The Cat and the Fiddle

Joan Bransfield Graham, April Halprin Wayland and Janet Wong on the Writing Process

2011-04-29T07:00:00.000-07:00

Hats off to The Opposite of Indifference for hosting today's Poetry Friday Round-Up, and offering such irresistible bookmarks (I have a soft spot for sock monkeys).

As promised, I'm posting Part 2 of my Q and A with noted poets (and fellow Children's Authors Network members) Joan Bransfield Graham, April Halprin Wayland, and Janet Wong.

Q: Using one of your poems as an example, could you briefly describe your writing process- from idea to finished product?

Joan: For my "Sun" poem in FLICKER FLASH I decided to speak as the sun itself--a mask poem. Sometimes the sun would shine down the hallway in my house, hitting me in the face like a big alarm clock--that was my inspiration. The sun, of course, would be loud; it would "shout," "bounce," and "solar power" to create a "dynamite, ring-a-ding day." The letters b, d, p, and t are "plosives" and their sounds add to the impact. It was fun to slip in a bit of scientific information. Then I played with the shape, experimenting with different fonts to achieve the best roundness. Ease of reading is always a consideration. There's a lot going on in two sentences. I read all my poems aloud many times and revise accordingly. I've enjoyed breaking this up and doing it in call-and-response with students. When I ask, "Who needs to be solar powered out of bed in the morning?" a lot of hands shoot up, especially the teachers!

Sun

"From
93,000,000
miles away I bring
you this dynamite, ring-
a-ding day. I'll shout in
your window and bounce
near your head to solar
power you out of
your bed."

--(c) Joan Bransfield Graham

Janet: One good example is "Scute," a poem that I wrote for PoetryTagTime, the eBook anthology that I compiled with Sylvia Vardell. In this book, 30 poets "play tag," writing poems that connect to one another. I was tagged by Mary Ann Hoberman, who wrote a poem about turtles, tortoises, and terrapins--so I knew that I had to write about some aspect of those T creatures. Since I was the last poet, I also wanted to link to the first poet, Jack Prelutsky, who wrote about the moon. Joseph Bruchac's Thirteen Moons on Turtle's Back popped into my mind; you can see what I did with that, below. I wrote over a dozen drafts but could not choose a favorite. Here are the three finalists that I chose to send to a few poet-friends. Take a look and see which you'd choose:

Scute #1

Every once in a while
a word sinks deep
into my mind
and I find myself
thinking about it
in the strangest places.
Today’s word: scute.
It’s a cute word--
or even if it isn’t,
I tell myself it is,
so I’ll remember
how to say it.
Scute.

In school we learned
some people see
thirteen moons
in the big scutes
on a turtle’s back.
I can see moons there,
sure--
but scutes actually
remind me more of
Mom’s cinnamon rolls
squished together
in her favorite oval pan.

And I see
an old tortoise scute
in Grandma’s
kitchen chopping block,
a thick slice of
meat-stained oak
that shows thirty years
of rings.

Scutes everywhere,
even where
you don’t expect
to find them.

Grandpa’s scaly tough
toenails: scutes--
and not-so-cute ones!

All these scute-thoughts
have got me thinking:
time to shed the old
and grow
a fresh new shell.

Scute #2

In school we learned
some people see thirteen moons
in the big scutes on a turtle’s back.
I can see moons there, sure--

but scutes actually remind me more
of Mom’s cinnamon rolls
squished together
in her favorite oval pan.

And I see an old tortoise scute
in Grandma’s kitchen chopping block,
a thick slice of meat-stained oak
that shows thirty years of rings.

Scutes everywhere, even where
you don’t expect to find them:
Grandpa, I think it’s time to shed
a few layers of toenails, don’t you?

Scute #3

Every once in a while
a word digs itself deep
into my mind
and I find it everywhere.

In school we learned
some people see thirteen moons
in the big scutes on a turtle’s back.
I can see moons in the scutes,
but turtle scutes remind me more
of Mom’s cinnamon rolls
squished together
in her favorite oval pan.
I see an old tortoise scute
in our kitchen chopping block,
which is one thick slice of oak
showing fifty years of rings.
Grandpa’s scaly tough toenails:
scutes--and not-so-cute ones!

Tonight all these scute-thoughts
have got me thinking:
time to shed the old
and grow a fresh new shell.

Their opinions were all over the map, of course! Most of the praise was for #2, but despite the praise—or maybe because I wasn't able to "accept" it easily—I kept questioning myself. One poet-friend asked if I could tinker further with the toenail section. After she said that, I knew instantly that this was what I needed to do. You can read the final draft in PoetryTagTime (our 99-cent eBook) or at www.poetrysuitcase.com (in the Poems section, connected to the turtle prop).

April:I just posted MIDNIGHT CAT on my Poetry Month blog.

I wanted to write a mask poem--a poem from the point of view of my cat. She sneaks into the house each night, tiptoes around my sleeping dog, Eli, and sleeps next to me all night long. In the morning before anyone's up, she sneaks back outside.

I love with working with the online Thesaurus.com and several online rhyming dictionaries, including Rhymezone.com. With this poem, I simply slid inside the mind of our cat (whose name, if you must know, is Snot), and then played with rhymes. And played and played and played. I wanted to limit the number of sounds I used in the poem and I wanted to get the 'tude of Snot and how she feels about our dog. Sometimes writing a poem takes a very long time and sometimes it feels like I'm splashing in a mud puddle. This one felt like I was deep in that delicious mud!

A bouquet of thanks to Joan, April and Janet!

May all your months be filled with poetry. Part One of this interview was posted last Friday.

Joan Bransfield Graham, April Halprin Wayland and Janet Wong on Writing Poetry

2011-04-22T07:00:00.000-07:00

Today I'm pleased to present Part One of a Q & A with acclaimed poets Joan Bransfield Graham, April Halprin Wayland and Janet Wong, (my fellow members in the Children's Authors Network). All three have poems out in the brand new Poetry Tag Time ebook.

Happy Poetry Month and Poetry Friday!

What is the challenge of writing poetry for children?

Janet: The hardest part of writing is knowing when to stop, which draft to choose. Most children like bouncy, silly rhymes, so it takes discipline to choose a more subtle approach. It's sort of like choosing between serving chicken nuggets and chicken soup.

April: To get quiet inside and find the real, the true.
To get past the obvious, to not write superficially.
That's the challenge of writing anything. It's all the same.
To be clear but not corny. Be accessible but don't underestimate the audience.

Joan: The challenge of writing poetry for children is to be original, capture a moment in time, create the poem you've never read before, connect with readers and make them say--"Oh, YES!" Each poem should be an act of discovery that surprises the senses, shakes you awake, and startles your imagination.

Which poets are your influences, and what about them do you admire?

Janet: Myra Cohn Livingston nurtured and "created" so many of us; she will forever be The Grandest Teacher of Children's Poets (and the most generous). She would go to great lengths to help new poets connect with editors (once you'd demonstrated some serious effort).

April: I love so many writers. I have to say that I love Janet Wong for her originality, for the often casual, conversational tone of her work. I love Joan Bransfield Graham for her use of language and for always finding a new way to look at things. My mother used to read Ogden Nash to us. In fact, I was named for his poem, "Always Marry an April Girl," which my parents would say aloud to me often. I love the way he invents words and his humor. I love e.e.cummings for his fanciful flights of poetry. I fell in love with Lawrence Ferlinghetti when I was thirteen. I loved his book, A CONEY ISLAND OF THE MIND.

Joan: I've always admired Valerie Worth's use of metaphor and David McCord's and Eve Merriam's wordplay. Richard Wilbur and Mary Oliver provide such stunning imagery, as does Billy Collins, whose perspective and humor are a constant surprise and delight. I was fortunate to be able to study with Myra Cohn Livingston in her Master Class at UCLA--along with Janet and April. What an amazing group--we learned so much from each other!

What is one of the most "autobiographical" poems you've written? Why does it have special meaning for you?

Janet: In GOOD LUCK GOLD (out-of-print, but I will be bringing it back to life soon in Kindle form) there is a poem called "Dad," where I say that my father is like a turtle. When he's mad, he snaps and pulls into his shell. It's becoming quite autobiographical because my own "turtle tendencies" are growing stronger each year--my son can tell you all about that!

April: EVERY one is in some way autobiographical. I've written poetry for many years and one poem a day for over a year...so I have too many to choose from! Whine, whine, whine... : ^ )

Joan: At first I did not realize this, but my books SPLISH SPLASH and FLICKER FLASH are very autobiographical! Growing up on a barrier island along the southern coast of New Jersey, I loved the ocean, boats, the salty air, the sound and rhythm of the waves. What was my first book? Water poems. For years I've studied photography, and I'm always conscious of the interplay of light and shadow. Before digital I developed my own black and white prints in the darkroom, where I saw the effects of light take shape. My next book? Poems about light. Philosopher Immanuel Kant said, "We see things not as they are, but as we are."

Any tips for classroom teachers on how to integrate poetry into the curriculum?

Janet: Here are three tips: 1) Build your own Poetry Suitcase; read why at www.poetrysuitcase.com;

2) Have kids write poems on endangered animals and send them to me via www.OnceUponATiger.com (where you'll find more info about what we're doing to build awareness of endangered animals and how we're donating money to help protect them; a good discussion topic for Earth Day); and

3) please visit our PoetryTagTime.blogspot.com blog where Sylvia Vardell shares amazing poetry tips on a daily basis!

April: Go to TeachingAuthors.com -- six children's authors who also teach writing. On most Fridays, which is "Poetry Friday" in the Kidlitosphere, one of us has posted poetry and a writing tip.

And here's another tip: be present. That's what I've learned in writing a poem a day. I've learned that for me, the way to net today's poem is to tune in: what am I feeling? What is that kid is saying? What does the smell of her peanut butter cookie remind me of?

Ask yourself what feels interesting in class today? Can I condense this into a poetry prompt? Maybe you're teaching cursive writing and you've talked about forming the curve of a letter.

Ask the class to become aware of other curves in class, then brainstorm a list of things with curves on the board (a swimming pool, the arch of a doorway, a macaroni noodle, a cat's tail...).

Then have each student make their own list of 5-10 things that curve...if there's time, let them walk around the school campus looking for ideas or eat their lunches and think about curves, then come back and write their list.

Then have them pick one thing from their list to explore in a poem.

Because rhyming can take you away from what you want to say and force you in another direction, you might ask them to avoid rhyming this time.

Why did they pick that particular item from their list? Ask them to think about why it's interesting and how they can weave details of it into the poem so that it will be interesting to readers.

Then stand on your head when you read their poems aloud.

Just kidding.

Joan: Each poem creates its own small world with vivid imagery and vigorous verbs . . . perfect to tuck into so many areas of the curriculum. Since I do lots of school visits and am a former teacher, I know that my poems in SPLISH SPLASH and FLICKER FLASH have been used to open science units on water and light, to inspire students to write their own concrete poetry, and to spotlight "word art" for art classes. You can find Teacher Idea Sheets on my Web site: www.joangraham.com. I've had many teachers tell me that my shape poems--since they are so visual--work well for their ESL students . . . providing clues to help decode words. I love the "Poetry Break" idea, where someone pops into each classroom to share a poem. You should always have a Poem in Your Pocket, and every month should be Poetry Month! All the lessons poetry teaches enhance any kind of writing you choose to do.

This is Part One of the Q & A. (Joan, April and Janet will talk about their writing process in Part Two, which I'll post next Friday.)

The Poetry Friday round-up is hosted today by Book Aunt.

Erica Silverman on Liberty's Voice: The Story of Emma Lazarus

2011-04-18T00:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome to this week's Nonfiction Monday Round-Up. If you'd like to join in, please leave your name, your link, and a description of your post in the comment section below. I'll add links throughout the day, beginning at 6 am on the West Coast.

Today, an interview with award-winning author Erica Silverman, whose picture book biography, Liberty's Voice: The Story of Emma Lazarus (illustrated by Stacey Schuett) was published this spring.

Why did you choose to write a biography of Emma Lazarus? What drew you, personally, to her story?

There is so much about her that intrigues me and that I admire.

Her passion for poetry from an early age was something I identified with. I was impressed by her strong need to learn and grow as a writer. She was a strong, independent woman, a successful writer in the late nineteenth century – a time when women had little voice in the public sphere and were decades away from winning the vote. And then, despite coming from a life of comfort and privilege, she became a strong voice for social justice. She became an active advocate for immigrants at a time when anti-immigrant sentiment was on the rise. And she was courageous, confronting anti-Semitism head-on in her writing, despite the fact that she traveled in mostly non-Jewish circles and was no doubt aware of the anti-Semitic attitudes among her own friends. She described herself as not being religious and yet had a strong Jewish identity and a strong feeling for Jewish history. She was in so many ways an independent thinker.

How do you think children might relate to Emma?

I hope they see her as a role model, are inspired by the fact that she followed her dream, listened to her “voice within”, and wasn’t afraid to speak out for her beliefs. I hope her willingness to stand up for immigrants' rights empowers them to speak up for their beliefs. I also hope they will see how poetry, which we don’t take very seriously as a culture, can actually be powerful and important. Lazarus’ poem, The New Colossus, quite literally defined the Statue of Liberty as our most well-known and loved national symbol for immigrants.

What was the greatest challenge in writing the book, and how did you overcome it? How long did it take to write?

Years. I started the book in 2002 and it’s just come out. I had a hard time tracking down some of the source materials. My best find was the many memorial letters written at the time of Emma’s death. They were published in a newspaper called the American Hebrew. I found them on microfilm at LAPL.

The other big challenge was narrowing down the story. There was so much about Emma’s life that fascinated me. And there was so much historical background I wanted to include. It was hard to leave so much out, but a picture book has to be very focused.

What advice would you give to writers of picture book biographies?

Find a storyline and stay with it. Find the moments in your subject’s life that are emotional, that have drama – moments of happiness, sadness, anger, failure, success. Include details that evoke the time and place in which your subject lived. You can’t tell everything about that time, but hopefully, you will awaken the reader’s curiosity and arouse a desire to learn more. And of course, in any picture book, you have to write “visually”, to give the artist scenes to illustrate.

Any interesting anecdotes about Emma that didn't make it into the book?

