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Well, Storystormers. We have made it to January 11 already. While many of us have developed an aversion to the news these days, I encourage you to give your morning newspaper a second chance. Why? Because your newspaper is chock full of book ideas! Here’s how it works:
- Brew a cup of coffee.
- Sit down with your favorite newspaper—or online equivalent. (I still prefer the paper kind.)
- Scan the headlines cover to cover.
- When a story idea jumps out at you, STOP! Rrrrrrip out the article. (Warning: Get permission from other house dwellers first. If you’re reading online, just save and print.)
- Change a few words in the headline and . . . eureka! An idea!
This tried-and-true method has worked for me for both fiction and non-fiction book ideas. Last year, I saw a headline in the New York Times Magazine that read, “How to Brush a Gorilla’s Teeth.” Rrrrrip! The article was about a primatologist who brushes gorillas’ teeth at the Bronx Zoo. Based on the headline, I wrote a fictional picture book called HOW TO BRUSH YOUR GORILLA’S TEETH. It was a funny how-to about tooth-brushing antics and anarchy. My agent loved it and invited illustrator extraordinaire Julie Bayless to sketch a dummy. (We got some nibbles from editors, but no bites…yet!)
A few years ago, I started a file of clips about creepy critters. They slowly evolved into a book idea, which I pitched to National Geographic Kids. While I can’t divulge the title yet, that book is coming out in 2018.
Two recent headlines that have inspired other book ideas:
- “Inky the Octopus Escapes from New Zealand Aquarium” (NYTimes 4/13/16)
The soccerball-size critter slithered out of its tank and down a drain pipe leading to the sea! - “British Parrot Missing for Four Years Returns Speaking Spanish” (Telegraph, 12/15/16)
Hola! Do you see the multicultural possibilities here?
Some pointers: Magazines work too. (If you’re in a doctor’s office, cough loudly while ripping.) Make sure to scan all sections, including sports, business news, ads, and even obituaries. A well-written obit will make you laugh, cry, and give you a jolt of inspiration…all elements of a perfect picture book. Remember all those icons we lost in 2016? Maybe you’ll be the one to write a picture book biography about Prince, David Bowie, Gwen Ifill, or Carrie Fisher!
Or perhaps a biography of a lesser-known individual will give you the motivation to start writing. Here’s an obit about Norma Lyon, a farmer’s wife, mother of nine, and butter sculptor at the Iowa State Fair. Lyon is famous for sculpting tons of salted butter into life-size cows, Barack Obama, and a diorama of the Last Supper.
Rodney White/Associated Press
Jus’ sayin’. Keep an open mind. The possibilities are as endless as the AP newswire. At the very least, you’ll be recycling and repurposing your daily newspaper.
So rrrrip away and story on!
When she’s not shredding her family’s New York Times, Chana Stiefel is writing books for kids. Her debut picture book, DADDY DEPOT (Feiwel & Friends), hits bookshelves on May 16, 2017. Chana’s book about creepy critters will be coming out from NatGeoKids in 2018, and WAKAWAKALOCH, a semi-autobiographical picture book (and Storystorm success story) about a cave girl who wants to change her unpronounceable name, will be published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 2019. Chana has also written 20+ non-fiction children’s books for the educational market. She has a Master’s degree in Science Journalism from NYU. Chana is represented by agent John M. Cusick at Folio Literary. Follow her on Twitter @chanastiefel and visit her at http://www.chanastiefel.com, her authors’ blog kidlittakeaways.com and picturethebooks2017.wordpress.com.
Chana will be giving away one signed copy of her debut picture book, DADDY DEPOT (after 5.16.17), and a written picture book critique up to 500 words.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
If I had a nickel for every time someone asked me if I was going to quit my job now that my first book has been published, I’d have…a couple of dollars. Which is not enough to quit my job and write picture books full-time.
But here’s the thing. For me and for many of you who are juggling writing with other obligations, whether they are full-time jobs, part-time jobs or taking care of your family (or any combination or permutation of the above), your other life can be a source of ideas.
I’m the theater critic for The Dallas Morning News. There’s no obvious correlation between that job and writing picture books. And yet, it was in the course of doing my job that I found the first picture book idea that I sold.
Now I didn’t realize I had come up with a picture book idea when I decided to write an article about a fascinating play, “The Signal Season of Dummy Hoy,” that was being produced at a local high school in Garland. I was intrigued with the subject of a baseball player who was deaf and taught signals to major league umpires so he could play the game he loved. But once the article was written and published, I moved on to other articles. After all, I write several articles a week and I’ve learned to go go go, so I don’t fall behind.
