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Ooga!
Know Tammi Sauer? She write new book. She write good book. Bob Shea draw picture. It ME WANT PET!
(Me read to five-year-old class. They giggle. They snort. They LOVE!)
Cave Boy star. Cave Boy want pet.
He find pet. Mama say no. Gah!
He find new pet. Papa say no. Gah, ug!
He get new new pet. Gran say no.
Cave Boy sad. Me sad. You sad!
What Cave Boy do?
Me no tell.
You read book. Ooga!
So…
Daughters want draw. I ask, “What pet you want Cave Boy have?”
Daughter Eight draw dinosaur. Me say no. Too stompy.
Daughter Five draw giraffe. Me say no. Too tall. No fit cave.
You have kid? Kid draw Cave Boy and new pet. Send to tarawrites (at) yahoo (dot) com by March 13. Me post here. Me pick pet. Kid win book.
OOGA!
Tammi Sauer author. She write many, many kid book. Book like CHICKEN DANCE and MOSTLY MONSTERLY and MR. DUCK MEANS BUSINESS. You visit her: TammiSauer.com. OOGA! (Ooga not book. Me like say OOGA!)
by I have to be honest with you.
I think the word “idea” is a little grand.
And by grand, I mean daunting.
An idea is a huge thing, right?
It requires freshness and originality, it encompasses possibility, it is—not to get all god-like here, but—the beginning of everything!
Meanwhile, we’re always being told, “There are no new ideas!”
Poet Audre Lord said, “There are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt.” And there are all those books and lectures that tell us there are only about seven plots available on the whole entire planet. And you guys. There is even a web site called “no new ideas” and it is just a blank page!
So. Phew. That’s out of the way.
No new ideas.
We can’t find what isn’t there.
But, this puts us PiBoIdMo folks in a bit of bind, doesn’t it?
What are we supposed to do for the rest of the month?
Well, personally, I think we should try for something smaller.
Not a whole new idea everyday—just a new perspective.
(And, guess what? The Greek origin of the word idea is idein, which means “to see”! Which means I’ve got support from ancient sages here, so let’s go with it.)
What if all we need is a new way of looking at things?
And what if that way is a child-like way?
A child, said author Olive Schreiner, “sees everything, looks straight at it, examines it, without any preconceived idea.”
Have you ever noticed what kids want to do when they’re riding a down escalator? They want to run up it!
Kids don’t look at things as if they’re static or rule-based or already defined. Surprise and experimentation are everyday affairs. Freshness and originality and possibility—all those things I found so daunting above? Ha. Child’s play.
And children, you’ll remember, are our audience.
So, what if we look straight at life today and examine it?
What if we let our preconceptions slip away and see things as children see things?
What if we imagine that socks are pockets (A Sock is a Pocket for Your Toes) or that the whole wide world could fit in a book (All the World) or that a worm and a bird could be best friends (Noodle & Lou)?
What if look around, each of us, at the animals in our houses and yards, the food on our tables, the books on our bedside tables, and we just plain see them in a new way? That’s all I’m going to do today, and you should join me. We’ll leave the grand and daunting to someone else…
(And now for the party favors!)
These really great photos that are all about accessing a child’s perspective.
And then this fine bit of musing by artist Austin Kleon:
(Scroll and read all the way through it. It’s worth it. Especially that very last section. I think he might’ve stuck it in just for picture book authors, don’t you?)
Liz Garton Scanlon is the author of the highly-acclaimed, Caldecott-honored picture book ALL THE WORLD, illustrated by Marla Frazee, as well as NOODLE & LOU, illustrated by Arthur Howard, and A SOCK IS A POCKET FOR YOUR TOES, illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser. Forthcoming books include THINK BIG, illustrated by Vanessa Newton; HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BUNNY, illustrated by Stephanie Graegin; and others. Liz is an assistant professor of creative writing at Austin Community College and the mother of two daughters. To learn more, visit her web site at LizGartonScanlon.com.
Liz is giving away a signed copy of the award-winning ALL THE WORLD! Leave a comment to enter and a winner will be randomly selected one week from today.
by Creatively, I’m very slow.
I like to be delicate with my ideas and usually spend three years developing a picture book.
Because of this, I have to look for ideas that hit my proverbial sweet spot and keep me enthused for the long haul.
For the picture book that I’m working on now, titled THE TRICYCLE MOUSE, my initial idea was to combine two of my favorite things: vehicles and animals.
Thus the characters in the book are hybridized animal-vehicles.
I started working on this over a year and a half ago, it still has a long way to go, but my excitement for the project has only grown.
Julian Hector is generously giving away an original signed painting he made exlcusively for PiBoIdMo, with characters from his picture book THE GENTLEMAN BUG! It’s unbelievably adorable! Lucky you!