I was fascinated by Emma’s relationship with Ralph Waldo Emerson, which began when she was just eighteen years old. In my book I show how she met him at a dinner party and sent him a book of her own poetry. They embarked on a correspondence in which he mentored her, praising her work while guiding her to improve.

But when Emerson edited an anthology of American poets, he did not include any of her poems. Emma was devastated and furious. What I found interesting is that she wasn’t afraid to let him know, and shot off an anger-fueled letter to him. In my early drafts, I included the scene in which she discovers the anthology’s omission and writes to him. My editor gently pointed out that the book wasn’t about their relationship and that this scene, while dramatic, didn’t really move the story forward. I recognized that he was right.

If Emma were alive today, and you could spend the day with her, where would you take her in your home town of Los Angeles?

We’d take a tour of some of the immigrant neighborhoods – starting with Boyle Heights. Perhaps we could join a rally for immigrant rights. And then we'd get on a plane to New York
and visit the Statue of Liberty.

Erica's next book is Hanukkah Hop, a stamping, hopping, bim-bim-bopping celebration of Hanukkah, complete with a dancing parrot, a live Klezmer band and a girl named Rachel who lives to dance. The retro 50s art is by Steve D'Amico.

Nonfiction Monday Round-up

Book, Dogs, and Frogs has a booktalk/review of Kakapo Rescue: Saving the World's Strangest Parrot.

Wild About Nature is giving away a copy of Flowers Bloom! by Mary Dodson Wade.

Just in time for spring! Check out Summer Birds: The Butterflies of Maria Merian by Margarita Engle, illustrated by Julie Paschkis at Bookmuse. Enjoy!

Jean Little Library a book about cats! Perfect!

Nonfiction Book Blast has Charles and Emma: The Darwins' Leap of Faith for this week.

Fourth Musketeer has a review of Patrick McDonnell's adorable picture book about Jane Goodall, Me...Jane.

Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast shares an interview with illustrator Zachary Pullen and lots of art from Richard Michelson's picture book biography of Lipman Pike.

True Tales and a Cherry on Top features The Brothers Kennedy: John, Robert, and Edward by Kathleen Krull, and an appreciative nod to The Peace Corps.

Lori Calabrese Writes is in with a review of National Geographic's Deadliest Animals.

Bookends Blog is soaring today with two Amelia Earhart books.

At Charlotte's Library , a review of The Thinking Girl's Treasury of Real Princesses.

The Cath in the Hat has a post on Who Scoops Elephant Poo?

Books for Learning covers several books about seeds.

The selection at All About Books With Janet Squires is Piano Starts Here: the young Art Tatum written and illustrated by Robert Andrew Parker. Drop by and listen to this Jazz great at his best.

Simply Science has At the Sea Floor Cafe by Lesley Bulion as part of the Peachtree Publishers blog tour.

Pink Me is in with a review of Mark Kurlansky's World Without Fish. (Mmm, fish! Fish from certified sustainable fisheries, of course!)

Great Kid Books shares Ask Me Everything, a new DK book. Mary Ann Scheuer says that her students love the visuals, the facts and the way it's all organized by questions they can ask themselves and each other.

Shelf-employed reviews two great new offerings from the talented duo of Steve Jenkins and Robin Page: Time to Eat and Time for a Bath.

Child Development & Picture Books: An Interview with Joanne Rocklin

2011-03-21T07:15:00.000-07:00

In preparing to teach a writing class, I've been thinking about some of the common problems of student manuscripts. Many are too descriptive and internal, many are "slight" stories, or they don't have "universal appeal."

Would a familiarity with child development help beginning writers with their picture book stories? Acclaimed author/ teacher Joanne Rocklin, who has a doctorate in psychology, graciously answered my questions on this topic.

How could a knowledge of child development benefit a picture book writer?

Our main goal as authors is to delight, move, and envelop kids in a world they can escape to--in other words, get them to love books. And the easiest way to do this is to understand the children themselves - their humor, their conflicts and needs, and their particular intellectual and social development.

What kinds of books meet the MAIN needs of the pre-school and early elementary age child?

BOOKS FOR TODDLER AND PRESCHOOL: As authors, we want to enhance the conditioning process by which the book remains something warm and comforting and wonderful, (a "transitional object" like a blankie or favorite toy) simply by its association with the parent who is reading and holding the child. What kind of book does this?

-Books which emphasize the senses, using bright, simple images so the baby can focus. Tasty, textured or smelly ones, like Pat the Bunny (Kunhardt, 1998)

-Books emphasizing Repetition, Rhythm and Rhyme, to give the child a comforting, secure feeling, making the world seem less chaotic. There is a security and increased sense of control when the rhyme and refrain reappears. The child is learning about "object permanence", a phrase coined by developmental psychologist Jean Piaget-- that objects still exist, even when out of sight.

-by the end of this period, Piaget's sensorimotor period, the toddler can hold an image in her mind for longer periods, and can anticipate what will happen next. And that's what's needed to understand story, and leads us to

PICTURE BOOKS: These books also reflect the developmental needs of the child (ages 3 and up):

-They are short! They should be able to be read in one sitting, because of the child's relatively short attention span.

-They are child-centered, i.e. there's a simple plot based on everyday situations in the child's life.

-There is a "rehearsal for separation" as defined by E.M. Roberts in The Children's Picture Book: the parent is often in the background, but nearby, as the child has adventures, as in Where the Wild Things Are (Sendak)

-Piaget and others have shown, and parents intuitively know, that children endow inanimate objects and animals with feelings and opinions (animism), that they believe the whole world thinks and feels as they do (egocentrism) and that they believe in magic. So it's natural for the child to accept storybook characters who are animals or fantasy creatures, and even anthropormorphic creatures (The Little Engine that Could/Piper, 1978)

- BUT-the main character is almost always a child in disguise! Animals behavior is species-appropriate (eg. bears hibernate) but with child-like feelings and needs. Mice are popular--they are small, cute, scared and mischievousness, and kids identify. Even main characters who are adults are child-like (Strega Nona/dePaola). All this disguise gives the listener some distance from the weighty issues brought up.

-And the issues are weighty: separation, fear of loss, sibling rivalry, shyness, and many more. There should be a conflict that the main character solves herself; nothing is solved by coincidence, magic, a parent. This allows for growth by the character, and thus the identifying reader. (eg. Henke's Julius, The Baby of the World.)

-Humor in the p.b. reflects what the child himself finds funny at this age: slapstick, surprise, silliness. (Hattie and the Fox/Mem Fox)

-Endings are important: funny, surprising, quiet--but there must be a sense of closure. The adult doesn't want to send the child off into the scary dark void called Sleep with loose story-endings.

-There should be a melding of words and pictures. The words have to be lovely, but spare, with few adjectives and lots of descriptive verbs, to leave room for the illustrator. The child is a beginning reader at this stage, and is learning to go back and forth between words and pictures as he enters the next stage--reading on his own.

What was one of your favorite books to read when you were a child? Why do you think it was meaningful to you at that time in your life?

My favorite books of all time were middle grades, so that's what I write today. Little Women and especially, Anne of Green Gables (I'm a former Canadian) are imprinted in my memory.

I sold my latest book ONE DAY AND ONE AMAZING MORNING ON ORANGE STREET, I was told, because it was a quintessential middle grade. I like to begin a middle grade novel on "a day that is different", and in this book a troubling orange plastic cone appears on the street, as does a mysterious stranger.

Middle grade is all about character and introspection, lots of introspection, and I love writing about that. I have several characters in my new book, each focused on their own particular conflict, but also worried about that orange cone, an old orange tree, and that stranger. I had fun changing points of view--something you can't do in a younger work. But older readers like peeking into the heads and homes of several characters and can keep everyone's perspective in mind. I even have the old orange tree telling its story, and get inside the mind of a dog, a rodent, and children from other eras.

In a middle grade, you don't have to disguise or distance the reader from the conflict--it's right out there in the open. I laid out all the conflicts and was marvelously surprised and moved when everything came together at the end, and everyone's best self was realized --that's the scary magic of writing a novel--it does come together at the end, but you don't often have the ending until you get there. I think it's fair to say that a picture book author needs to have a clearer sense of the ending almost from the beginning...but that's a writing issue and not necessarily a child developmental one!

Any suggestions for reference books or websites about this?

I've mentioned Piaget. I just love his work and he seems to have started it all. Then there are lots of other books out there that codify the age needs and characteristics. Brazelton, The Gessell Institute (Ilg, Ames and Baker's book). I'm sure there are hundreds of more current ones, but not necessarily better ones.

Thanks so much, Joanne!

School Visit at Glenoaks

2011-03-20T10:30:00.000-07:00

On Friday I had a smashing good time at Glenoaks Elementary, along with authors and illustrators Lisze Bechtold, Naomi Howland and Amy Koss.

We did classroom presentations in the grades most appropriate for our books- an ideal format. I enjoy the intimacy, and speaking to my target audience. One of my main points: something you love right now, as a child, might make you famous someday.

Dino host Rex Green made a surprise appearance. Much to the amusement of even the fourth graders.

Merci beaucoup, Glendale Assistance League, for inviting me once again !

Nonfiction for Children's Hearts and Minds

2011-03-14T07:00:00.000-07:00

One of the most frequently cited examples of the use of child psychology in fiction picture books is Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are. Max's vivid imagination allows him to express rage/rebellion against discipline, as well as need for mother love.

Non-fiction picture books can reach young readers' hearts in the a similar way. In A Seed is Sleepy, Dianna Hutts Aston alludes to the struggle for independence, one of the main challenges of early childhood.

Kids will recognize themselves in Aston's anthropormorphized seeds, which are small, vulnerable, naked, growing, in need of nurture. The book begins "A seed is sleepy. It lies there, tucked inside its flower, on its cone, or beneath the soil. Snug. Still." Like a child in bed.

The seed is needy, like a growing child. It's thirsty and hungry. Several lines suggest a youngster's need to separate. The seed will be "cozy" until it's ready to grow. It may take its time. Then "the seed is adventurous" for " It must strike out on its own..." and "push up up up..."

Once it finds an ideal place to put down roots, the seed behaves like a mother, giving the baby plant an embryo or seed coat to keep it warm, and seed leaves for its first meal.

A few other comments about technique. Aston's text, a series of attributes about seeds (illustrated in graceful watercolors by Sylvia Long), is full of rhythm and repetition. The imagery (including freckles and a child's shoelaces) is kid friendly. In the emphatic finish that circles back to the beginning, the sleepy seed has breakfast and a drink of water, then awakens in a crowd of vivid sunflowers.

I've long been a fan of Eric Carle's The Tiny Seed, on a comparable subject. While Aston combines poetic language and factual material, Carle creates a dramatic narrative. His protagonist must overcome many perils on its journey to fulfillment- becoming a flower. Kids will root for the tiny, vulnerable hero making its way alone in the world. Both books hint at a growing child's struggles.

If you're a picture book author who is not already familiar with childhood ages and stages (both personal and social) consider researching the subject. It may help you create metaphors and narrative that connect intimately with young readers.

E-books vs. Traditional Books: The Kids Speak

2011-02-02T18:48:00.000-08:00

Back from a scenic and stimulating week at Author Go Round in Santa Barbara, where I had an unexpected treat: a discussion with book-loving students (mostly grades 4 - 8, around 100 per day,) about the pros and cons of traditional vs electronic formats.

Bruce Hale, Joe Cepeda, Amy Goldman Koss, and me
along with Rose Koller and Steve Keithley of the SBCEO.

An overwhelming majority spoke wistfully of the tactile pleasures of traditional books. They liked holding old fashioned books in their hands, looking at their covers, rifling through the pages to see how much they'd read, they even liked smelling them. Paper books made it easier to "get into" the story (the glare of the electronic screen was a distraction). They liked keeping books on their shelves, looking at their spines, holding on to them as a keepsake. They didn't have to worry about charging, losing or damaging them. Some said we shouldn't "modernize" everything, and some lamented the closing of bookstores that might come with a total transition to ebooks.

A couple of students said they liked conventional books for novels, but ebooks for other kinds of material. The minority of kids who preferred electronic devices mentioned the convenience of having their whole library in one place, and the ability to immediately look up words.

This was a small sample, I know, but it blew me away. I had assumed that children raised in a culture obsessed with electronic media would be uncritical of it. When it comes to the experience of reading fiction, this group of kids detected a qualitative difference between digital and traditional formats. I hope publishers continue to give them a choice.

Book Trailers Day 5: An Interview with April Halprin Wayland

2011-01-21T07:15:00.000-08:00

And so we wrap up Book Trailer Week at TC & TF.

The joys and perils of having students make your book trailer. Today author April Halprin Wayland shares her experiences.

What questions should an author ask herself before making (or having made) a trailer?

How much am I willing to pay?
Do I want to farm it out or do it myself?
Do I have the time to do it myself?
Do I have the skills to do a good job myself?
Whose book trailers do I admire?
What will make viewers want to buy my book?

What goals did you set for yourself for the trailer for New Year At The Pier?

I wanted the book trailer up at least a month before my book came out.
I wanted it to be short.
I wanted it to capture the warmth and the essence of the holiday which this book describes.
I wanted it to be original...to stand out from the crowd.

Please note that I was very lucky. I'd hired a high school student to do a previous book trailer. Beware of high school students! He was terrific and truly original and I love the trailer...but he created half of it on his girlfriend's computer...and then they broke up. Then he got sick. Then there were finals. It came out in the summer instead Poetry Month (April), which was my target. It was a good experiment and learning experience!

I knew Chase Gregory, then a freshman at Tufts, through her parents. She is media savvy and smart and original and she gets the picture very quickly. (Bonus: she's also really wonderful)
It's a Jewish book and she's not Jewish...yet she captured the essence of this celebration beautifully.

She found music that I mention in the book. It was perfect, so we contacted the Klezmer musicians who played it and paid them to use their music. We also link to their website. She could have gotten some generic music for free, but this was absolutely the right music to use.

I literally handed her the picture book which she hadn't read and said, "Make me a trailer, Chase. Do anything you want." She filmed our local pier and the ocean and gulls...and combined those live action images and the music with illustrations from the book (which we got permission to use from the illustrator and our publisher).

The first one was a bit too long, so I asked her to do a shorter version...I've posted them both on my website. I love-love-LOVE the trailer.