Then I received a thank you email from a man named Steve Sandy who is a friend of the Hoy family. Steve is deaf and shared with me that his life’s dream is to get William Hoy in the National Baseball Hall of Fame where he would be the first deaf player honored there. We emailed back and forth and I found myself on board with his dream and eager to help.
Suddenly, I had my Storystorm moment: What if I write a children’s book about William Hoy and the kids help Hoy by writing letters for him to the Hall of Fame? I asked Steve if he’d help with the research and he said he would. It took me YEARS to turn that idea into a story, mainly because I had no clue about the craft of picture book writing when I started, but that did become the story that got me my agent (the wonderful Karen Grencik of Red Fox Literary) and became my debut picture book in March 2016 from Albert Whitman. We’ve sold three books since.
It’s not every day that a story idea hits you while you’re working and won’t let you go until you transform it into a manuscript. And yet, consider, that those ideas may be kicking around your office or your home, waiting for you to recognize them for the great possibilities they are.
Maybe someone at the office tells you a story you can’t get out of your head or you are working on a project and your mind starts wandering on an only remotely related line of thought. Perhaps someone asks a question or is frustrated because there’s a person or a subject that should be better known or understood. Maybe you overhear a child, or your own child, with a concern or an anecdote that cradles the seed of something bigger.
In fact, I’m willing to bet you could meet your StoryStorm goal of 30 IN ONE DAY, if you weren’t on the go go go to finish all those important things you have to get done.
John Lennon once wrote, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Yes, you’re busy, but don’t forget that life and ideas are waiting like treasures in plain sight to be discovered and savored while you’re shushing the distractions that, in the end, may turn out to be the best part of your day. Slow down and think twice—or thrice!—about all the off topic observations, off track remarks and the many moments between the boxes you check off on your to-do list. Consider that the busy job you have that steals your writing time may also be a repository of ideas!
Here’s another story I like. Atalanta, the original woman in a hurry, refused to marry anyone that couldn’t beat her in a race. Most suitors didn’t try because the penalty for losing the race meant death, which had a way of dampening the ardor. One young man wasn’t deterred. He was not as fast as Atalanta, but he had an idea. He brought three golden apples to the race and as they ran, he threw one, then two, then the third golden apple just before the finish line. Atalanta veered off the beaten track to get those apples and the young man won.
Personally, I think Atalanta won, too. She got herself a clever and determined young man, three golden apples and a break from all the running and executions. So, I guess what I’m saying, is if life throws you golden apples, chase them and turn them into stories. Or golden cider. Either way, you win.
Nancy Churnin is the theater critic for The Dallas Morning News and the author of THE WILLIAM HOY STORY, How a Deaf Baseball Player Changed the Game (Albert Whitman & Company, March 1, 2016).
Her next book, MANJHI MOVES A MOUNTAIN, will be published by Creston Books Sept. 1, 2017. Next up: MAKING HIS SHOT, How Charlie Sifford Broke the Color Barrier in Golf and THE PRINCESS AND THE TREE, both from Albert Whitman. Visit her online at nancychurnin.com and on Twitter @nchurnin.
In lieu of golden apples, Nancy Churnin will toss one winner a signed copy of THE WILLIAM HOY STORY, How a Deaf Baseball Player Changed the Game…and another winner a picture book critique.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
by Salina Yoon & Christopher Polentz
People often ask me if my characters come first, or the story. Which inspires the other? Each book is different, but it’s an interesting question, and fun to reflect on. In my case, envisioning a character helps me to tell his or her story with authenticity. But they are often not fully fleshed out until my story is complete. My husband, however, fleshes his characters out with extravagant detail before the story is ever conceived.
I’d like to introduce you to my husband, artist Christopher Polentz, an aspiring writer and illustrator. He paints portraits with stunning realism inspired by actual vintage photographs he finds at antique shops. These portraits inspire stories!
I never simply copy the photograph. Over the hours of painting we spend together, developing a tangible painting, a thought process is at work. Beyond this picture; who is this person? Who were their friends? What was their position in life? Jotting down notes, organizing thoughts in my head, a real person emerges from this simple inspiration found in an antique store for $3.00.
My mental notes encourage more imagery, a background environment, she should appear emaciated-why? She’s wearing a necklace, what should be hanging from that necklace I ask myself. And so the conversation goes. And from this single photograph an imagined world of complexity evolves. None of which was planned, yet happened, spontaneously. Over the years I have found my paintings feeling incomplete in some way. My viewers had questions. A natural human curiosity wanted answers. I found myself retelling, and embellishing on my own original thoughts. And listening to my audience-they have some of the most compelling thoughts about my characters, and I take it-it’s great! Then, tying one character to another, it all slowly came together and made sense. They all belonged together, as they all came from me. I realized the need to put these stories, previously confined to my mind, on paper.