Leave a comment to enter and a winner will be randomly chosen one week from today.
Julian Hector is one of the youngest author/illustrators working in children’s publishing today. Five years ago, he was plucked out of college by an editor at Disney-Hyperion, and he’s been writing and illustrating children’s book ever since. His most recent book is MONDAY IS ONE DAY, written by Arthur A. Levine, and you can visit his website here: www.Julianhector.com.
Carol Gordon Ekster is a former teacher, author and writing tutor, and if you live in the Andover, MA area, she will visit your classroom for free!
Sponsored by this blog as part of the KidLit4Japan auctions, the giveaway runs now to May 15, with a visit to be arranged before the end of the school year.
Carol Gordon Ekster will visit for an hour, read her book Where Am I Sleeping Tonight? and lead the class in a writing lesson, focusing on the features of good writing. Sending home a note to parents for possible purchase of her book would be appreciated. And of course she will sign them!
The winning class should be within 25-30 miles of Andover, MA and the visit is most appropriate for 2nd through 5th grade.
To enter, leave a comment telling us why your class would love to win this author visit. The winning class will be chosen on May 15. Good luck!
by James Burks
It’s day 18 of PiBoIdMo and I’m here to give you inspiration or at least a small push towards the finish line. I’m sure that, at some point in your life, most of you have put together a puzzle. It could have been a small puzzle with only a hundred pieces, or a ginormous puzzle with a bazillion pieces. Regardless of the size, if you can put together a puzzle then you can put together a story. So let’s get started.
To put together a story puzzle, the first things you need are the pieces. That’s where your ideas come in. Every single idea you come up with is a piece of the story puzzle. This includes characters, settings, or lines of dialogue; you name it, they are all pieces of the puzzle. And here’s the best part: there are no wrong pieces. If a piece doesn’t seem to fit into the puzzle you’re working on, you can set it aside to use later.
Here’s an example of a recent story puzzle that I put together:
About a year ago, I sat down and tried to come up with my next great idea. I had just sold my first two stories to different publishers and was trying to come up with a third story that my agent could send out. I had the first piece of my story puzzle: a squirrel. I spent the next few days creating more pieces. I gave the squirrel a name (another puzzle piece), and I came up with a bunch of stuff that he loved to do (more puzzle pieces). After a few days I took all the pieces and arranged them into a simple story, drew some rough drawings (for illustrators, these are more pieces), and sent it off to my agent. My agent thought it needed something more, though, and at the time I didn’t know what that was. So I set the entire puzzle aside and went off to work on another project.
After about a month, my agent called and asked if I had come up with any new ideas. I hadn’t. Or at least that’s what I thought. After hanging up the phone I started running through a bunch of random ideas while surfing the internet. I remember contemplating Amelia Earhart (I think the biopic was coming out or had just came out), went from there to Penguins, then to the South Pole, and from there to a bird migrating south for the winter. (It’s always a good idea to let your brain off its leash once in a while and let it run free. You never know what it might bring back.) Something about a bird flying south for the winter ended up sticking with me.
I didn’t know it just yet but I had just found another piece to my story puzzle.
From there, everything seemed to magically fall into place. I took the bird migrating south for the winter and stuck him with the squirrel from my earlier story. A small part of my story puzzle took shape.
Then I started to ask myself a series of questions to fill in the rest:
Why do they have to migrate south together for the winter? There had to be a reason and it had to be big. I asked myself what would happen if Squirrel was forced to go along after he unintentionally sacrificed his entire winter stash of food to save Bird from an attacking cat. He would have no other choice; if he didn’t go with Bird then he’d starve.
But, where was the conflict? What was going to make my story interesting? Maybe they were like the odd couple. I imagined Bird as a total free spirit who just wanted to have fun, while Squirrel was a bit neurotic and was all about responsibility. Squirrel can’t stand Bird, but they’re stuck together. A natural conflict of personality that would provide for some humorous scenes.
This left one last question. How would the two characters change by the end of the story? What would their character arc be? In the case of this story, I decided to have Bird learn to be a little more responsible and Squirrel learn to have a little more fun. The story, at its heart, would be about finding a balance between having fun and being responsible. And by the time the journey ended, they might even become friends.
At that point I could pretty much see the overall structure of my puzzle. The edges were complete and all the major parts were coming together. All I had to do was fill in the missing pieces in the middle, which solidified as I wrote the outline and got to know the characters better. Two weeks later I sent it off to my agent, we made some minor tweaks, and eventually sold it to a major publisher. (Deal announcement pending; I’m drawing and writing the book for release sometime in 2012.)