My trailer for Tyrannosaurus Math? It was made by film school senior Jesse Johnson, using Final Cut Pro, audio from an online music library collection, and her considerable natural talents.

Thanks to April, and all the interviewees who took the time to answer my questions. I've learned a lot!

Book Trailers Day 4: An Interview with Mary Ann Fraser

2011-01-20T07:15:00.000-08:00

Are you thinking about making your first book trailer yourself? Today author/illustrator Mary Ann Fraser tells us how she went about making the video for the Ogg and Bob easy readers, which she also illustrated. The books were written by her son Ian.

How did you learn to make trailers?

I first learned about making book trailers from David Boeshaar at a Ventura/Santa Barbara retreat on social networking. He was great at making the process easy to understand, but a lot of it is just digging in and playing with the software to learn all you can do.

What goals did you set for yourself? What questions should an author ask herself about her book before making the trailer?

Basically the goal was to attract attention to my book (s) without giving too much away, and the final product needed to be two minutes or less. I also knew I wanted to make something a little different than what was already being done, but was somewhat limited by my video equipment, especially when it came to sound.

I think it's important to plan around what you know how to do and what you can afford. There are copyright free music downloads out there, some for free, some not. It's wise to figure out your budget from the beginning. I recommend writing a script before you start.

Were there any surprises or challenges along the way?

The most challenging part for me was figuring out how to get the video from the camera to my computer. I finally had to load it onto my husband's computer and then he sent it to mine. You can do voice-overs with an inexpensive headset and mike, but the sound will be compromised. The better the equipment, the better the final product.

What kind of software did you use?

I use Windows Movie maker which came with my computer. It is very user friendly.

Can you recommend places on the web for linking trailers?

Amazon's Author Central now allows you to attach a video to your author profile page. You might also look at http://www.bookbuzzr.com, http://www.squidoo.com, http://www.trailerspy.com, or http://www:vodpod.com.

Thanks for sharing, Mary Ann.

TC&TF dedicates this week to book trailers, to celebrate the debut of my own for Tyrannosaus Math (see sidebar), created by the young and talented Jesse Johnson.
Tomorrow: An interview with author April Halprin Wayland.

Book Trailers Day 3: An Interview with Tina Nichols Coury

2011-01-19T07:15:00.000-08:00

Today, TC & TF welcomes Tina Nichols Coury, author, blogger, and producer of many book trailers.

How did you learn to make trailers?

In 2008, my husband, Al Coury, received a lifetime achievement award from a heritage foundation in Washington D.C. and needed to supply a ten-minute video about his career. I wasn’t happy with the videos that a production company had done for the organization. My control freak self rose to the surface and I decided to go take classes and learn to do it myself.

Could you give an example of a trailer you admire?

The trailer for “The Hunger Games.” It is powerful, short and leaves you wanting to read the book. Also the trailer for “The Graveyard Book.” I had interviewed Neil Gaiman on my blog after he won the Newbery and was tickled with the animated trailer that he narrated. 

What questions should an author ask themselves about their book before making the trailer?

Number one: can I afford a professional trailer? If you can, make sure the trailer producer READS your book.(You'd be amazed at the stories I've heard about how they "didn't get it.") There are many different companies that specialize in creating video trailers. You can spend as little as fifty dollars for a basic one or up to fifteen hundred for an all out animated version.

But if you have a knack and the proper equipment, you can produce a trailer yourself. Start with a short script, three sentences long. Make it a tease and not the whole story. Next, search for the perfect music to set the tone. It must be royalty free! I know of horror stories where people had to pay royalty fees when their kid made a trailer using licensed music. There are websites that specialize in royalty free music - Music Bakery, Royalty Free Music.com, and Beatsuite, just to name a few.

You want your trailer to be unique so it stands out. Make sure the trailer is short: 40 seconds to 1:20 max. Use the cover, your photo and the publishers name to set you apart from the self-published. Publish it on You Tube using a work in progress title, like "A-13." DO NOT USE YOUR BOOK NAME AT THIS POINT! You risk having a ghost trailer when you delete it for the approved version. Send the video to your agent and editor for approval or suggestions. Make the changes and sit on it for a week, as you would with a rewrite. When there is approval on all fronts, name it.

What kind of challenges have you faced in producing trailers?

The challenges usually arise from the clients. Most production houses limit editorial changes to three for a trailer. I am into making the client happy and have at times done as many as ten changes when the agent and editors get involved.   

What kind of software do you use?

I use a 17-inch Mac book Pro, with Motion Four and Finale Cut Studio.

  Can you recommend places on the web for linking trailers?

Be sure to post your book trailer everywhere you can: your website, Blazing Trailers, Teacher Tube, Amazon, You Tube, Vimeo…just to name a few. If you do a blog tour, start it off with the debut of your book trailer.

Thanks for all those tips, Tina!

TC&TF dedicates this week to book trailers, to celebrate the debut of my own for Tyrannosaurus Math (see sidebar), created by the young and talented Jesse Johnson.

Tomorrow: children's book author/illustrator Mary Ann Fraser tells us about making her first trailer.

Book Trailers Day 2: An Interview with Tom Lichtenheld

2011-01-18T07:30:00.000-08:00

Today I have the pleasure of sharing my interview with Tom Lichtenheld, who illustrated and collaborated with Chris Barton on their trailer for Shark vs. Train. The video won School Library Journal's Trailee award (Publisher/Author created for elementary readers PreK-6) last year.

Additionally, Tom handled production of the trailer for Amy Krouse Rosenthal's Duck! Rabbit! He did the storyboard, and hired a Flash artist and music house.

You're an experienced art director. How did that help you in coming up with the concept for the trailers?

As much as the technical skills, what I bring from advertising is the understanding that every execution needs a strong idea at its center.

What goals did you set for each trailer? Could you describe your process in coming up with the scripts?

I try to entertain the viewer and charm them into finding out more about the book. What I do not try to do is recreate the book in video form. The only time this worked was with Duck!Rabbit!, but that book was already set up more or less as a storyboard, so it worked well. Otherwise I think it's better to convey the personality of the book and just give a hint of the storyline.

Regarding the "personality" of the books. If you could tell us what, specifically, you were trying to capture for those two, that would be helpful.

For Shark vs. Train, we were definitely going for zany. Shark and Train are blindly competitive and goofily inept, so they come off as a couple of blow-hards that are more likely to be laughed at than feared.

Any surprises or challenges along the way?

The budgets are teeny-tiny, but it's a good reminder that a powerful idea is more important than expensive production techniques. For instance, the soundtrack for the Duck!Rabbit! trailer was recorded in my nephew's closet, using a Flip camera as a tape recorder.

What software/hardware was used?

The Shark vs. Train trailer uses a lot of stock footage, and Flash is great for animation.

How would you describe an effective book trailer?

Not overly slick, doesn't take itself too seriously, and is interesting enough to live on its own. The pace and rhythm should definitely reflect the book.

Thanks, Tom.

TC&TF dedicates this week to book trailers, to celebrate the debut of my own (see sidebar), created by the young and talented Jesse Johnson. Tomorrow: an interview with Tina Nichols Coury, blogger- children's book author and trailer producer.

Book Trailers: A Librarian's Viewpoint

2011-01-17T12:26:00.000-08:00

This week, TC&TF runs a series of posts on book trailers, in honor of my very first!

Trailer created by Jesse Johnson at johnsonejesse@gmail.com

Today, we hear from librarian and book trailer devotee Charna Gross of Sinai Akiba Academy.

Do you think trailers are effective forms of advertising? How are you exposed to the many trailers that are out there? Any sites that you regularly visit?

Yes! Kids are used to music videos, Youtube videos and movie previews. Book trailers speak their language. I look at book trailers that are mentioned on LM-Net, and I look them up on Youtube. I like http://kidlitbooktrailers.ning.com/ and here is a site that gives a lot of info on how to make book trailers: http://www.darcypattison.com/marketing/book-trailers/

Could you give a few examples of well-executed trailers, and tell us why they might persuade you to read the books they promote?

I really liked the Found book trailer so much that I ordered the book: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5BC3hKlon8&feature=related I also really enjoyed the trailer for the Secret of the Scarlett Stone at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsk-ofw9ico. They are exciting visually and musically, and describe the book well without giving anything away.

Conversely, what kinds of trailers do not pique your interest?

If a trailer uses music that doesn’t fit the story or doesn't provide enough supporting text, it doesn't work for me. Another observation is that trailers shouldn't be too static. A trailer is meant to move.

How have you been using trailers at your school?

I have used them mostly as student-made products, either for a report on a book that the class is reading or for individuals to create their own trailers on books they want to promote. I have an educators’ account on Animoto, so it is limitless in terms of students making their own trailers.

What kind of observations/feedback have you gotten from the students about trailers?

Students inevitably want to check out books they’ve seen trailers of. Creating the trailers adds to their tech skills. They really enjoy using Animoto, but that is not the only way to do it.

Thanks for giving us your input, Charna.

Tomorrow: an interview with Tom Lichtenheld, illustrator of Shark vs. Train.

The Omnivorous Reader

2011-01-04T18:39:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year,

TC&TF is back after a long unannounced hiatus, during which time drafts for bio have been written/rewritten, and hands been wrung. Sigh.

To cheer up and keep limber, I've also been reading a lot, all kinds of things. One of my resolutions is to start writing down and organizing the bits I like. For now I'll just share a few on the old blog!

From Five Surprisingly Effective Dinner Party Riddles That I Can Personally Guarantee
By Dan Kennedy (McSweeney):

Q: What's the difference between a knife fight and a dinner party?
 A: About six more glasses of this wine.

From When You Reach Me, a middle grade novel by Rebecca Stead:

"The girls at school had been hurting each others' feelings for years before Sal left me and I was forced to really notice them."

From Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins:

"I want them to water ski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to do is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it."

From Arthur & George, a novel by Julian Barnes:

(An excerpt from a dinner party, where the hostess senses the "male restiveness" at the far end of the table)

"They were eager for the curtained study, the poked fire, the lit cigar, the glass of brandy, and the opportunity, in as civilized a way as possible, to tear great lumps out of one another."

From the short story Distant Relations by Orhan Pamuk (published in The New Yorker)

(This is what happens after the main character, who is soon to be married, has a conversation with Fusun, a beautiful salesgirl:)

"Then, for a moment, I paused: my ghost had left my body and I was now, in some corner of Heaven, embracing Fusun and kissing her."

From the short story Everything I Know About My Family On My Mother's Side by Nathan Englander (published in Esquire)

(The main character's girlfriend has left him)
She is gone, and she will be surprised that I'm alive to write this-because she, and everyone who knows me, didn't think I'd survive it. That I can't be alone for a minute. That I can't manage a second of silence. A second of peace. That to breathe, I need a second set of lungs by my side.

In other news: I'll be teaching a six week class called "Writing the Picture Book: An Intermediate Workshop" for UCLA Extension on Saturday afternoons beginning April 2.

May your new year be filled with fabulous books- whether you read them, or write them!

Picture Book Biographies: Story Arcs

2010-11-15T07:51:00.000-08:00

I've finished the main research phase for my picture book biography. On a bulletin board I've mounted all kinds of photos and illustrations- not just of my subject, but of people he knew and milieus he would have been familiar with. I keep going back to the Internet to look at photos of the places where he lived.

Now the question is: How much of my subject's life will my story cover? Will it be comprehensive enough for children to use in writing biographical reports? If that's the case, I'd need to include details about birth, marriage, homes and death- no matter how unfortunate the circumstances.

Another story arc might cover childhood, through the person's "breakthrough." My book Dreamer from the Village starts with Chagall's birth, and continues til his art is first recognized and becomes popular. On the last page the story fastforwards many years later, to his exhibition at the Louvre when he was on old man.

Some "picture bo ok biographies" treat an even shorter period, perhaps a pivotal episode in childhood (Alan Schroeder's Ragtime Tumpie recalls the first time a very young Josephine Baker appeared on stage.) Other bio's plunge in during a
a fruitful phase of the subject's career (Action Jackson by Jan Greenberg, for example, begins with Jackson Pollack as a practicing artist)

Still others may describe only a few exhilarating moments during a famous person's life (The brief narrative in Home Run: The Story of Babe Ruth by Robert Burleigh covers part of a baseball game). These shorter bio's often include backmatter, sidebars (Peter Sis's Starry Messenger), or other ways of communicating additional information. (In Burleigh's book, this is cleverly done with fact-laden baseball cards.)

The shorter narratives may be written lyrically, so they convey more impact. The young reader may emotionally connect with the subject, and be inspired to learn more about him.

So many possibilities. Once I know the story arc, I'll have to decide on plot points (the acts and then the scenes), plus how much - and what kind- of details/anecdotes to include. The negative space, what is left out, will be as important as what is put in.

Whatever I decide, it's been a great pleasure, over all these months, getting to know the poignant and quirky particulars about "my guy" and his times.

Today's Non-Fiction Monday round up is over at In Need of Chocolate.

A big thanks to California Readers for choosing Tyrannosaurus Math to be in the 2011 California Collection, a recommended choice for school libraries.

What Makes an Award-winning Nonfiction Book for Children?

2010-10-19T16:25:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, Alexis O'Neil l, Mary Ann Fraser and I presented a talk on Funding Author Visits at the CRA (California Reading Association) conference in Riverside.

Here we are with the Barnes & Noble booksellers.

One of the highlights of the event was a session introducing this year's CRA's Eureka! Awards for Nonfiction. Coordinators Sandra Yoon, Helen Foster James, and Armin Schulz gave us insights into why the books were chosen.

Factors included:

1. Tie in with the curriculum, and/or with excellent fiction (Larry Dane Brimner's Birmingham Sunday, for example, would pair up nicely with The Watsons Go to Birmingham: 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis). Several titles were recommended for Women's History Month.

2. Innovative, appealing book design and illustration.

3. Unusual take on biography (The Extraordinary Mark Twain (According to Susy)).

4. Relevant for a range of grade levels.

5. Dramatic narrative (or poetry) was enhanced by factoid sidebars (in one case including photos).

6. Useful, accessible glossary of terms.

7. Subject matter pertinent to their students' cultural background.

8. Inspirational story with kid appeal (Pierre the Penguin).

It was a pleasure to learn what leading educators value in nonfiction, and to hear so much excitement and praise for it. Kudos to the committee for all the time and thought they spent on bestowing these awards.