My portrait has not inspired just one idea, but several, because they are all inner-connected like a family tree. I now have a story of pictures supported by the movie of my mind that is always different and ever changing-one photograph, object, or maybe a past experience all play a role. So this is what I do. I shop, hunt, and think, never knowing where or what that next thing is adding to another piece of my puzzle, a new chapter in MY Twilight Zone.
My finished portraits are not finished at all. It’s just the beginning. A character is born with a story to tell, and we, the creator, are the ones to tell it.
Try this.
Go to an antique or thrift store. Scan through photographs of real life people or things people have owned. There are games, tools, dishes, toys, jewelry, and all kinds of unexpected treasures! Each one has a story to tell, and only you can tell it because it’s from your own imagination. Let an object or photograph trigger a story. Don’t simply interpret it. Make it your own! Elaborate and invent. Even inanimate objects can come to life if you’re using your imagination. What is their story?
Have fun browsing and imagining. Find something ordinary and make it extraordinary!
Pictured: Portraits by Christopher Polentz that have inspired stories. Feel free to let them trigger stories of your own!
Christopher Polentz graduated with honors from Art Center College of Design in 1985 earning his BFA degree. After a long career as a freelance artist working with clients such as; Atlantic Records, MGM/UA Entertainment, Mattel Toys and Reebok, Chris returned to college earning his MA degree from Syracuse University in 2001. Chris now pursues gallery work and has exhibited with galleries including; CoproNason Gallery-Santa Monica, La Luz de Jesus Gallery-Culver City, Sparks Gallery- San Diego and Cannon Gallery-Carlsbad. He continues to teach, and likes to think of himself as more technician than artist, working traditionally in his preferred medium of graphite and acrylic. Chris has been teaching art for over thirty years, including twenty years at both Art Center College of Design and Palomar Community College.
You can learn more about Christopher Polentz and his art at christopherpolentz.com.
Salina Yoon is an award winning author and illustrator of over 160 books for young children, including the popular Penguin picture book series and the new Duck Duck Porcupine beginning reader series. She was the featured author for the 2016 Kohl’s Cares Summer Campaign, and her awards include the 2015 Award for Excellence in a Picture Book for FOUND, by the Children’s Literature Council of Southern California, the 2015 International Literacy Association’s Children’s Choice Reading List for FOUND, and much more.
You can learn more about Salina Yoon and her books at salinayoon.com or follow Salina on Twitter at @salinayoon.
Chris and Salina have two boys, one more artistically inclined than the other (but they won’t name names) and they share one agent, Jamie Weiss Chilton, of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency.
Christopher is giving away a print of one of his portraits (that you can use to inspire a new character).
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
by Tara Lazar (with Deb Lund)
Over the holidays, I caught an NPR broadcast on secular Christmas music. Immediately struck by the rich voices of Perry Como, Judy Garland, and Nat King Cole, I listened to the broadcast two more times on the NPR app.
We don’t hear many voices like these anymore. At the risk of sounding like an old curmudgeon, much of today’s popular music is auto-tuned, synthesized and over-produced. There is something simple and stirring about the classic tunes of the mid-20th century. The voices have not been altered—they are as smooth and clear as ice forming on a still pond. I challenge you to listen and not get chills.
As I often do when something moves me, I circled back to pondering writing, books, and what is different about today’s stories compared to those of fifty and sixty years ago. For one thing, we are more open to discussing sensitive subjects like racism, mental illness and death. And while there is a need for many more, diverse characters allow children to see themselves reflected back and give others a window into different cultures and experiences. There is much progress to celebrate.
But when was the last time you delved into a classic children’s book? What do they have to offer us? Often aspiring authors are told not to examine them, they are not indicative of what gets published today; for example, picture storybooks, those longer titles with one page of illustration beside a packed page of text, have vanished. However, many picture books and novels remain popular today and explore timeless themes and emotions. Don’t the books of your childhood bring you joy to this very day?
It is because the voices remain clear and strong even after decades.