I hope you find inspiration in my recent experience and are able to put together some great story puzzles of your own. Just remember that there are no wrong pieces. You may not use every idea or piece you think of right now, but every piece (used or not) helps you build your puzzle. Now go forth and conquer the book world!
James Burks has spent the last 15 years working in the animation industry on various movies and television shows, including The Emperor’s New Groove, Atlantis, Treasure Planet, Home on the Range, Space Jam, The Iron Giant, Wow Wow Wubbzy, and most recently on Fan Boy and Chum Chum. His first graphic novel for kids, GABBY AND GATOR, was published by Yen Press in September 2010 and is a Junior Library Guild selection. James is currently working on a picture book with Lerner/Carolrhoda entitled BEEP AND BAH (2012), and the graphic novel mentioned above.
James is giving away a signed copy of GABBY & GATOR! Leave a comment to enter. A winner will be randomly selected one week from today.
Thanks to James for the PiBoIdMo 2010 logo and badges!
Today’s inspiration from author-illustrator Adam F. Watkins is purely visual. You figure out the story—and you can also win this signed illustration. Just leave a comment! A winner will be randomly selected one week from today.
Adam lives in southern Ohio with his wife Amy and daughter Lucy. He graduated from the Columbus College of Art and Design in 2004, where he majored in illustration. He studied under C.F. Payne his junior and senior years. He worked for an advertising agency in Cincinnati after graduation and is now a full-time freelancer. He loves children’s books and the outdoors. Adam hopes to one day share his illustrations and stories with kids all over the world.
Some awards he has acquired along the way:
2003 – Society of Illustrators student show
2004 – Best in Show, Art of Illustration Show
2006 – Gold Addy Award
It’s not always about the cute bunnies.
I’ve been drawing a lot of bunnies lately. Well, actually one bunny in particular.
He is very persistent and keeps showing up when I’m doodling, waiting for his chance to star in a story. He is not what I am supposed to be drawing right now. I am supposed to be drawing chickens and mice and Christmas trees as well as coming up with a brilliant picture book idea everyday, none of which have had anything to do with bunnies so far. But he keeps showing up, begging for attention like a puppy who wants to go for a walk.
I have nothing against him, I think he is kind of cute. It’s just that I have no time right now for cute little bunnies. I really need to be working on these other things, before I can pay any attention to him.
So I am just trying to ignore him. And the more that I try to ignore him, the more I find myself thinking about him. Where did he COME from? Why does he keep BOTHERING me? What does he WANT? What does he NEED? WHO is this BUNNY?
Ideas are funny things. Sometimes it seems that you will never have another good idea again no matter how hard you try. Sometimes you need to wheedle an idea out of a germ of a thought. And sometimes they just burst through the door and kick you in the head. Who knows which ideas will grow into a full fledged story and which ones will just fizzle away. The best that you can do is listen to them, push them if they need it and give them a chance to shine.
I don’t know yet who this bunny is or if he will ever grow into his own story. All I know is that he’s been bugging me and pretty soon I am going to have to do something about it. The other characters are starting to complain.
Sarah Dillard is an award-winning author/illustrator. Her latest book is Perfectly Arugula.
You can win Sarah’s signed illustration of Bunny and Mouse above! Leave a comment to enter. (One entry per person.) A winner will be randomly selected one week from today. Good luck!
Those of us you who were children once upon a time will surely remember how frustrating it was suddenly to have been plunked down in a world where everyone knew more than you did—about everything. Children spend a great deal of time trying to figure things out: where does snow come from? Why can’t dogs talk? What happens next? Or, as we say in our family: “Who ordered the veal cutlet?”*
Kids develop their own little GPS-like subroutines, constantly recalculating to keep themselves on track—but sometimes, inevitably, they get it wrong. Misperceptions and missed information lead to misunderstandings . . . and—I won’t sugar-coat this—little misunderstandings often lead to:
Major Disappointment!
Total Humiliation!
Nightmares!
(Yeah, I was grown before I figured that one out.)
Thank goodness for picture books!
In a picture book, you can check out your own real-live dinosaur any time from the Storybook Lending Zoo.
You can have the queen invite the golfer with the highest score to the palace for tea, and meet the prince, who is even worse at Goony Golf than you are.
You can become a super-hero in training, and rid the world of evil, baby-eating furniture.
How cool is that? As children’s book writers and illustrators, we get to do this all the time. So, having aired three of my own neuroses . . . er, picture book ideas . . . here is a tip for today: think back to those times in your childhood when things were not quite what you expected them to be—and imagine what it would take to discover a new, old friend . . . or have the last laugh . . . or fly to the rescue.