Blog Stop for Ogg and Bob

2010-10-07T00:01:00.000-07:00

The Cat & The Fiddle happily joins the blog tour for Ogg and Bob by Ian Fraser, with illustrations by Mary Ann Fraser.

Ian reinvents the easy reader "buddy genre" with these charmingly illustrated books ("Meet Mammoth" and "Life With Mammoth") about two cave guys and their pet. The cave buddies' naivete and misadventures should elicit lots of laughs, and their rudimentary speech ("Me wash feet ten days ago") is just right for decoding practice. Another plus is the exotic, distant setting- it's a place children rarely get to visit in fiction. Ogg and Bob delivers fresh meat to the easy reader crowd- and they're going to eat it up.

I had lots of questions for the talented son and mother team behind this book.

The idea of using early man with simplistic speech for an early reader is brilliant...how did that idea come about? What were the turning points (the most important events) on the road to publication?

IAN: Well I'm pleased that you thought that the simplistic speech was brilliant. The idea was mostly a result of long hours spent reading all of Gary Larson's The Far Side comic collection, Bill Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes, and a whole lot of boredom. I simply thought that cavemen were funny. The book started out as a small story that I wrote when I had nothing to do. It was the encouragement of my mother and the lack of something to do for my senior project in high school that prompted me to try publishing it.

Why the fascination with cave men? Tell us a little about playing "cave man" when you were a boy.

IAN: I suppose pre-history was a large part of my childhood. Or some semblance of it was anyway. I always loved dinosaurs, and there was always a need for hapless victims of these rampaging beasts. I guess there's probably something deeper about getting in touch with our primeval selves or something else silly like that, but the truth is I thought that it would be funny to use cavemen at the time.

Are you more of an Ogg or a Bob- how so?

IAN: I'm not really sure. I see myself as a combination of both really. Their interactions and personalities are probably similar to how I would interact with myself if I were cloned in some secret government base, tagged, and let loose in the wild.

Keeping in mind the format of the easy reader, what were your goals in writing each of the little stories--(for example, it had to have repetition, physical humor, etc)

IAN: The stories weren't really written for a easy reader format. They were actually written more for something like a cross between a screenplay and a comic book. I wrote them to be as entertaining and as hilarious as possible. When writing, all I did was try to make each scene as funny as possible. Most of my editing however, was to piece everything together and make it flow in some semblance of a story.

What advice would you give someone whose illustrator is their mom?

IAN: Be happy for it. Being able to communicate exactly how I saw the story whenever I wanted was a blessing. We could exchange ideas simply by walking into the next room. I don't know if Ogg and Bob could have succeeded this well if I had someone else illustrate it for me.

Now, some questions for Mary Ann. Did you encourage Ian's fascination with cave men when he was young?

MARY ANN: Not really. Ian was a voracious reader and had a fascination for all kinds of subjects when he was younger. He loved humor, particularly Gary Larson's The Far Side, so I think there was fodder there for sure.

Could you tell us about the process of creating the characters? Why did you choose blue for Mug (their pet mammoth)?

MARY ANN: It took a lot of sketching to develop Ogg and Bob. I wanted them to be distinct as individuals and to project very child-like qualities despite the underarm hair and five o'clock shadows. I think of them as the Lucy and Ethel, Laurel and hardy of neanderthals. Mug's blue hue was actually the suggestion of Margery Cuyler at Marshall Cavendish. The publisher had decided to do the books in full color, but the art was predominantly browns, a bit boring, so we spiced it up. Ian has had a difficult time with the blue. He likes things to be based in fact, but that's a mechanical engineering student for you. I like how it visually punches up the book and informs the reader not to take this from a scientific point of view.

What are the challenges of illustrating an easy reader as opposed to a standard picture book?

MARY ANN: First of all, there's simply way more art. Keeping the characters consistent and the art varied is that much more of a challenge. Also, the books are a smaller trim size than I am used to, so the gutter has a bigger impact and compositions need to be kept simple.

What were the joys and tribulations of working with your son?

MARY ANN: It was mostly all joy. Ian cracked me up a lot of the time when we would be talking about the project. A couple late nights we bantered ideas back and forth about Ogg and Bob's possible misadventures until we were in hysterics. Invariably he did his own thing and I really respect that. I think staying out of it when he was working on the book for his senior project was the most challenging part for me --parents weren't allowed to be mentors. Following the two book offer from Marshall Cavendish he had to expand the stories he had and then write three additional ones, and he only had his winter break from college in which to do it. I think that was a bit daunting, so I tried to be the cheerleader. (You can read supportive nag here.) Once he wrapped his head around it, though, I was amazed at how quickly he pulled it off. I hope he continues to enjoy writing as much as I have. Rumor tells me that he has more adventures for Ogg and Bob rattling around in his head when he's not reading quantum physics or studying material properties. Now if I could just get him to call home more often.

For each day of the tour Mary Ann Fraser will be giving away an original piece of art from Ogg and Bob to a randomly selected commenter. So follow the tour and be sure to comment to enter. "Winners of the "Ogg and Bob Art Giveaway" will be announced Monday, October 18 at www.maryannfraser.wordpress.com/.

Not Your Mother's Picture Book Bio

2010-09-27T10:12:00.000-07:00

Many years ago, I checked Jonah Winter's Diego out of the library for my young children. The book begins

"Deep in the mountains of Mexico there was a town called Guanajuato. And in Guanajuato there were two happy parents. They were happy because they had twin sons, Diego and Carlos."

Diego falls ill and is taken to an Indian healer, who has "magical things" in her small hut. What a delight it was to discover, a few pages later, that this simple text reminiscent of folktales was in fact a biography of Diego Rivera.

Diego was published in 1991 (and it inspired me to write my first p.b. bio, Dreamer from the Village: The Story of Marc Chagall). Since then, more and more authors have been bending the genre.

Consider the range of approaches and tones in the openings of following picture book biographies:

"You gotta be kidding! You never heard of Sandy Koufax? He was only the greatest lefty who ever pitched in the game of baseball. Well, for six years he was, anyway. From 1961 to 1966, almost no one could hit the guy. The mighty Mickey Mantle, one of the greatest power hitters of all time:whiff! After the Mick struck out one day, he turned to the catcher and said, "what the heck was THAT?"
-You Never Heard of Sandy Koufax?! by Jonah Winter and Andre Carrilho

The narrator of the book is an anonymous veteran teammate. Note his lively, period language, and how he involves the reader/listener (as did Laurie Halse Andersen, earlier, in Thank You, Sarah.)

Carole B oston Weatherford's biography of Jesse Owens, written in the second person, puts the reader in the position of addressing (and rooting for) the athlete:

"Go from cotton fields to city sidewalks/from sickly child to keen competitor/ from second class citizen to first place finisher/Go, Jesse, go. Trounce Jim Crow/ Run as fast as your feet can fly/ As far as your dreams will reach." - Jesse Owens: Fastest Man Alive

An unusual and impassioned way of telling the dramatic story of the African American who captured four medals at Hitler's 1936 Berlin Olympics.

M.T. Anderson begins his story of Erik Satie with poetry and mystery:

"Erik Satie/was born by the sea/ in the village of Honfleur/on the coast of France./ It was 1866. "I was born/very young/ in a very old world," said Satie once. / And he never grew up/but was always a child/ with an old man's smile."

Anderson's rhythmic language, full of quirky imagery, captures the essence of this eccentric musician.

Expressive language can lend poignancy to bios written in the traditional format. This lyrical passage introduces us to a devoted, little known nature painter:

"There was once a man whose love of nature was as wide as the world. There was once an artist who needed to paint as much as he needed to breathe. There was once an islander who lived in a cottage at the edge of Mississippi, where the sea meets the earth and the sky. His name is Walter Anderson. He may be the most famous American artist you've never heard of."-The Secret World of Walter Anderson by Hester Bass.

Authors of picture book biographies have more choices than ever. They can experiment with innovative storytelling techniques-invented narrators, interactivity, or unconventional formats. They can entertain young readers with humor, or touch their hearts with poetry.

As I begin writing my upcoming bio, I'll ask myself what tone, what approach, what "voice" best conveys the story I want to tell. How can I snare the young reader?

I also need to decide when to begin and end my story. But more on that next time. For more posts on the subject, check the labels to the right.

The Poetry of Picture Book Biographies

2010-09-13T11:10:00.000-07:00

Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart
Wordsworth

This is as true with picture book biographies as it is for fiction. Effective writing is all about summoning and expressing emotion. Especially when it comes to capturing the zeal and commitment of the man or woman you are portraying.

Enjoy the vigorous prose from these picture book biographies:

"His eyes move up and down, back and forth. With light steps, he follows the sweep of his brush. He stops and a pool of paint pauses. Paint, paint and more paint, dripping, pouring, flinging. "The painting has a life of its own. I try to let it come through." Jan Greenberg & Sandra Jordan's Action Jackson.

Note the upbeat rhythms. Feel the movement of the up/down/back/forth. Repetition creates emphasis. Hear those explosive p's as the paint hits the canvas.

"Colors came to life like actors on a stage! One color stepped away. Another popped forward. Colors became softer and louder...Colors even disappeared! Josef kept making painting after painting of squares...With each painting he proved that colors don't stand alone-they interact! 'I can kill the most brilliant red by putting it with violet,' he said." Natasha Wing's An Eye for Color: The Story of Josef Albers.

Metaphors create imagery. Repetition for emphasis. Varying sentence length creates interest- and short sentences are more energetic. Note the contrast: "colors don't do stand alone-they interact!

"When the billboard came into view that afternoon, what the brothers saw astonished them. From more than a mile away, it looked like the billboard was on fire! When they got up close, the Switzers didn't find any flames. Instead they discovered something even more exciting. It was just like those silk samples Bob has seen in his backyard in Berkeley: even without the ultraviolet light on, the billboard was glowing-glowing bright orange in the setting sun." Chris Barton's The Day Glo Brothers

The power of simile, and emphatic words/phrases like "astonished" "from more than a mile away" and "even more exciting." Repetition. Contrast between sentences 3 and 4.

Poetic language enhances the drama of the story's climax.

As I continue to research my subject, I'll be looking for actions that reveal his ardor for his work. Did it start in his childhood? What were his inspirations? What lengths did he go to accomplish his goals? What obstacles did he have to overcome? Did he ever describe his love for his work?

Once you feel a deep emotional connection to the person you're writing about, once your imagination is truly engaged, the evocative language will pour forth. Capturing your subject's passion is one of the greatest challenges- and rewards- of writing a picture book biography.

2010-09-08T10:15:00.001-07:00

In celebration of Darcy Pattison's Random Acts of Publicity Week, I recommend The Rooster Prince of Breslov by Ann Redisch Stampler, illustrated by Eugene Yelchin.

The book is a feast for the eye and ears- a blend of witty, lucid storytelling:

"In Breslov, there lived a prince who had more than he wanted. When he was hungry for a slice of bread, he got a slice of cake dripping with honey. When he asked for a raisin, he was given a silver bowl of candied plums. When his eyes rested on a pony or a strudel or a bird's nest or a golden bowl, it was bundled up and brought to him before he even blinked."

and satirical, eye-popping illustrations.

Ann offers a fresh take on this well-known Yiddish parable, about a pampered prince who starts behaving like a rooster til he spends several days with a wise old man. (The sage acts like a rooster to gain the boy's trust.) Though children will be amused by the antics of the strutting, clucking pair, the folktale is much more than that. Ann has impressively re-visioned it as a coming of age story. The prince has a fit of roosterism- an extended, paralyzing tantrum- because he's been spoiled rotten. Only through acts of compassion- through the boy's concerns for the old man's comfort- is he able to grow and mature. A relevant story in this era of so many coddled, over-programmed kids....and a thought-provoking read for the upcoming Jewish holidays.

Today I have the pleasure of sharing an interview with Ann.

Why did you choose to retell this folktale?

I only retell stories that I truly love, and I have always loved the story of The Rooster Prince. It’s a hilarious, over the top slapstick tale with a wonderful message. The story has special relevance for me as a parent since not only is it a coming of age story that addresses what it means to become a good person, but it also deals with the way a parent or teacher can help raise a child to be adult who honors the values of compassion and kindness.

Broadly, how is your version different than the original? What elements did you flesh out or reinterpret?

The original original of this story, to the best of my knowledge, is attributed to Rabbi Nachman of Breslov. His is a very spare story that is interpreted as showing that a teacher of religion must meet the student at the student’s level – even if that is a very low level – in order to help the student climb to spiritual heights.

But of course, with the oral tradition, things change! And my grandmother’s version was, to my mind, very much a down to earth, immigrant’s story in reaction to the material riches available to American children, about how a child having “more than he wanted” does not necessarily lead either to happiness or to desirable, humane values.

And while the bones of the story belong to Rabbi Nachman and my grandmother, the imagery, rhythms, and the particular way the message is woven through, are mine.

What kind of research, if any, did you do for this book?

I read a lot of folklore and have studied the culture from which this story comes. But I think that, really, to write these stories well, the connection has to go beyond research. Even the best researched story in the world won’t come alive on the page unless the writer has a real emotional and with some stories spiritual connection to the tale.

You've retold several folktales. What are the rewards and challenges of writing in this genre?

Writers who retell folktales with their own spin face a bit of a paradox. Folktales come from an oral tradition that maintains its vibrancy, at least in part, as a result of the flexibility available to the teller in presenting a new and different version of the tale every time he or she tells it. Yet when we present the stories as books, we pin them down and trap them in a single, unchangeable form.

The writer’s job is to get the story right in a way that honors its roots and its cultural context but that also reflects the writer’s own creativity and values. When you get it right, there is a sense of having preserved a lively and important bit of the culture that produced the story. And because, in the case of The Rooster Prince, the culture in question is my own heritage, this is particularly gratifying.

If you were to interview the Rooster Prince, what questions might you ask him?

Well, if he were still a child, in the rooster state he’s in throughout much of the book, the only question to which I might expect a response would be something like, “So, uh, cock-a-doodle-doo? Buck buck buck, cluck cluck?” But if I were to meet him as the man he is on the last page, I might ask him if somewhere deep in his heart, there is a special place for the rooster he once was.

To learn more about Ann and her books, visit her website at annstampler.com.

Children's Books For Labor Day

2010-09-06T10:03:00.000-07:00

Honor Labor.