The first line of E.B. White’s “Charlotte’s Web” grabs us immediately: “Where is Papa going with that axe?” Who wasn’t struck by Judy Blume’s honesty in “Are you There, God? It’s Me, Margaret.” The single sentence of “Where the Wild Things Are” by Maurice Sendak drifts between fantasy and reality, seamlessly, just like a child’s daydreams. It concludes with Mom’s dinner waiting, still hot. Dr. Seuss’s “Green Eggs and Ham” bounces along with an undeniable, yet varying, rhythm. “Goodnight Moon” evokes vivid images with a calm, deliberate, yet subtle, pace. And speaking of pace, Peter in “A Snowy Day” alters his footsteps in the freshly fallen snow and we feel his fascination. When his snowball melts in his pocket, the innocence and disappointment is palpable, but readers are immediately lifted by the promise of another snowy day…this time, with a friend.
Voice is not only what you say, but how you say it. The order and timing of story events will contribute to mood just as well as a turn of phrase. Would we be talking about these books today had they not begun and ended precisely where they did? We remember the emotions they stir in us. Emotion is the most important part of art, the most universal way we convey and share story.
So pick up a meaningful old favorite today.
- What universal themes are behind the story?
- What promise is made at the beginning?
- How do you feel when you read the last line?
- What “rules” does it follow?
- Are there any elements you can borrow?
Like those melodious voices from the past, there are reasons old classics are still loved today. Reread them a few times as if you were listening to a favorite old song.
What about it sings to you?
Tara Lazar is a picture book author and founder of Storystorm. She has two books releasing in 2017—WAY PAST BEDTIME from Aladdin/S&S and 7 ATE 9: THE UNTOLD STORY from Disney*Hyperion. Tara is a council member of the Rutgers University Council on Children’s Literature and a picture book mentor for We Need Diverse Books. She lives in New Jersey with her husband, two daughters, and far too many stuffed animals.
Tara is giving away a signed F&G (folded and gathered proof) of WAY PAST BEDTIME or 7 ATE 9: THE UNTOLD STORY, the winner’s choice.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
A year ago last autumn in Chicago during the Architecture Biennial, one exhibit captured my imagination. Situated in the middle of a large room were several dozen waist-high stands, each holding small everyday objects, such as fake flowers, egg crate foam, or a crumpled mini plastic water bottle.
What made the objects startling, though, was that the artist/architect had included tiny plastic people on or by each group of objects. Those plastic people changed the objects from everyday to fantastic—no longer just things you’d find in a junk drawer, they were now a whole new landscape for those little people. I had a moment of vertigo. I was looking at something small, a pile of Pringles, but to the plastic people, the Pringles were hills. And if the Pringles were hills, what did that make me?
At this point you’re probably thinking, “Did I click on the right blog? Isn’t this supposed to be about WRITING?” But writing is the first thing that came to mind when I saw the exhibit, particularly writing for children, because the everyday can become fantastic if you just change your perspective. We do it all the time as writers of kids’ books. We imagine ourselves as we were when we were three or seven or ten. We remember what it felt like to be younger, smaller, under our parents’ control.
But as writers, we’re not limited to imagining ourselves as children. We can imagine ourselves as anything at all. A monkey. A vampire. A purple two-headed dragon. A little plastic person in a field of giant fake flowers. We can picture ourselves on the outside looking in . . . or on the inside longing to get out.
Perspective has been on my mind a lot lately. This year, I had two books come out that look at perspective differently. The first, LADY LIBERTY’S HOLIDAY, features a larger-than-life main character, the Statue of Liberty, and views America through her eyes. To her, Niagara Falls isn’t just a gorgeous waterfall—it’s the perfect spot to shower. And the Golden Gate Bridge? A great place to nap. The only thing that makes her feel small is the Grand Canyon.
MARTA! BIG AND SMALL, on the other hand, takes on the idea of how perspective differs depending on what something is compared to. So compared to an elephant, Marta is small. Compared to a bug, she is big. (Or “grande”—it’s a bilingual book.) It’s the whole idea of me, the Pringles, and the tiny plastic people. We are all big, and we are all small. Everything is relative.
And this is where the inspiration comes from. If you’re looking for a new idea, change your perspective. What would it be like if you were the size of a mouse? What would you eat . . . or wear . . . or play with? What if you were as big as a Brachiosaurus?
Look around. A pile of Pringles can be a hillside. A handful of twigs can be a forest. A piece of egg crate foam on its side can be a modern housing development. Lie on the floor. Crawl on your knees. Climb a ladder and see what it’s like to be eight feet tall. Take an elevator to the top of a tall building and look down. Then look up. Who sees the world that way? There’s your character. What challenges would they face? There’s your plot.
In one of the explanations of the exhibit, the artist/architect wrote “Anything stacked is architecture.” He found inspiration for his craft in the everyday, just as I found inspiration in his exhibit. Who knows where your next idea might come from? Like architecture, inspiration is everywhere!