And then, for the love of heaven, explain to the little person in your life that dinosaurs are really extinct; that, as silly as it sounds, low score wins at Goony Golf; and that, yes, if necessary, a very tiny baby can sleep safely in a dresser drawer . . . but only if you take the drawer OUT of the dresser first!
*A line from Mel Brooks’ Silent Movie . . . um, maybe you had to be there.
Bonnie Adamson’s latest illustration project is BEDTIME MONSTER (¡A dormir, pequeño monstruo!) by Heather Ayris Burnell, released in September by Raven Tree Press.
Visit Bonnie’s soon-to-be-completely-overhauled website at www.bonnieadamson.net, or hang out with her on Twitter, where she co-hosts #kidlitchat on Tuesday nights and #kidlitart (for children’s book illustrators and friends) every Thursday.
Bonnie then, practicing her skeptical glare; and now—-an older and wiser children’s book illustrator.
Prize Alert! Leave a comment to enter. One randomly-selected winner will choose one of the three picture-book-inspired sketches above for Bonnie to paint in watercolor (Dinosaur, Royalty, Superhero). One entry per person! Winner will be selected one week from today. Good luck!
[UPDATE: The winner is Sheryl Tilley! Congratulations and enjoy!]
My story “The Juggler Triplets” will appear in the November issue of Abe’s Peanut, a micro-magazine for kids ages 6-10. Delivered in four postcard installments, the story appears on one side with full-color illustration by Lichen Frank on the other.
Independently published by editors Anna and Tess Knoebel, Abe’s Peanut launched this year after the success of Abe’s Penny, a micro-magazine for adults: “Off-set printed on double thick matte card stock, each issue dispenses art and literature while becoming a collectible, temporal object.” (In kidspeak: “They look cool tacked to your bedroom door.”)
Recent Abe’s Peanut contributors include Audrey Vernick, author of Is Your Buffalo Ready for Kindergarten?, and Lisa Tharpe, author of P is for Please: A Bestiary of Manners.
Kids love receiving their own mail, so here’s a chance to receive four postcards with your child’s name on the label.
Leave a comment naming your child’s favorite picture book for one contest entry. Mention the giveaway elsewhere for two additional entries. A winner will be chosen on Friday, October 22nd.
And stay-tuned for PiBoIdMo in November, when there will be several itty-bitty (plus some hugantic) giveaways!
Putting Your Best Paw Forward
by Jennifer Swanson
Who’s an animal lover? Come on raise your hand. Do you own a pet now? Did you once? Besides being empathetic friends to us when we are down or energetic reasons to exercise, pets can also be great inspiration to aspiring picture book authors. What child doesn’t love to read about the crazy antics of the myriad of dogs in Go, Dog, Go by P.D. Eastman. And of course, who can forget the hours of enjoyment from The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Suess or even the best known hippopotamus friends, George and Martha by James Marshall. Animals or pets in general are found in abundance in children’s picture books.
So, why not use your own pets for inspiration? That’s what I did when I created my dynamic canine detective duo, Penny and Rio. My two real dogs (who are also named Penny and Rio) served as the creative map for my characters.
Luckily my real dogs had very distinctive personalities and were always doing crazy things. That’s what caught my imagination.
In this picture, Penny had just dug out our flower planter at the end of the deck. She used to lie in this for hours, just staring at the yard.
Naturally, this meant to me that she was a pet detective determined to solve a mysterious case. This is how I got my plot for my first book, Penny and Rio: The Mysterious Backyard Meeting.
For me a mystery was the logical choice as I have been a die-hard Nancy Drew fan since I first began to read, but you could have your pets do anything.
Perhaps your cat will become an astronaut and fly through space to land on a planet inhabited only by mice. Or your pet fish possesses super powers so that at night it flies out of the tank to save the lives of the Palmetto bugs living in your garage. Maybe the fireflies you catch at night are really beings from another planet and wish to take over the world.
Your imagination is limitless. So next time you are stumped for a picture book idea, take your notebook and observe some animals. Go to the zoo if you can. See how they interact. Then give them human characteristics and situations. Make the elephant set out on a quest for magic peanuts. Have the lion be a bus driver. Whatever you want? The more outrageous the better.
If you are still stumped, read the newspaper or the internet for articles on humans or animals. I’ve actually written several stories from the ideas I’ve seen in the newspaper.
Whatever you do, have fun and don’t forget to always, put your best paw forward.
Jennifer Swanson is the award-winning author of the Penny and Rio early reader series.
Jennifer is generously giving away a signed copy of Penny and Rio: The Locked Doghouse Mystery.
Just leave a comment to be entered. You do not have to be a PiBoIdMo participant to enter.
Winner will be chosen randomly at the conclusion of PiBoIdMo!
Writing for Kids (While Raising Them) 