There's no shortage of picture books about firefighters, zookeepers, bakers, and other high interest jobs. Plenty of books too about teachers and librarians- since they play such a vital role in the daily lives of children. It's rare to find a title, however, that points out the ways workers are connected or mutually dependent on each other.

"Who comes to the rescue when the fishermen run aground at 5 a.m.?" is a question posed in Jessica Hartland's Night Shift (2007).

The book describes the work of donut makers, late night djs, bridge painters, window dressers and ten other evening workers-each of them related in some way. (The donut maker sells a donut to the fisherman, who is later rescued by the tugboat captain). At the end of their shift the workers gather at an all night cafe- and it's nearly morning. Hartland's book has much to offer- it celebrates workers and "community", it's interactive, and the illustrations are lively and cheerful.

And now, for older readers. I was recently astonished to come across the title, You Wouldn't Want to Be a Victorian Mill Worker!
one of a British series published in the states by Franklin Watts (2007).

Author John Malam engages the reader and supplies plenty of detail:

"Gray smoke covers the town like a dirty blanket and blocks out the sunlight. You've moved in with an Irish family that lives in the district called Little Ireland- a rat-infested slum along the banks of the River Medlock. There are 4000 poor people here, and your landlady and her family live in the cellar of one of the houses. ...Welcome to your new home!"

It's grim but dramatic stuff- and though the colorful cartoonish illustrations (complete with scowling mill managers) may seem at odds with the subject matter- they'll attract and keep the attention of the target audience. (The book does end on an upbeat note- a couple of years after a strike, a government factory inspector's report leads to new restrictive child labor laws...) This title, paired with a traditional photo illustrated book about child labor (such as Russell Freedman's Immigrant Kids), would be an excellent resource for teaching history and social responsibility.

Also in the series: You Wouldn't Want to be a Pyramid Builder, You Wouldn't Want To Work on The Railroads, and many more.

Other recommended books about work: Margaret King Mitchell's Uncle Jed's Barber Shop, Gary Paulsen's Work Song and The Tortilla Factory, Deborah Hopkinson's Sky Boys.

On a personal note: Melissa Sweet is currently in the preliminary stages of illustrating my book on Clara Lemlich, the firebrand who led the groundbreaking Shirtwaist Maker's Strike of 1909. I'm grateful to her, to my editors, and to everyone at Balzer & Bray who will be involved in the publication of my book in 2012!

Happy Labor Day

Picture Book Biography: Crafting the Setting

2010-08-30T10:51:00.000-07:00

The Cat & The Fiddle reopens, after a summer break.

I've been working full-bore on my fifth picture book biography. The writing won't come til I can vividly imagine the setting of the story-which might include geography and the culture of the times.

Here are good examples of setting from picture books about historical figures. Notice the use of cultural artifacts and details about natural environment:

"In the days when farmers worked with ox and sled and cut the dark with lantern light, there lived a boy who loved snow more than anything else in the world. Willie Bentley's happiest days were snowstorm days. He watched snowflakes fall on his mittens, on the dried grass of Vermont farm fields, on the dark metal handle of the barn door." - Jacqueline Briggs Martin's Snowflake Bentley

"On an island called Puerto Rico, where baseball players are as plentiful as tropical flowers in a rain forest, there was a boy who had very little but a fever to play and win at baseball. He had no money for a baseball bat, so he made one from a guava tree branch." - Jonah Winter's Roberto Clemente

"They came face to face with a fish as big as a truck-with long fangs, lips like giant tires, and huge saucer eyes. They called it the truckfish. On the bottom, they found pink ghost crabs, with eyes on long stalks, buried so deep in the sand they looked like a garden of eyes." - Jennifer Berne's Manfish: The Story of Jacques Cousteau

"We'd wander in the gardens, he and I, beside the pleasure lake where lotus blossoms grew. The servant girls would come on soundless feet and bring us fruit- grapes, dates and figs- the baskets balanced on their heads, a cloth of linen spread beneath a canopy that kept us from the sun. And we would feast while harpists played." Eve Bunting's I Am the Mummy Heb Nefert

Where does a writer track down these kinds of details? So far I've read biographies and novels- and watched movies- from the same time period and location as my subject. I've looked at paintings and cartoons and researched period costume. I've visited one of the locations where he lived, and taken a field trip to an equestrian center- because horses and jumping events may play a part in the story. For one section I'll need to learn more about the type of office he worked in, and the tools of his trade.

Once my imagination is furnished with the imagery, once I feel like I "own" the material, I can start writing. The hours of research required are a way of honoring the subject matter.

In other news: Tyrannosaurus Math has been licensed to the Scholastic Book Club, and it's also coming out in Japanese. A belated congrats to Barbara Bietz for her Beautiful Blogger award, and thanks for "passing the award on" to the TC&TF.

An Interview with Candace Ryan, Author of Animal House

2010-07-27T09:34:00.001-07:00

I met Candace Ryan a few years ago at an SCBWI conference. She's an incredibly supportive and active member of the children's book community in Southern California. It's a pleasure for me to post this interview with Candace, in celebration of Animal House, her debut picture book that arrived this month.

How does Animal House reflect Candace Ryan? Why were YOU the person to write this book?

This is a really good question. I’ve always loved wordplay, humor, and animals. In the most basic sense, ANIMAL HOUSE is about the joining of these elements.

But the real reason that I, Candace Ryan, had to write this book is because the uncultivated mathematician/scientist in me is obsessed with discovering patterns. Of course, most of these patterns are meaningless in terms of having practical, real-life applications. Fortunately, children’s literature isn’t overly concerned with the "practical."

For this reason, I couldn’t just combine animals with furniture in a willy-nilly fashion. Anyone can do that. But by using the pun as my accomplice, I created a system of logic in a nonsensical world. As a result, creatures like a "refrigergator" seem improbable and inevitable at the same time. When nothing much makes sense in the real world, it can be strangely satisfying to discover the sense in an unreal one.

This book obviously has a sense of humor. Are you an inveterate punster? What about the rest of your family? Are you guys silly?

Punning has become a very important means of expression for me. I didn’t grow up in a punning household, although my father had a great sense of humor and was a talented writer.

It wasn’t until I was a ninth grader, studying Shakespeare, that I realized punning could be an art form. Later, when I discovered James Joyce, the fabric of space-time tore. I realized there was no limit to what the pun could do.

In recent years, after claiming my writer identity, I’ve indulged almost compulsively in the act of punning. But I’m not really much of a spontaneous punster. Most of my punning occurs when I’m thinking, daydreaming, or actively writing.

And my family? My husband, son, and I are just three silly kids looking for the next fun fix. There can never be enough laughter and hijinks in our house.

Did this book go through a metamorphosis, from the original concept? If there were any challenges, what were they?

ANIMAL HOUSE started as a list of animal/furniture objects in conjunction with a punny title. I knew early on that a story structure based on touring the house would make for the most natural and logical fit.

Whereas other authors might have made an outline to get a story flowing, I was busy drawing a floor plan. I wrote the names of the creatures inside the rooms where they would most likely be found. I figured that creating more rooms inside the gorvilla would translate to creating more action in the story.

I actually wrote the first draft in verse, but I knew I didn’t want it to stay that way. I had been hearing a lot of sing-songy verse read aloud that week in a writing course I was taking, and the rhythms were stuck in my head.

Writing in verse was the only way I could get it to come out. Once I had a first draft, I transcribed it into prose. Then, my agent helped me set riskier stakes for the main character, and my editor helped me raise them.

The biggest challenge ANIMAL HOUSE presented involved the issue of verisimilitude. I had written a story in which all the internal mechanics of how animal/furniture creatures moved and how they fit inside the gorvilla made sense to me.

The problem was (and oftentimes is), I had to realize that no one else lives inside my head. The book had to explain, either with words or images, how exactly a kangaroom bounces out of a gorvilla. Working with the great team at Walker, we figured it out.

Which children book authors are your influences or inspirations? Who are your current faves?

The children’s book authors that had the biggest impact on me when I was a kid were Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein. My early exposure to books was somewhat limited, so I feel very fortunate to have read these two heavyweights during my formative years. My imagination found ample playroom in their books.

My current favorites are (in alphabetical order): Mac Barnett, Douglas Florian, Emily Gravett, Adam Rex, Amy Krouse Rosenthal, Jon Scieszka, Laura Vaccaro Seeger, Shaun Tan, Jan Thomas, David Wiesner, and Mo Willems.

Which of the animal houses would you like to live in, and why?

The gorvilla is definitely my favorite. What better place to monkey around?

Animal House was illustrated by Nathan Hale. Publication festivities are ongoing at his blog. To be eligible for a free autographed copy of the book, go to Goodreads.

Picture Books For Hard Times: The Wrap Up

2010-07-09T11:03:00.000-07:00

Finally, Spuds, by Karen Hesse.

The set-up: A mother and her three children (Maybelle, Jack and Eddie- in that birth order) live a hard-scrabble life in a rural area.

From the title to the last word, this book rings with authenticity. Hesse nails all the details- the speech, the setting, the emotions - beginning with sibling relations, and desire. One night when Ma is working Maybelle persuades her gullible younger brothers to do their own "tater harvest" on a neighbor's farm. As they pick the potatoes in the darkness, she "gooses" the boys on with mouthwatering descriptions: "Ma's gonna boil 'em and bake 'em. She's gonna slice 'em thin as fingernails and fry 'em up crusty brown with lots of salt sparklin'."

The key scenes are emotionally powerful. After the stealthy tater snatching, the children come home and spill their bags on the kitchen floor. "Them hard spuds rolled out, fillin' the room with the smell of dirt. I bent down to sort the muddy clumps. Then I knelt. Then I sat down in the middle of the cracked linoleum. And that's when I felt a hole open up inside my heart." The children have harvested mostly stones.

Spuds is about honesty, and forgiveness- even in the hardest times. Ma makes the kids return their catch, but she forgives them. (After all, Maybelle says she was only trying help her put food on the table.) The farmer tactfully thanks the children for clearing his field. With the potatoes he lets them keep, Ma makes a fry up that tastes like "all kinds of goodness." That goodness is sustenance, mother love, and compassion.

----------

In the picture books discussed this week, the authors selectively use details to convey financial hardship. The characters need a way out, an escape or a different focus. Beauty, imagination, and self-expression offer release. Working towards a goal, being generous towards the even less fortunate- or experiencing someone else's generosity- also helps them transcend their condition. The characters may not solely solve their own problems (at least one loving adult is involved), but they're active and dynamic.

Fly Away Home and Tar Beach are two other moving, inspirational books about characters in hard times. If you discover others, please let me know, and if you're writing such a story...bravo!

Picture Books For Hard Times: Day 4

2010-07-08T09:44:00.001-07:00

Today, a look at Those Shoes by Maribeth Boelts, a hard times picture book with a spot-on child voice.

The set-up: Jeremy, who lives with his grandma on a limited income, dreams of getting a new pair of high top tennis shoes like all the boys are wearing.

On all fronts, Boelts has written a convincing socially realistic story. The dialogue is authentic ("There’s no room for ‘want’ around here- just ‘need’," says Grandma) and the details well-chosen (Jeremy is given outdated shoes from the guidance counselor that "have an animal on them from a cartoon I don't think any kid ever watched.") The boy's thoughts ring so true: "I'm not going to cry about any dumb shoes. But when I'm writing my spelling words later, every word looks like the word shoes and my grip is so tight on my pencil I think it might bust."

The character's behavior is plausible too- his envy, his guilt, his indecision and his final "sacrifice." Jeremy wants those shoes so bad he buys a pair that are too tight from a thrift shop. Then he notices a classmate with a taped up shoe, and feet smaller than his. At the park after school, he can help but notice that loose piece of tape smacking the concrete every time he jumps.

Jeremy solves his problem by solving someone else's. Unlike Lydia in The Gardener, he undergoes a crisis of conscience. Jeremy's generosity comes gradually, honestly, with difficulty...we experience his inner turmoil. I'm not going to do it, he thinks, over and over. The reader must infer what thought he's banishing from his mind. When Antonio comes for dinner, Jeremy can feel him "wishing those shoes were his." At night, he lies awake thinking about the boy, and tries the high tops on one last time. The next morning he races over to Antonio's doorstep to give him the shoes, before he can change his mind. It's so human, so childlike.

Those Shoes is realistic, but hopeful. All of Jeremy's classmates (except for Antonio) make fun of his unfashionable shoes. More important than this is the love from Grandma (who schleps him to the thrift shops and buys him the winter boots he needs), support from the guidance counselor, and friendship from Antonio. At the end of the book the two boys race off together in the newly fallen snow.

Tomorrow: one more book, and a wrap up.

Picture Books for Hard Times: Day 3

2010-07-07T09:22:00.000-07:00

In which we continue our discussion of picture books about characters with financial difficulties. How do the characters transcend their circumstances? Let's look at How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz.

The set-up: a boy and his family flee their war-torn country and move, penniless, to a far off land.

With a few choice details, Shulevitz paints a bleak picture of the family's impoverished existence. The sun-baked houses are made of clay, straw and camel dung. The family shares a room with another couple. The boy has no toys, books, and little to eat.

A couple of telling scenes evoke the wretchedness:

One day his father goes out to buy bread, but instead returns with a map. He could only have afforded a tiny bit of bread, so they would have been hungry anyway. Mother is incredulous.

“No supper tonight,” Mother said bitterly. “We’ll have the map instead.”

The furious son goes to bed hungry and doesn’t think he’ll ever forgive his father. To make matters worse, his roommate is noisily eating:

“oh! how loudly he chewed. He chewed a small crust of bread with such enthusiasm, as if it were the most the most delicious morsel in the world.” The boy covers his head with his blanket so he won’t hear.

Can you feel the pain?

It's important that you do, because of what follows. The next day, Father hangs up a huge map, which floods the cheerless room with color. The boy is fascinated with it. He makes rhymes out of the strange sounding locations, and repeats them like a magic incantation. This carries him far away:

“I climbed snowy mountains where icy winds licked my face.” He goes on to wondrous temples, shady fruit groves, and cities of tall buildings (all lovingly illustrated by the author).

The book ends with: “And so I spent enchanted hours far, far from our hunger and misery. I forgave my father. He was right, after all.”