For more on the exhibit, Sou Fujimoto’s “Architecture Is Everywhere,” click on this link.
Jen Arena writes, edits, and finds for inspiration in the world around her for everything from easy-to-reads to picture books to early chapter books. Her recent titles include BESOS FOR BABY (Little Brown), LADY LIBERTY’S HOLIDAY (Knopf), and MARTA! BIG AND SMALLl (Roaring Brook), which the Huffington Post named in its Best Picture Books of 2016 as an Honorable Mention in the category of—you guessed it—“Best on Perspective.” Her next picture book SLEEP TIGHT, SNOW WHITE will be published in 2017 by Knopf. Visit her on twitter at @hallojen or at her website: jenarenabooks.com.
In honor of the very first Storystorm, Jen is giving away a thirty-minute brainstorming session/Q&A/editorial consult phone call. She has twenty years of experience as an editor with Putnam, Golden Books, and Random House and has been writing for kids just as long. Ask away!
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
Novels were my first love—as a children’s literature graduate student, as an editor, as a bookseller, and then as a writer. I loved long descriptive passages, the rising tension and angst, the unexpected twists and turns of complicated plots, and all the ways that casts of characters could clash, conflict, and come together. Novels were other worlds in which I could become fully immersed for long stretches of time, emerging only to jot down particularly beautiful sentences in my journal. However, these complications presented certain problems for me once I began writing my own novels.
It turns out that plotting is . . . not my strong suit.
While wrestling with the plot of my second novel, SOME OF THE PARTS, I turned to picture books for help. There were plenty in our house, but I knew those too well to read them objectively (and my kids kept interrupting), so I went to the library and gathered stacks of new ones, old ones, favorite classics and unfamiliar texts. I was searching for a sense of how stories were built, and I knew that picture books had patterns I could see clearly, structures I would recognize. The more I read, the more I fell in love. I felt like I was cheating on my novel, but I didn’t care. It was glorious—the humor, the energy, the sweetness, and unexpected twists and turns of uncomplicated plots were a revelation.
I began thinking in picture books, seeing new possibilities. My son’s preschool playground rule (“There are no bad guys at our school.”) sparked a story.
So did a conversation at an academic dinner, where I was seated between an astronomer and a marine biologist.
There were some practical things I did to put the picture books to work for myself:
- I typed out the text of books that were particularly successful in some way, so that I could see the words separately from the pictures. This is how picture book manuscripts arrive at a publisher (most of the time) and how mine look when I write them, because I am not the illustrator. When you can read the text alone, you get the clearest possible sense of how it operates, what jobs it has and what jobs it should not try to do (e.g. extensive description).
- I took note of elements like repetition, alliteration, rhyme, and plot structures to get a sense of what the rules were. I compared older books and newer ones, to see how the rules had changed. Word counts and formats vary wildly from then to now, and I wanted a strong sense of both the history of the form and the current trends, so I knew where my stories would fit.
- I allowed myself to start with themes and ideas that I knew had been written before. Because I had been reading so many picture books by other authors, my first efforts to write my own often mimicked what I’d read. (I could call it “an homage” and get away with it, right? Maybe?) But I let it happen, because I needed to warm up those muscles and strengthen them. It was like taking a class at the gym: for a while, I just followed along with what the instructor did. I couldn’t design my own routine right away.
Before long, I had a couple of drafts that I really liked (and several more that had yet to find their feet). I revised and fine-tuned them until I felt brave enough to send them to my agent. She replied almost immediately. “You’ve done it,” she said. “You’ve cracked the picture book code.”
So, what have picture books taught me? To be open to unexpected possibilities, to examine small moments and know that stories can grow out of anything that happens, and to be confident in my ability to structure a narrative. Writing both picture books and longer stories allows me a unique kind of balance between different forms, and has allowed me to see plot on a much smaller, more manageable scale and then expand that scaffolding to a larger one.
They’ve also taught me that sometimes you think your characters are elephants, but your illustrator has other ideas…
Hannah Barnaby is the author of WONDER SHOW, a 2013 Morris Award finalist, and SOME OF THE PARTS. She makes her double picture book debut in 2017 with BAD GUY, illustrated by Mike Yamada (coming in May from S&S), and GARCIA & COLETTE GO EXPLORING, illustrated by Andrew Joyner (coming in June from Putnam). Hannah lives in Charlottesville, VA, where she teaches creative writing and wrangles a variety of children and dogs. Visit her online at hannahbarnaby.com, Twitter @hannahrbarnaby and Facebook.
Her two picture books are now available for pre-order via Indiebound: BAD GUY and GARCIA & COLETTE GO EXPLORING.
