on and tell your reader all the wonderful anecdotes you have! Q: What's coming up for you next? Please tell us about any new releases, exciting news, upcoming events or anything else you'd like to share with our readers? NC: I’m thrilled to share that I have two picture book biographies coming out this year: Beautiful Shades of Brown, the Art of Laura Wheeler Waring, illustrated by Felicia Marshall, on Feb. 4 from Creston Books/Lerner Books and For Spacious Skies, Katharine Lee Bates and the Inspiration for ‘America the Beautiful,’ illustrated by Olga Baumert, releasing April 1 from Albert Whitman & Company. Thanks again, Nancy! All the best with your wonderful kidlit work and we can't wait to see more beautiful and inspiring books from you! Please support our featured authors/illustrators by following them on Twitter, requesting their book through your local library, posting reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, and of course, purchasing their books. Thank you! Comment on this post and share it on social media for a chance to win a signed copy of Beautiful Shades of Brown. Winner will be announced on 2/11/20. Connect with Nancy website: www.nancychurnin.com Twitter: @nchurnin Nancy Churnin, a longtime journalist and former theater critic for The Dallas Morning News and The Los Angeles Times, is the award-winning author of eight picture book biographies, including Irving Berlin, the Immigrant Boy Who Made America Sing, a Sydney Taylor and National Council for the Social Studies Notable; Manjhi Moves a Mountain, winner of the South Asia Book Award, a Junior Library Guild and Anne Izard Storytellers Choice Award selection, The William Hoy Story, on the Texas 2X2 and the state reading lists and Martin & Anne, on the Jewish Book Council’s recommended Civil Rights and Race reading list. She graduated with honors from Harvard University and has a masters from Columbia University in journalism. She lives in North Texas with her husband, a dog named Dog and two cantankerous cats.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I hope you enjoyed this post and will be back for our next chat. If you'd like to support my work, please order one of my books and/or invite me to your elementary school for an author visit. Last week, I suddenly felt in such a giving mood that I started something I call #MissionJoyGiveaway. I'll explain in a moment, but let me first say this. This idea has been circling in my mind for quite a while now – every time I think about my calling, my purpose, my mark in the world and the ripple effect I want to create through what I love doing most, which is writing and creating books for children. But I haven't been able to fully grasp the "how" in executing it. How can I speak the right words at the right time to the kids who desperately need them? How will I find my audience? How will I deliver my message? When I was little, I was very sensitive to words spoken to me. I often longed to hear words of encouragement, understanding, validation . . . from the people closest to me. But I never did. So when I became an author, I knew that I wanted to make an impact. I knew that words were free while they were priceless, and that the right words could be powerful enough to affect a life. At the same time, I felt stuck and bummed by not reaching enough people or not reaching the right people, because I was somehow restricted by outside circumstances (or so I believed) or personal limitations: lack of marketing skills, not enough time, not enough resources etc. How can I have my message heard if it's not reaching people? And then came divine intervention. It all clicked. Words are free. They're priceless. Asking gives you the answers you need. I got it! I can spread joy through my words without worrying about resources or marketing skills or overwhelming tasks. Sooo . . . #MissionJoyGiveaway was born! Forget about the fancy-schmancy gadgets as gifts. Let's go back to "the sticks and the stones" (they're still around, even after all this technology that surrounds us). So are the words and the handwritten letters. I can send those gifts out – personal, meaningful, inspiring. And I know who to ask in helping me find the recipients. I reached out to a group of elementary school librarians and asked them to message me if they could think of any needy student or one who wishes for a book, but might not get one, or a child going through a tough time who could use a personalized card/letter of encouragement from a children's author. Or perhaps a whole class that might need to get excited about reading, books or writing. Anything that I can do to make a difference with a note, a kind word, or a book. Soon after I posted, I got my first message. It was about a first grader who had just lost her mom to cancer, lives in poverty and will be moving in with her grandma. Heartbreaking. I have just the right book for her, Sarah's Song, to accompany my letter and I hope those give her some small joy or a bit of peace as she's going through this painful time. When I shared my idea for #MissionJoyGiveaway with a writer friend, she told me about another family in need – a single mom of four who recently lost their house and all their belongings in a fire and are now living in a hotel. My friend said, "The kids can sure use a book to read as they are getting bored in that hotel room." They will be getting some books from me, as well. Books are also going to Inova Life with Cancer in Virginia and I will keep writing notes and letters throughout this month. 'Tis the season and it makes me jolly to be able to help in some small way. I'd like to extend an invitation to anyone who'd love to be a part of this, especially my fellow authors: Please join me in #MissionJoyGiveaway and reach out to your communities and beyond to seek kids in need and send them notes, letters or books. Brighten a child's holiday this season! Let's spread the word and the joy with #MissionJoyGiveaway If the classic picture book structure is your favorite and you want to stick with it, make sure you hit all the important points when drafting your story. Here's an easy model to follow – apply it to your manuscript spread by spread, find what's missing or where your pace is disturbed, then modify, mold, and master!