Even more poignant, the book is based on Shulevitz’ childhood. His family fled Warsaw after the 1939 blitz, and lived as refugees in the Soviet Union, Paris, and Israel. The Author's Note includes a photograph of the artist/author taken in Turkestan, a map he drew on an envelope, and a scene of the marketplace he later drew from memory.

Shulevitz’s writing in How I Learned Geography is spare, honest, and selectively descriptive. The utter dreariness of his life at the beginning of the story sharply contrasts with the sensory richness of the map passages later.

In this hard times book, a loving parent initiates the “solution." It’s the boy’s vivid imagination, however, that transforms the map into something magical. The map offers colorful destinations for his mental journeys, an escape from his deprivation. Like the books discussed in my previous posts this week, “beauty”- whether real or imagined- relieves the child of the sadness of his condition.

Tomorrow: another character, and very different circumstances.

Picture Books for Hard Times: Day 2

2010-07-06T10:20:00.000-07:00

Today, a look at The Gardener by Sarah Stewart (illustrated by her husband, David Small.)

Like all the hard time books I’ve chosen for this week, The Gardener is told in the first person/lyrical voice, though it’s in the form of letters. The narrator writes in the present tense about past events, giving us immediate access to her feelings.

The set-up: While her father looks for work in a rural area, Lydia is sent to live with her undemonstrative baker/uncle in the city.

Lydia devises a secret plan to win over her uncle (the outward goal is to make him smile). Suspense builds til the end, when we learn that she has covertly grown scores of flowers to transform the bakery's dirty unkempt roof into a lovely oasis.

We feel Lydia's excitement as she hatches and executes her secret plan. Her letters home bubble with enthusiasm: “My heart is pounding so hard I’m sure the customers can hear it downstairs!”

At the end of the book, the shop is closed so Lydia, her uncle and the bakery workers can have a party in the rooftop garden. The uncle brings out a cake covered in flowers, a cake that “equals one thousand smiles.” It turns out there’s more to celebrate, for Papa has found a job and Lydia will be going home.

Stewart uses just a few telling details to show Lydia’s circumstances at the beginning of the story. In her letter to her uncle she writes, “Did I tell you that Papa has been out of work for a long time, and no one asks Mama to make dresses anymore? We all cried, even Papa.” She wears one of her mother’s dresses, made over for her, on the train.

David Small's exquisite illustrations pack emotional wallop in the scenes, while dramatically evoking the Depression era setting.

The Gardener has much in common with A Chair For My Mother (see yesterday's post). In both books, the main characters have supportive environments (in the former, friends and neighbors bring Lydia plants and containers). Both girls are positive and singlemindedly focused on their goal- they're both working towards something concrete, and beautiful. But Lydia- a rural girl who knows all about growing things- takes pleasure in using her talent to benefit someone else. The goal involves expressing her own identity (her parents have taught her about beauty. Neighbors call her “the gardener.”)

Tomorrow- another predicament, another solution.

Picture Books For Hard Times

2010-07-05T11:10:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday, America, and may the next year be a healthy and prosperous one.

Especially for the less fortunate among us. With those people in mind, the TC&TF devotes this week to picture books about characters with economic hardships.

Each day we’ll look at a hopeful yet authentic story. The subject matter presents many challenges: Which details can be used to evoke the setting? How can the characters transcend their circumstances? Is it possible for the characters to solve their own problems? How will emotion be conveyed?

One of my all-time favorite realistic picture books is Vera Williams’ A Chair For My Mother.

The set-up: a child, her mother and grandmother are saving spare change to buy a chair, because their possessions have been destroyed in a house fire:

“When we can’t get a single other coin into the jar, we are going to take out all the money and go buy a chair Yes, a chair. A wonderful, beautiful, fat soft arm chair. We will get one covered in velvet with roses all over it. We will get the best chair in the whole world.”

Ah, feel the desire in those few sentences. The repetition and lush description that creates emphasis. And note the choice of the first person/lyrical voice- for a story about healing, after a traumatic event.

An upbeat attitude prevails throughout the book. The chair becomes a symbol of hope, renewal and comfort. It provides the family with an achievable, concrete goal. The community is supportive- the boss at the diner where mother works gives the child coins for helping out. After the fire, friends and relatives donate food, furniture and other necessities.

The story is optimistic, while also vividly real. The author uses a few well chosen details to describe the aftermath of the fire, and scenes of everyday life. When mama comes home her feet hurt, and sometimes she’s so tired she falls asleep while the child counts the money into piles. Some days mama has only a little money and she looks worried. When grandma wants to sit back and hum and cut up potatoes, she has to get as comfortable as she can on a hard kitchen chair.

One of the more interesting things in ACFMM is the use of flashback, uncommon in picture books. It starts in the present tense as the family saves money for the chair, goes into the past for back story about the fire, returns to the present …when mom and child are still saving up coins. Why? Because this re-creates the feeling of desire in the main character. We can feel her wanting that chair, feeling the pain of the past, anticipating it more as the jar fills up and then….

the story moves forward in time. The family goes furniture shopping and finally find the chair “they were dreaming of.”

The story ends in the never-ending present, leaving the reader with a cozy, reassuring scene. “Now” grandma sits in the chair during the day, mama rests in it at night, and after supper the child joins her, sometimes falling asleep.

The watercolors are lovely. The plump cozy chair is covered with roses. No wonder this book is still in print!

The Logic of Poetic Picture Books: A Look at ALL THE WORLD

2010-06-18T09:42:00.000-07:00

Much has been written about the structure of picture books- the importance of beginnings, middles and ends, plot turning points, rising and falling action.

But what about plotless picture book poems? These books don't depend on conflict, suspense and resolution, yet they still make use of structural logic (beyond their formal aspects, if they're in verse). Poetic books still lead the reader on an engaging journey. The accumulation of scenes/images, set forth in purposeful order, convince us of an emotional truth.

Just look at Liz Scanlon's All The World (illustrated by Marla Frazee), one of last year's critical favorites.

This book is a celebration of the pleasures of nature, and human love. It begins

"Rock, stone, pebble, sand/Body, shoulder, arm, hand/A moat to dig/A shell to keep
All the world is wide and deep."

Notice the organization of this stanza, repeated with variation throughout the book:

-The lists go from big to little
-The imagery moves from the particular in the first line, to the general in the last. Suggesting illustrations that move from close up, to wide angle (and rendered brilliantly by Frazee).
-Also note that the human activity is implied...giving the artist people to illustrate.

From the shore, the poem moves on to gardens, to tree-climbing, and other outdoor delights. When "Morning sun becomes noon blue" the story becomes anchored in time, and subsequently unrolls in chronological order (Frazee depicts one long family excursion).

Then, at midpoint:

"Slip, trip, stumble, fall/Tip the bucket/Spill it all/Better luck another day/All the world goes round this way"

This accident/loss/moment of human weakness (And how real- and reassuring- this moment is, for young children!) shifts the focus in the second half of the book from nature to people, from the outer world to the intimate one. The day draws on, the family comes home to a warm hearth and loving relatives.

In its final verse the poem synthesizes what's come before (the outer and interpersonal worlds) then goes beyond that- to our bonds with humankind:
"Hope and peace and love and trust/All the world is all of us."

This book doesn't have a classical plot, but it's got solid architecture, down to each well-wrought couplet. If you're struggling with your plotless picture book manuscript (in verse or not), consider:

Does your book have structural logic? Does a principle of order (chronological, specific to general, size, distance, quantity, quality, etc.) organize your "scenes" and create movement?
Do you use repetition of words and/or images with variation? Does your ending echo- and deepen- the beginning?

You can also study your favorite poetic picture books, looking for organizing principles and links between the scenes/verses. Would the poem work if these verses were put in random order?

Naomi Howland on "Princess Says Goodnight"

2010-05-25T12:09:00.000-07:00

My "Writing the Picture Book" course at UCLA Extension has just come to a close. When a class has a great esprit de corps like this one, I'm wistful when it ends. One of the highlights of the six weeks was a visit from Naomi Howland. The students got to see her manuscripts, storyboards, sketches and dummies and hear about all the patient hard work that goes into writing and illustrating a picture book.

Naomi also read her wonderful new release, Princess Says Goodnight, which received a starred review from PW!

Here's a brief interview with Naomi for our customers at The Cat & The Fiddle:

What was your initial inspiration for the book?

When children see their teachers outside of school, doing something ordinary like grocery shopping, it is always such a surprise. I began thinking about how a child might wonder about other adults they see and about these adult’s lives. That got me thinking about bedtime routines, which led to thinking about how policemen and kings and queens might get ready for bed. It was a circuitous journey.

Did you need to do any research?

No- I have raised 2 princesses and one prince and am experienced in royal behavior and expectations. :o)

What was the time line between initial idea, and publication?

I have thought about this bedtime book for years and years, possibly ten years.

What could beginning writers or illustrators learn from your experience?

While you may have a good initial idea, you have to write and rewrite and rewrite some more. When I first submitted Princess Says Goodnight, it was about a king and queen getting ready for bed. Now it is about a little girl who imagines she is a princess. The characters changed though many of the activities stayed the same.

What do you hope young readers will take away from this book?

I hope this is both a fun and comforting bedtime book. Princess also uses some nice language and I hope that children want to know what those words mean.

Finally, where would you take the princess if she came for a visit to Los Angeles?

I would take a princess to the Huntington Gardens because to walk around the roses, outdoor sculptures, or through the buildings there would make any little girl feel like royalty. Also, she would have a fine time playing in the children’s garden. And I would buy her an eclair and some petit fours in the afternoon.

Thanks so much, Naomi. With David Small's buoyant art, and your classy rhymes, this book is sure to be a winner.

The Torrible Zone: Authors Talk About Writing Obstacles

2010-05-12T18:02:00.000-07:00

TC &TF dedicates this post to Edward Lear, master of magical nonsense verse, who was born on this day in 1812.

In one of his poems, Lear sings of the blue headed Jumblies, who improbably sailed the sea in a sieve,

And in twenty years they all came back,
In twenty years or more,

And every one said, `How tall they've grown!
For they've been to the Lakes, and the Torrible Zone,
And the hills of the Chankly Bore!'

So in honor of Edward, this post is about the time authors spend in the Torrible Zone. Sometimes, during the writing process, the sky is dark and the voyage is long. I asked my fellow writers in CAN (The Children's Authors Network) “Which of your stories was most difficult to write? What did you learn from the process?”

Alexis O'Neill: It took me seven years to write my shortest story, The Recess Queen (586 words). What I learned is that some stories can't be rushed. You have to find the right mix of conflict and characters to pull off a satisfying read. I also learned that, even when your story is hidden away in a filing cabinet, you have to keep your antennae up for creative solutions to a story's problems.

Jeri Chase Ferris: The story most difficult for me to write was my historical fiction set during the Siege of Leningrad. Difficult because of my passion for the people and grief at the unimaginable suffering they experienced. Also difficult because it has been in progress for fifteen years! (the writing, that is). I learned to push on anyway, and to put all that emotion right into my characters. If you are passionate about your story, then YOU are the one to tell it. No one else will do it as well as you, so keep writing!

Janet Wong : The easiest story for me to write was Me and Rolly Maloo-the picture book version. The idea for it came from nowhere. While I was writing it, I found myself thinking that Judy O'Malley at Houghton Mifflin would be the perfect editor. Judy bought it in a week. When Judy left for Charlesbridge, she negotiated to take our project with her. Charlesbridge asked me to revise the book. Ordinarily I have no problem with revision--even substantial changes and many of them--but Charlesbridge's editorial team thought the book would read better as a novel. From this picture book...to a novel? Their point was reasonable: the book is about cheating on a math test, and cheating really isn't an issue until 3rd grade or so, when they're reading novels.

I struggled for the next two years with making it twenty times longer. I had a strong vision of its illustrations, and I couldn't figure out how to reconcile those images with the format of a novel.

During that time, Judy O'Malley fell into a coma and I thought both the book and my beloved editor Judy were gone. Now, over six years after selling it, Me and Rolly Maloo is finally a hardcover book that I can knock my knuckles on. The project has inherited a second editor, Emily Mitchell, whose attention to detail is magnificent--but the book is still Judy's, and I dedicated it to her.

Joan Graham : Splish Splash, while challenging to write, was more difficult to market as it was concrete poetry, and not everyone knew what that was. I had not seen a full book of shape poems since Robert Froman's Seeing Things and Street Poems in the 70s, and those were in black and white. Once I did find a home for my manuscript in 1993 with Houghton Mifflin (Hooray for them for seeing the possibilities!), there were just a few very minor tweaks, and it was ready to go to an artist. I believe Splish Splash was one of the first books to be illustrated by computer; it was published in 1994 and is now celebrating its Sweet Sixteen Birthday. After Splish Splash came out, a friend called to say she had been to NYC and saw my book at the Museum of Modern Art! Well, it is word art, and I learned to be persistent and stay true to my vision.

April Halprin Wayland : The novel I'm writing now. It's been 14+ years.

Why is it difficult?

Because it's been 14 + years!

Me: Dreamer From the Village was a tough self-taught class in how to write a picture book biography. After months of research I was drowning in a sea of vivid anecdotes. Several revisions went by before I realized I had to narrow the story down to the sources of Chagall’s inspiration, how he learned his craft, and the distinguishing characteristics of his art. I kept re-reading Jonah Winter's Diego to get a sense of simplicity. One editor helped me distill the material, but ultimately passed on the project. The whole process must have taken over a year, but the manuscript ended up where it belonged- in the hands of Marc Aronson, who was named after the artist! (his father, a scenic designer, knew Chagall and wrote a monograph about him).

So if you're struggling with a story, take heart. Writing is not always smooth sailing. Be one of the select few who takes risks and toughs it out.

Like the Jumblies. They are initially discouraged from taking their adventure. But they don't care a button, they don't care a fig! And upon their return, everyone

..... drank their health, and gave them a feast
Of dumplings made of beautiful yeast;
And every one said, 'If we only live,
We too will go to sea in a Sieve,---
To the hills of the Chankly Bore!

Write on.

For Math Awareness Month and Non-Fiction Monday: Edward Einhorn

2010-04-26T00:01:00.001-07:00

Today, Edward Einhorn, author of A Very Improbable Story: A Math Adventure, answers some questions about his book.