Hannah is giving away her code-cracking secrets in a picture book critique.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
by Dan Moynihan
“DON’T THINK. JUST DRAW.”
That’s what I’ll tell you in one of my collaborative story-making events. That’s our motto as we set forth to create a wild batch of picture book stories in about an hour. There’s no time for self-doubt or self-editing, so just draw, just write, just create. There’s no preparation of ideas, and no plan once we start, but we somehow create amazing stories that are joyful, surprising, and at least partly coherent. We’re not sure where we’re going, but we’ll get there together!
You’ll start off with a blank, 12-page booklet in which to begin a story—just to begin it. It could start with a single sentence or a bit of dialogue. It could start with a character or object in an environment. It doesn’t really matter what it is. The important thing is just to start. Just start moving your pen if you don’t have an idea yet. There’s a lot of power in just starting.
And you don’t need a plan. When you begin the story, you don’t need to know the end of the story yet or even what will happen next. In fact, in this case you can’t know. Because in just a few minutes, you’ll be passing that booklet to the person on the right, who will continue the story that you started.
When you pass that booklet, you let go of your story. It’s in someone else’s hands now, and you have no control over where it will go. But that’s the whole fun of this activity—you get to see the unexpected places that an idea can go. So when you’re working on your own stories, don’t hold on to them too tightly. Don’t be afraid to let them do anything they want to do. Don’t be afraid to explore a possibility just because you don’t know where it will lead.
Just as you passed that booklet to your neighbor, you will receive another booklet. This one already has a story started in it, with characters, setting, and action that someone else created. Now it’s up to you to continue the story.
What will happen next? Again, you don’t need to know the ending or even what happens in two more pages. Just one step in the story.
Despite being limited by the story that someone else started, most people find the second step to be easier and more fun than the first step. With a blank booklet, you had total freedom. But when anything is possible, it might be that nothing feels particularly right. Having something to react against focuses your creativity. That’s why I love writing and drawing prompts. Paradoxically, arbitrary constraints make us more creative.
When I feel stuck on one of my own stories, I imagine that I’m actually in the midst of one of these collaborative picture book events. There is no longer a story that I’m struggling with, but a story that has appeared before me out of nowhere. I’ve got two minutes to come up with the next step in the story—not the whole story, just one step—without thinking at all about where it is leading. I come up with something, and then move on to the next step.
I often find that my imagination will not allow me to see step two until I have taken step one. I try to see the path ahead in my mind, but I can’t. But I don’t get frustrated. I just start drawing, because I know that the story will only take shape through its own process of creation.
Look at that story that you’re stuck on. What would you do if you had to come up with something—anything—for the next step of the story? Forget about plans. Just take one step. Anything is better than nothing. Then repeat. This process might take your story just where it needs to go. Or it might lead you down a cul-de-sac, but it keeps you moving. Just go back and try again. What else could have happened? And then what? Eventually, you’ll find the right path for your story.
Ideas and stories take shape through action. Don’t wait for them to form in your mind. When you don’t know what to do, just keep writing and drawing!
Dan Moynihan is the author-illustrator of HIDING DINOSAURS, which was named a Must-Read Picture Book by the Massachusetts Center for the Book. His comics have appeared in Nickelodeon Magazine and Heeby Jeeby Comix. He also enjoys teaching watercolor painting and illustration classes at Cambridge Center for Adult Education. Dan lives in Boston with his wife Cathy and an orange cat named Butters. Visit him online at danmoynihan.blogspot.com and follow him on Twitter @HelloDanM.
Dan is giving away a signed copy of HIDING DINOSAURS.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
by Tammi Sauer
I am a huge fan of Storystorm (formerly known as PiBoIdMo). Many of my books started right here!
YOUR ALIEN, my book with Goro Fujita, for example, first appeared on my 2012 PiBoIdMo list. That year, I decided to step away from the classic picture book structure which has served me well in many of my books including BAWK & ROLL!, MOSTLY MONSTERLY, and PRINCESS IN TRAINING, and I challenged myself to try other approaches. I wrote ROAR! (Paula Wiseman/S&S, 2015), a book entirely in dialogue. I wrote MARY HAD A LITTLE GLAM (Sterling, 2016), my first rhymer. I also really, really, really wanted to write:
- a circle story*
- told in second-person narration**
- that starred a little alien***.
I mean, who doesn’t?!
To come up with the plot for this manuscript, I asked myself the biggest two-word question I know:
- What if…a little alien accidentally crash-lands in a boy’s yard?
- What if…the boy wants to keep him?
- What if…the boy takes him to school?