[For a 32-page picture book, you'll have fourteen spreads in which to fit your story.] 1. Introduce your main character (MC) and show us something interesting or special about him/her: skills, quirks, relationships etc. This is also where you set the expectation of tone, type of story, and voice. 2. Establish the MC's normal world. What's the setting? Does the setting play a special role in your story? 3. Develop MC even further. What does he/she want? You might introduce a secondary character. 4. Inciting incident: something happens that disturbs the "normal" and prompts the MC to take action. The MC needs to do something about it, either to restore the balance or to take a step toward their goal/desire that they've had at the beginning. 5. First try: MC fails and the situation gets worse. This failure also brings a little change in him/her. It helps the MC learn more about the world or himself. 6. Second try: MC fails again. Tension escalates. MC has a bit of a different perspective. He learns something from this failure, too. 7. Third try: MC fails once again. This time it seems like all is lost and there's no way out of the mess. 8. MC reflects on the situation and contemplates his next move. MC gets past the defeat, finds hope, and the motivation to try again. 9. MC gathers his/her strength and skills learned from previous experience and makes a decision to solve his/her problem in a different way. 10. The preparation: does the MC need to gather supplies, resources or dig deeper to ensure success this time? 11. Final battle. The MC makes the biggest effort here, using all of his/her previous lessons learned and new resources. 12. MC wins! He/she solves the problem. You can use a twist, a surprise, or a clever solution here. The most important thing is that no one else solves the problem for your MC. It should not feel like a coincidence, either. The more original this part is, the more of the "golden factor" your book will have. Don't use the first idea that comes to mind. Search further and think outside-the-box. 13. A satisfying ending. MC might not get exactly what he/she wanted, but what they need. Tie it back to the beginning. 14. MC is changed as a result of his journey. Show the "new normal" for your MC with a hint of what the future might look like for them. Finish on a positive, hopeful or humorous note, depending on the tone and type of story. Make sure it matches what you've established for the story's world from the get-go. That's it! There's some wiggle room here and there, but overall this model should give you some guidance on how to develop your classic structured picture book. This is only the frame to get you started with your draft. As for the rest of the elements that make for a great picture book, like an original idea, vocabulary, voice, literary devices, imagery, page turns, illustration potential etc., those are subject to future posts. Happy creating! Leave a comment and share your biggest challenges, advice or thoughts on crafting your classic structured picture book. |
About Rosie J. PovaRosie J. Pova is a multi-published, award-winning children's author and kid lit Writing Coach. She's the creator of Picture Book Mastery System™ that is proven to help emerging children's writers advance their career and get closer to their publishing goals.
Rosie's latest picture book, Sunday Rain, was featured in The New York Times and recommended by Parents magazine. Her upcoming picture book, The School of Failure: A Story About Success will be released in the spring of 2022 in both China and the USA. Rosie also loves to visit schools and her interactive workshops empower students to unleash their creativity and grow in confidence through reading, writing, and creating. Teachers and librarians love Rosie for her bubbly, upbeat personality which captures students' attention, encourages them to think creatively, and motivates them to pursue big dreams. She has been featured on TV, radio, podcasts, and print media, and also speaks on women's and moms’ topics, sharing her journey from a Bulgarian immigrant to a published author. Find out more about Rosie's online courses, mentorships, and her work by visiting her website: RosieJPova.com Check out her Critique Services here, her Workshops here, and her school visits page here. Rosie is represented by Jackie Kruzie of Focused Artists. Twitter: @RosiePOV Archives
March 2024
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