What was the inspiration for A Very Improbable Story? Was it an idea, an image, or....?

I knew I was interested in tackling math concepts, because when I work as a tutor, my favorite thing to tutor is math. I love the moment when students understand an idea for the first time, when what was once difficult or stressful becomes exciting and fun. And then they have that extra piece of knowledge for the rest of their lives.

One concept that often seems most imposing is probability. It can also be one of the most fun, so it seemed a great candidate for a picture book--especially because I had never seen one on the subject before. And the image of a magical cat on a boy's head--I don't know why, but it popped into my head. So I went with it.

Does the book resemble your original concept? Did you revise several times?

There were a number of revisions. The basic concept stayed the same but the details changed a lot. The biggest additions was probably the soccer theme. It both brought urgency to the story and allowed a good real world application for probability.

What was the most challenging aspect of writing the book?

Probability is a complicated idea to explain in a very few words. Keeping the story simple and understandable while conveying knowledge was definitely the biggest challenge. But that challenge was also what I loved most about writing the book.

How would you like teachers and parents to use the book?

First of all, the book should simply be read and enjoyed. Math aside, I hope people can appreciate it and read it aloud as simply the story of a boy and a magical cat.

Then I think playing with the concept through math games like the one in the story would both be fun and instructional. I sometimes visit schools and read the book and teach a few lessons based on the book, one using Oatie Woofs (the fictional cereal from the book) and one using marbles. The Oatie Woofs lesson is on my website. Feel free to steal it! Or make up your own.

Alas, April draws to a close, so this is the final interview in celebration of Math Awareness Month. I'd like to thank Edward, Betsy and Loreen for stopping by The Cat & The Fiddle to give us insights into the creation of their books. You've proven that magic, poetry and whimsy can play a role in math instruction. We look forward to more!

For Math Awareness Month: An Interview with Betsy Franco

2010-04-19T10:04:00.000-07:00

Today, fellow Trike Press author Betsy Franco shares some thoughts about the writing of Zero Is the Leaves on the Tree.

1. What was the inspiration for the book? Was it an idea, an image, or....?

I've always been intrigued by zero. I wanted to write a book that would capture the character of zero. I wanted to show that zero might be "nothing," but that it was very powerful, very meaningful.

2. Does the book resemble your original concept? Did you revise several times?

I rewrote it many many times because the images had to be different, precise, illustratable, poetic, and seasonal. I have file folders filled with pages filled with possible images. I also added "0 leaves," "0 sounds," "0 ripples," etc. to each page so that children would know what I meant, and so that they could repeat that refrain out loud if they were being read to.

3. What was the most challenging aspect of writing the book?

I wanted to make sure that each image had an expectancy, an observable absence, a poignancy that kids could relate to. I wanted them to go way beyond the normal notions of zero and feel it in their bones.

4. How would you like teachers and parents to use the book?

I'd love for kids to write and illustrate their own zero pages in the format I use in the book.

Betsy, thanks so much for giving us some insight into your writing process. Teachers could borrow some of your techniques (like the file folder full of images) in a math/writing lesson.

For Math Awareness Month: An Interview with Loreen Leedy

2010-04-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

I've just returned from a trip to London and Paris -where I had the great pleasure of meeting and wining and dining with Doug Cushman, the wonderful illustrator of Tyrannosaurus Math. Quel plasir!

So this is my first blog post for April- which happens to be Math Awareness Month. To mark the occasion, TC & TF asked author Loreen Leedy some questions about the writing of Missing Math.

1. What was the inspiration for Missing Math? Did it start with a concept, or an image, or...?

The initial impulse for Missing Math is unfortunately lost in the mists of time. It may have been the play on words of "number cruncher" being someone who works with numbers vs. a character who eats numbers. I generally work back and forth between scribbled words and doodles that may not end up in the final book but that are part of the process of one idea leading to another one until THE idea arises that I feel inspired to keep developing. Though the "number cruncher" character didn't end up in the final book, he got things rolling.

2. How long did it take to complete the winning manuscript? What types of changes were made (point of view, age level, etc) and why? What can writers learn from your experience with this manuscript?

I worked on the basic idea of math disappearing off and on for about 8 years, creating at least four picture book versions plus a chapter book. My editor liked the basic concept but kept rejecting each manuscript/dummy, then later would bring it up again. The only reason I kept trying was that the idea fascinated me, how pervasive math and numbers are in everyday activities from cooking to buying things to making a phone call, yet we rarely think about it. Just as an artist has to sketch out an idea to see how it looks, an author has to actually write up a story to see whether it will work or not. What writers could learn from my slog is that there are many possible ways to give expression to an idea, and you may have to spend time in dead ends before you get to drive onto the freeway(!)

3. What was the most challenging aspect of writing the book?

Getting so many rejections for the same basic idea, then starting over again. At least my list of possible numbers/math scenarios came in handy for every revision (sports scores, money, postal addresses, speed limits, shoe and clothing sizes, telling time, etc.)

4. How would you like teachers and parents to use the book?

My math education was quite sterile and disconnected from any sense of real life... my hope is that teachers and parents can use my books to create a true appreciation of math and numbers, especially in children who find the topic puzzling or intimidating.

Loreen, I'm in total agreement! Thanks for sharing your writing process with us.
__________________________________________________________________

A Post for Sid Fleischman

2010-03-21T14:33:00.000-07:00

One of the great storytellers of children's literature, Sid Fleischman, passed away this week.

This post is in his honor.

Sid is known for his novels and biographies, but I became acquainted with his writing through a picture book called The Scarebird.

I reread it yesterday. You could teach a whole class with this book.

You could talk about characterization through action. The main character, a kind old farmer called Lonesome John, begins to treat his scarecrow like a human. He puts a head and face on it, greets it day and night, and as time goes by he offers it his best clothes for protection from the punishing weather.

You could point out how Sid uses lively, authentic dialogue for characterization, too:

“Does that face suit you, Scarebird? You look like sunshine on stilts with them yeller-painted eyes! Well, make yourself at home.”

“Ain’t you all dressed up! Those are my town shoes, but I hardly go to town anymore so you’re welcome to them."

(I dare you to find one bland speech in the book. Or one cliché, or one lazy verb.)

You could highlight Sid’s hallmarks, musical language and the use of detail to create a vivid, believable setting. During a storm the farmer “heard the windows chattering like baby rattles." You could show how the detail of the nickle-plated harmonica, which the farmer likes to play on his porch, recurs like a leitmotiv, in this picture book that’s like a little movie.

But that’s only a fraction of what you could discuss. The Scarebird is a model of well-crafted scenes, pacing, patterns, and plot.

Most of all, you could discuss the book’s humanity. By midpoint in the story, the scarebird has become Lonesome John’s imaginary friend. They are playing checkers when

“a shadow fell across the checkerboard.

He (the farmer) looked up and saw a young man in worn jeans standing there, barefooted and bareheaded."

The farmer feeds the boy (Sam, a poor orphan) and over the next few days lets him do chores. Sam could use shoes and other protective clothes, so Lonesome John removes them in stages from the scarecrow, apologetically. At the end of the book, he looks at the scarebird for a long moment, then turns to the boy and asks “Do you play checkers?” Psychological transference, in a children’s book.

Sid, you honored young people with your brilliant, lovely stories.

Rest in peace.

The Perfect School Visit

2010-02-28T16:50:00.000-08:00

Last week I had an ideal school visit at John Marshall Elementary School in Glendale. Ideal, because the kids were polite, engaged, and prepared. The diligent ladies of the Glendale Assistance League (sponsors of Author Day) had already read them Dream Town and Dreamer From The Village because they tie into the third grade curriculum.

I showed the children copies of Marc Chagall’s works (on the overhead projector- which works well because of his luminous colors),

pointing out the magical animals, the floating people, the green violinist, etc.

One of my goals is to convey how Chagall expressed excitement and deep feeling through his dreamlike imagery and use of color.

Afterwards I displayed several pairs of pictures with similar themes and asked them to identify Chagall’s. It's always a joy to see them do this.

They aced the “Test Your Chagall IQ” oral quiz, and felt like art experts by the end of the talk. Many of them were itching to draw.

Afterwards, two of the teachers told me they often do a Chagall lesson with their classes. It was the perfect storm! The kids were immersed in art, and my book played a part. Man, I love this job.

Picture Book Endings: A Biography, A Wrap-Up

2010-02-22T07:14:00.000-08:00

Today, a look at the last page of Jacqueline Briggs Martin’s award-winning biography, Snowflake Bentley, then some final thoughts about picture book endings.

The beginning: “In the days when farmers worked with ox and sled and cut the dark with lantern light, there lived a boy who loved snow more than anything else in the world. Willie Bentley’s happiest days were snowstorm days. He watched snowflakes fall on his mittens, on the dried grass of Vermont farm fields, on the dark metal handle of the barn door. He said snow was as beautiful as butterflies, or apple blossoms.”

In lyrical prose, the book tells the story of how Wilson devotes his life to the study of snowflakes. He develops a microphotography technique for taking pictures of them, then gives talks and presentations. He publishes his pictures of snowflakes in magazines and in a final collection. At the age of 66 he walks eight miles in a blizzard to take more photographs, becomes ill and dies.

How does the author handle the sad, poignant material? This is a common challenge for biographers who write for young people, since many trailblazers have died (or lived their final years) under tragic circumstances. Here's Jacqueline Briggs Martin’s solution:

“A monument was built for Willie in the center of town. The girls and boys who had been his neighbors grew up and told their sons and daughters the story of the man who loved snow. Forty years after Wilson Bentley’s death, children in his village worked to set up a museum in honor of the farmer-scientist. And his book has taken the delicate snow crystals that once blew across Vermont, past mountains, over the earth. Neighbors and strangers have come to know of the icy wonders that land on their own mittens-thanks to Snowflake Bentley.”

With vivid description, imagery, metaphor and rhythmic language, Martin shifts the focus from Bentley to his legacy, from the individual to his contribution to society. His book wondrously transports his beloved Vermont snowflakes to people all over the earth. Now "neighbors and strangers" have the lovely ice crystals on their mittens (whereas Bentley marveled at them at the beginning of the story.) Bentley's name occupies the last space in the story, the position of emphasis.

The Wrap Up

We’ve looked at six picture book endings, six books of different genres. What do these books tell us about crafting effective closing lines?

1. The endings recall the beginnings in some way: they repeat an event, an image, a theme. This repetition gives closure and consistency. It creates an emotional effect.

2. The endings may incorporate imagery from the beginning, but they show change that illustrates a character’s development (Snowy Day/Snowflake Bentley), or a conclusion he/she has come to (All Pigs are Beautiful/Diary of a Worm.) Repetition throughout the story may lend the image symbolic qualities (the sack in Nine for California).

3. The last scene is comforting (Diary of A Worm, Nine for California), or instills a sense of wonder (Night in the Country/Snowflake Bentley/Snowy Day) and underlines the theme of the book. It’s emotional.

4. The last scene can show characters in an action that endlessly repeats (Nine for California), a character taking one final action (The Snowy Day), or imply what the characters will do in the future (Night in the Country).

5. The last lines may be surprising or unexpected (All Pigs are Beautiful,Night in the Country, Nine for California).

6. Biographies often end with a summary of the subject’s legacy. This can be effectively expressed through imagery and metaphor (Snowflake Bentley).

The ending of the story is your last chance to make an impression on the readers. You need to know exactly what it is you’re trying to say, so you can say it succinctly and artfully. If you’re struggling with the ending of your picture book, go back to the beginning.

Like Eudora Welty said:

“I think the end is implicit in the beginning. It must be. If that isn’t there in the beginning, you don’t know what you’re working toward. You should have a sense of a story’s shape and form and its destination, all of which is like a flower inside a seed.”

Experiment with the techniques listed here, or look at your favorite books to get more ideas. Use poetic language (repetition, rhythm, patterned sentences, etc.) to make the ending more musical and evocative.

If this involves lots of trial and error, don’t be discouraged. Hemingway rewrote the ending to Farewell to Arms 39 times.

Hope this helps!

I’ll be teaching a class at UCLA Extension (page 152 in the catalogue) this April.

Picture Book Endings Day 5 - Lyrical

2010-02-19T07:17:00.000-08:00

In keeping with Poetry Friday, today's post is about poetic pb's.

What makes a satisfying ending to a lyrical picture book- one with no plot? One of my favorite last lines was written by Cynthia Rylant in Night in the Country.

“There is no night so dark, so black as night in the country. In the little houses people lie sleeping and dreaming about daytime things, while outside-in the fields, and by the rivers, and deep in the trees- there is only night and nighttime things.”

What follows are more in depth descriptions of the people, animals and things that are making noise: “There are frogs. Night frogs who sing songs for you every night: reek eek reek reek. Night songs.” The owls swoop, an apple falls, houses settle….etc.

As in many plotless picture books, the structure here is chronology. Night passes. The actions mentioned towards the end of the book are quieter – a cow nuzzles her calf. Toward morning,

“the owls will go to sleep, the frogs will grow quiet, the rabbits will run away.
Then they will spend a day in the country listening to you.”

As we’ve seen in the books discussed earlier this week, the ending of NITC recalls the beginning, when people were listening to nocturnal animals. The animals mentioned at the start are referenced again.

But that last line is a surprise, a fresh and amusing perspective. Who ever thought that nocturnal animals would have trouble sleeping during the day? The sentence is effective also because of the stress on the very last word, YOU.

How do authors write great endings to lyrical picture books? What have you noticed?

Monday's post will cover picture book biographies, and some tips on writing endings.

Picture Book Endings Day 4: Historical Fiction

2010-02-18T09:00:00.000-08:00

Today, a look at the finish of Nine for California, by Sonia Levitin.

It begins: “Pa sent a letter by stage. “Come to California, my dears. I am lonely without you. In the letter was a big bank note, all the money Pa had in the world. He had worked in the gold fields for a whole year. “What good is gold,” Pa wrote, “without my family.”

Young Amanda then relates the rough 21 day journey. The stagecoach is filled with her family of six, plus three grumpy grownups, so she has to sit on the sack her mama packed with "everything we'll need." Throughout the trip Amanda gets bored but adventure arrives in the form of Indians, a buffalo stampede, and a robbery. Mama uses up her bag of tricks to calm the kids (and even ward off buffalo). By the time the family arrives in California and reunites with Pa, the adult passengers have come to appreciate Mama's resourcefulness.