- What if…the boy and the alien have an amazing day, but, when nighttime comes, the boy discovers something is wrong with his alien?
Each of these questions pushed me to consider what happened next in the story. If one question took me to a dead end, I gave myself a detour. I simply asked myself a new “What If..?” question.
The sequel, YOUR ALIEN RETURNS, debuted in October. I used the “What if…?” approach for determining the plot for this book as well.
Maybe you’d like to give the “What if…?” approach a try.
Select one character and one situation (or choose your own!). Ask yourself, “What if…a (character) (situation)?” Next ask yourself, “And then what? And then what? And then what?”
*Circle Story: what happens at the very end of the story echoes something that happened in the very beginning of the story
**Second Person Narration: addresses the reader directly and uses the pronouns “you,” “your,” and “yours”
***
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Tammi Sauer is a full-time children’s book author who also presents at schools and conferences across the nation. She has sold 28 picture books to major publishing houses including Disney*Hyperion, HarperCollins, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Penguin Random House, Scholastic, Simon & Schuster, and Sterling. In addition to winning awards, Tammi’s books have gone on to do great things. CHICKEN DANCE: THE MUSICAL is currently on a national tour, NUGGET & FANG was a featured book at the 2015 Scholastic Book Fair, and YOUR ALIEN, an NPR Best Book of 2015, was recently released in Italian, Spanish, Korean, and French which makes her feel extra fancy.
You can learn more about Tammi and her books at tammisauer.com.
Attention, earthlings! Tammi is giving away a signed copy of YOUR ALIEN RETURNS, a bookmark annnnd an out-of-this-world alien button.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
by Josh Funk
Yesterday, Tara told us to be mindful and also to daydream. Mindfulness and daydreaming may seem like opposites; pay close attention to the world…and pay attention to only what’s in your head. And just to prove that ideas come from anywhere and everywhere, today I’m going to suggest you do a third thing—something right in between.
Only half concentrate on what you’re doing. Space out…a little. Don’t pay too close attention. You know you’re gonna anyway. You’re probably multi-tasking while you read this post; maybe you’re exercising (good for you!) or driving (please pull over before continuing. Seriously.), or in the bathroom (hey, that’s where I’m writing this!).
Today I’m going to tell you why I love otter car wrecks. Sorry, I meant autocrrects. Bah! I mean autocorrects. And typlos. Seriously? AUTOCORRECTS AND TYPOS! And how they can inspire goofy, absurd, and sometimes preposterous creativity.
Do you want a robust hobbit dude?
Why wasn’t I invited, poo-head?
I solved your evil baristas.
I said or wrote all those things over the past few years…sort of.
I like to think that I have pretty good hearing. But if you ask my wife, she’ll tell you I’m not the best listener. I clearly wasn’t paying close attention when I thought I texted my wife, “Do you want to go out for food?” but ended up asking her about a chubby cowboy creature from middle earth. While a book about a hobbit is probably copyright protected, I’ll be there’s a market for LOTR fan-fiction.
When Anna Staniszewski told me in gchat that she was having a book launch, I responded with what I thought was, “Why wasn’t I invited, though?” I can’t say that I didn’t not not start working on a manuscript about a birthday party for an anthropomorphic piece of—wait, never mind. As Tara always says, don’t give away your ideas.
And I honestly have no idea what I said when Siri searched for those evil baristas. My best guess is that I wanted a burrito. But I made sure to write it down because a villainous coffee artisan sounds like a perfect future foil for Inspector Croissant!
So use those absurd auto-corrects to your advantage. If you mishear someone speak, maybe what you think you heard will bear a brainstorm. It may seem nonsensical now. But definitely write it all down. For all you know, a typo isn’t just a typo—it’s your subconscious genius giving you an inspirational kick in the barista.
Josh Funk writes silly stories and somehow tricks people into publishing them as picture books, such as Lady Pancake & Sir French Toast and its upcoming sequel The Case of the Stinky Stench along with Pirasaurs!, Dear Dragon, It’s Not Jack and the Beanstalk and more! This morning he started drafting a book about otters getting into car wrecks.
Josh is a board member of The Writers’ Loft in Sherborn, MA and the co-coordinator of the 2017 New England Regional SCBWI Conference. He has a 12 Step Guide to Writing Picture Books in the ‘Resources for Writers’ section of his website. Josh grew up in New England and studied Computer Science in school. Today, he still lives in New England and when not writing Java code or Python scripts, he drinks Java coffee and writes picture book manuscripts.
Josh is terrible at writing bios, so please help fill in the blanks. Josh enjoys _______ during ________ and has always loved __________. He has played ____________ since age __ and his biggest fear in life is being eaten by a __________.
Find out more about Josh at joshfunkbooks.com and on Twitter @joshfunkbooks.
Josh is giving away one signed & personalized copy of each of his three books: Lady Pancake & Sir French Toast, Dear Dragon, and Pirasaurs!—one each to three lucky winners.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
by Tara Lazar
Amidst the chaos and confusion of the past year, a Zen movement gathered steam, gently simmering in the background of our harried lives and minds. You may have noticed—albeit fleetingly—while shuffling through news of war, tragedy, and a deeply divided nation. You may have caught a glimpse, in the corner of your eye, as you rushed from work to home to school to conflicting calendar commitments.
Our technologically advanced, modern lives are supposed to be more efficient and productive, but instead we feel required to do MORE with the time we have—and to feel badly when we don’t, to somehow believe we are faulty, we have failed.
This picture has been reproduced by kind permission of stormthorgerson.com.
And for these reasons, “mindfulness” achieved an elevated status this past year. I witnessed it everywhere in 2016—in magazines and articles, on TV, and even in the opening of a sensory deprivation spa a few miles from my home.
I learned about mindfulness before it had a name. Newly diagnosed with MS, I became a worry-wart, imagining my future as a helpless invalid. I lamented the inevitable loss of independence, a retirement not surrounded by loving grandchildren, but by indifferent nurses. Finally, after what I refer to as “the lost year,” I learned that worrying about the future makes you miss out on the here and now. I strived to instead be present in the moment. This is mindfulness.
Mindfulness can work wonders for creativity. Being more aware of your environment, your actions, interactions and emotions gives you a better understanding of being human, which, in turn, is fuel for character development. Others’ reactions also serve as powerful material for storytelling. Being mindful can help us capture and remember pieces of daily life that lend an authenticity to our stories. Moving about with a constant, present focus, will allow you to see ideas, to be open to the inspiration that exists around you every day.
In being mindful, we should also make time just to be, just to think. The most successful entrepreneurs in the world schedule time to ponder their lives and careers. You should be similarly thoughtful about your writing path. Where do you want to go? What do you want to accomplish? Who do you want to be as an author?
This is where I often sit and just think. I call it the “brick oven” because it remains warm even on winter days…and because it bakes my ideas.
And now I am going to confuse the Dickens out of you.
While I am all for the benefits of mindfulness, I also urge you to let your mind wander, to daydream. You probably already do. And you should not stop.
Not being mindful when performing routine tasks—like folding laundry, washing dishes, taking a shower—allows the mind to escape the doldrums of daily life. You do not have to think about how to do the things you have done thousands of times. You can free up your mind to go on an adventure. Some of the best ideas come when we are not focused on the here and now.
But wait, isn’t that the opposite of mindfulness?
Actually, I believe practicing mindfulness can lead us to become better daydreamers. They are not adversaries, but partners in creative living. According to daydream researchers McMillan, Singer and Kaufman, “Creativity lies in that intersection between our outer world and our inner world.” I interpret this as meaning we must pay strong attention to both daily duties and daydreaming. In other words, let the things around you stimulate the daydream. This is called inspiration, right?
We can set aside time just to daydream, or we can be aware when we lose our focus to daydream, and allow the thoughts to flow. If we stop our minds from wandering, I fear we may lose our ability to be creative. After all, the illusive ideas we seek ultimately come from within our own minds. So maybe when you feel a daydream coming, you can pay attention to it, let it happen. Grab a notebook. Yes, be MINDFUL of when you are not MINDFUL.
And this, my friends, is how you mine—and mind—your ideas.
Tara Lazar is a picture book author and founder of Storystorm. She has two books releasing in 2017—WAY PAST BEDTIME from Aladdin/S&S and 7 ATE 9: THE UNTOLD STORY from Disney*Hyperion. Tara is a council member of the Rutgers University Council on Children’s Literature and a picture book mentor for We Need Diverse Books. She lives in New Jersey with her husband, two daughters, and far too many stuffed animals.
Tara is giving away an “Ask Me Anything” Skype session (or Facetime, or telephone). These typically last about an hour, but she will stay on the line (internet?) until you have answers to your most burning questions regarding children’s publishing. From initial idea to polished query, from deciding on an agent to marketing a book, she will cover it all. The opinions of Tara do reflect those of her employer, which, incidentally, is also Tara.
Leave ONE COMMENT below to enter. You are eligible to win if you are a registered Storystorm participant and you have commented once on this blog post. Prizes will be given away at the conclusion of the event.
Good luck!
Writing for Kids (While Raising Them) 