The ending: “When we were settled, Ma and I stuffed the sack with goose feathers. On winter nights we would lie on it, all five of us, sometimes Mama too, rocking and swaying, pretending we were in the stagecoach bound for California again.”

In this twist, Amanda, her siblings and even her ma are nostalgic for the trip that was at turns monotonous, scary and uncomfortable. The sack, which played a key role from the beginning of the story, becomes a souvenir for the entire trip. Instead of sitting on it, Amanda can now lie on it, daydreamy, recalling the bumpy movement and her adventures. The reader is left with a heartening, cozy scene that is set in the past, but repeats itself (on winter nights we would lie on it).

The last sentence (vivid and as rhythmic as the motion it describes) speaks of the importance of family (hinted at from Pa’s loneliness) , the human need for adventure, and a means of holding on to happy moments when they pass.

Sonia Levitin graciously provided me with this insight into the ending of the book:

"The idea came from an early pioneer diary I read, the diary of Mary Walker, an early Oregon pioneer. Many years after the trek she spoke of how it was to be rocked to sleep in the covered wagon. She became somewhat demented in her old age and used to sit on her old saddle, rocking and swaying...and remembering."

Have you been moved by the endings of other historical fiction pbs? How does the author create the emotion?

Picture Book Endings Day 3: Realistic Fiction

2010-02-17T07:08:00.000-08:00

How do authors wrap up realistic stories? Consider the classic The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats.

The book begins “One winter morning Peter woke up and looked out the window. Snow had fallen during the night. It covered everything as far as he could see.”

The recap: he puts on his snowsuit and explores different ways of walking in the snow. He observes the snowball fight of big boys, since he’s not old enough to join them yet. He builds a snowman, slides, etc. Finally he makes a snowball, puts it in his pocket for tomorrow, and enters his warm house. He tells his mom about his adventures and thinks about them in the bath. Before going to bed he makes the rueful discovery that his snowball has disappeared. He dreams that the sun has melted all the snow.

The end: “but when he woke up his dream was gone. The snow was still everywhere. New snow was falling!

After breakfast he called to his friend from across the hall, and they went out together into the deep, deep snow.”

A sweet, reassuring, ending. All accomplished with simplicity and restraint. The “souvenir” of his happy snow day is gone forever, but new snow has arrived. Emphasis is conveyed through “everywhere,” the exclamation point, and the repetition of “deep.” The scene resembles the beginning, but it’s different. This time Peter chooses a friend to go out with. He is more experienced now- he has learned that you must enjoy snow in the moment, because it’s transitory. He has played in it on his own, and now he wants to share it (socializing was foreshadowed in the big boy scene).

This is an ending that circles back to the start, but shows the character has changed. Unlike the many children’s book protagonists who return home at story’s close, Peter is embarking on a new adventure. The reader goes out with him into the wonderland of snow.

Are there realistic endings that you find poignant?

Picture Book Endings Day 2: Fantasy

2010-02-16T09:42:00.000-08:00

What makes a satisfying conclusion to a fantasy text? Many endings resonate and seem inevitable, because they echo the beginning of the story. Diary of Worm by Doreen Cronin is a good example. It starts with:

“March 20. Mom says there are three things I should always remember:

1. The earth gives us everything we need.

2. When we dig tunnels, we help take care of the earth

3. Never bother Daddy when he’s eating the newspaper.”

The ensuing diary includes humorous entries about worm’s friendship with spider, school days, his stress about fishing season, getting stepped on, nightmares about giant birds. The penultimate entry lists three good things about being a worm.

The ending:

“It’s not always easy being a worm. We’re very small, and sometimes people forget that we’re even here. But like Mom always says, the earth never forgets we’re here.”

This conclusion summarizes the book and makes a connection with children- who are little, and easily overlooked.

What a brilliant closer. That last sentence recalls the earlier advice of Mom regarding earth ( also brings up associations of mother/earth). The personification of earth is poetic, leaves the reader with the comfy feeling of everything-is-relatedness, and strongly (note the use of “never”) affirms that even small creatures are appreciated and have their role. A deep way to end a hilarious story!

Like the ending of All Pigs Are Beautiful (the book discussed here yesterday), this finish refers back to the beginning, it sums up the story, and in spare language creates emotional impact. There are other types of endings for fantasy texts.

Which ones resonate with you? Why?

Picture Book Endings - Day 1

2010-02-14T22:09:00.000-08:00

Through next Monday, the Cat & The Fiddle dishes up thoughts on picture book endings.

Much has been written about famous openers and favorite first lines. No one can deny the importance of the beginning paragraph in establishing story elements, and snaring the reader.

Although they're not as quotable (because their impact depends on context), endings are equally crucial. Beginnings are all about promise, but endings have the harder work of following through. It's the last lines that determine whether or not a story has left a successful emotional impact.

For Non-Fiction Monday, a look at the affective ending of All Pigs Are Beautiful by Dick King-Smith.

This book is somewhat of a mash-up. It’s written in first person POV and relates personal experiences, but includes informational material and side-bar factoids.

APAB begins: “I love pigs. I don’t care if they’re little pigs or big pigs, with long snouts or short snouts, with ears that stick up or ears that flop down. I don’t mind if they’re black or white or ginger or spotted. I just love pigs.”

Emotion conveyed through repetition, detail, description, all with an honest, conversational tone. Putting aside E.B. White’s lovable Wilbur (remember, he needed a spider to convince him of his worth) the outpouring of pig-aphilia is surprising. Pigs are not fluffy and cuddly- they’re associated with messiness, filth, ugliness. Which makes the reader wonder why the writer loves them so much. Stay tuned.

The writer relates loving anecdotes about his boar Monty (a pale white who liked to wallow in mud and be scratched between the ears) and general information about pigs (i.e. “Each piglet chooses its own private teat and returns to it for every feeding.”). He describes pigs' commonalities with humans (they can be moody and stubborn, their moms are nurturing, etc.) and suggests several things they might be saying if you understood their grunts and squeaks. "This food is really excellent, yum, yum." etc.

The book ends with: “How you noticed how often I’ve said that pigs are like people? That’s one of the reasons I like them so much. There is one big difference, though. People can be good-looking or just ordinary-looking or plain ugly. But all pigs are beautiful.”

Why does this work?

The question is an effective way of summarizing the book, and it grabs the reader's attention.

The description of people recalls the description of pigs in the beginning paragraph, creating a satisfying circle.

The last sentence is earned by what has come before. “All pigs are beautiful” is a conclusion that’s strong and surprising given the reputation of pigs in popular culture, but we understand why the author feels this way. It’s his intimacy with pigs, his affection for them, that makes them beautiful in his eyes. The unadorned language rings true.

What non-fiction pb endings do you admire? Why?

Tomorrow, a look at the ending of a popular fantasy picture book.

P.S. Humongous thanks to the Cooperative Children's Book Center for choosing Tyrannosaurus Math as one of the best concept books of 2010.

Tricks of the Trade: Revision Tips from Picture Book Authors

2010-01-27T07:21:00.000-08:00

Today TC & TF features revision tips from authors who have taught in UCLA Extension’s Writers Program. Including yours truly.

Why ? Because I’m currently tweaking a manuscript, and have been pondering the revision process itself. I wondered what tricks my comrades had up their sleeves. Here's what they had to say.

Caroline Arnold:

After I've done all the usual grammar and syntax corrections, cutting and pasting, and I think I'm getting close, I always read my manuscript aloud. Even with books for older readers that are not meant as read-alouds, this helps me hear if my text is flowing smoothly.

Merrily Kutner:

Here’s my tip: when revising, check to see if you’ve used active not passive writing. Passive writing tells rather than shows. When writing actively, the specific verb you choose is your most valuable tool and many times saves words. So, pick verbs that describe exactly how the character is acting; alternate words for “sat” carry different emotional meanings (perched, slouched, squat). The subject and verb contain the important information in each sentence so keep those elements close together toward the front of the sentence for greatest impact. Sentences that start with “there was,” “there is,” and “there are” are telling and most always passive.

Example:
Passive—The leaves were raked into piles by Mark and John.
Active—Mark and John raked the leaves.

Although the first sentence is acceptable it isn’t a strong one. If you make Mark and John the subjects and put the “rakes” directly in their hands, you’ll create a more active and vivid picture for readers. Also, if you’re stumped where to revise just try to cut each page by 30 words…it will add up and get your word count down.

Alexis O’Neill:

Make sure that at least one person in your writers' group is a ruthless chopper. When you can't find one more word to eliminate from your precious manuscript, give The Chopper a target word count and invite her to cut cut cut. This is how I got my 700-word book review down to the required 250 words. And, on that word diet, it read beautifully!

Ann Whitford Paul:

It’s been said, “An apple a day keeps the doctor away.” I say, “The willingness and ability to revise will keep rejection letters away.” Try new approaches. Imagine your story is a pippin apple. Maybe if you told it from a different viewpoint, it would turn into a macintosh or delicious apple. Share your apple with other growers. A critique group will catch things that you hadn’t considered and offer suggestions for improvement. And don’t expect everything to come together overnight. An apple tree takes years to produce an apple. You might take years to produce a story. Enjoy the process and the taste of accomplishment when you finally get an offer will be all the sweeter.

Barney Saltzberg:

First and foremost, LEAVE YOUR EGO AT HOME, Preferably in a closet with the door closed!

Practical tips: I find that since I write on the computer, it helps me to print out what I'm working on so I can read my story on paper. I read it with a pen or pencil and make my edits on the page. I will then go back, save a new draft and add the changes I have made. Since I write picture books, I do read my work out loud. It's helpful to 'hear' they rhythm of what I'm reading.

At some point in the process when I think I'm close to being finished, I might have someone else read my work out loud to see how the story works. I know how to 'read' what I've written, but someone else might emphasize different things in my story. Having them read the story without my setting it up, or explaining things, is a way to see if they understand what I'm trying to say. We tend to defend or explain what we've written. People want to 'get' our work. If it's not making sense to another person, don't think of it as an attack, think of it as an opportunity to re-examine what you have just written and find a way to make the story more compelling and clear.

April Halprin Wayland:

When I first wrote New Year at the Pier—A Rosh Hashanah Story, illustrated by Stéphane Jorisch (Dial), the main character was a 10-year-old girl. My editor, Lauri Hornik, suggested making the main character younger, more in keeping with the picture book audience.

At first I was cranky. I liked the story just fine, thank you. But my friend Janet Wong said, Just try it. So I tried it. I made the little brother into the main character. Since he was younger, he couldn’t write a list of the things he wanted to apologize for….which sent me in a new direction and did wonders for the book.

Huh. My editor was right….imagine that!

So if you want to rewrite something but you don’t know where to begin, here’s a blog post about looking at something from a completely different point of view.

Michelle Markel:

For me, the hardest part of revision is keeping the love alive. Sometimes you go on MANY dates with your manuscript. Some of them don't end so well. How can you rekindle the spark of the first drafts? (don’t throw them out- lest you forget those magical moments!) Read some poetry or other inspired writing before looking at your own. Stimulate your imagination with regards to your main character or setting. Take field trips, go back to the library, use Google images or Youtube.

Or do the opposite. Ignore your story. You two may need some time apart. Indulge in other activities and see how long you can bear living without each other. Arrange to meet when you’re good and ready. Something mysterious may occur the next time you meet- the grace of a solution.

What works for you?

P.S. Revision is one of the topics covered in Writing the Picture Book, a six week Saturday afternoon class I'll be teaching this Spring through UCLA Extension. Catalog on-line in February.

Thanks to Kate Narita for posting cool lesson ideas for Tyrannosaurus Math, as well as an interview with me today.

Math Books Have Feelings Too

2010-01-04T00:28:00.001-08:00

When I was in elementary school during the Mad Men era, math was drill and kill. Math was presented as a useful tool, a way to manage money and measure yardage and lumber. By the time I was in high school, yawning through a trigonometry class, Math seemed like its own closed off universe, one I wanted to visit as infrequently as possible.

So I'm delighted by math books that approach the subject with a sense of awe, or use math metaphorically. My hope is that children will develop an early appreciation for the subject. Our lives are filled with losses, additions, divisions and multiplications….

Here are five of my favorites:

Zero is the Leaves on The Tree by Betsy Franco

In this book zero means stillness, absence, silence and more:

Zero is "the sound of snowflakes landing on your mitten,"

"the ripples in the pool before the first swimmer jumps in."

(Full disclosure: contemplating nullness and emptiness and numbers, thoughts drifted to Three Dog's Night's lyrics "Cause one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do / One is the loneliest number, worse than two")

One Gorilla by Atsuko Morozumi

The narrator counts the things she loves (which are tenderly portrayed) “Here is a list of things I love. One gorilla. 2 butterflies among the flowers. And one gorilla. Three budgerigars in my house and one gorilla." Counting as an expressive act.

Note: now that I think about it, the artwork reminds me of Henri Rousseau, painter of imaginary jungles (and subject of my upcoming book from Eerdmans).

MATHterpieces- the Art of Problem Solving by David Schwartz

Opposite a reproduction of 12 famous paintings are related items that the reader is asked to group in different ways. Dali's painting The Persistence of Memory is accompanied by the verse, "Is it a dream or is it real? / It's hard to know when art's surreal. / Dali's clocks once so precise-- / now they're melting just like ice. / Find SEVEN ways to make an 8 / group the CLOCKS, it's getting late."

Adding up melting clocks sounds like fun to me. As an advocate of exposing children to the visual arts, which rely on math (pattern, balance, repetition...) to work their charms, I like the pairing of math and masterpiece here.

1-2-3 A Child’s First Counting Book by Alison Jay.

The gorgeous artwork conveys the emotion in this book, inviting the reader to enter a magical kingdom and count its fairy tale elements. When I opened this the first time, I sighed with happiness.

Marvelous Math, edited by Lee Bennett Hopkins.

This fancifully illustrated book will get readers thinking about the many ways math touches their lives. It includes this lovely poem by my friend Joan Graham:

Nature Knows Its Math

Divide

the year

into seasons,

four,

subtract

the snow then

add

some more

green,

a bud,

a breeze,

a whispering

behind

the trees,

and here

beneath the

rain-scrubbed

sky

orange poppies

multiply.

Check out a past post from Miss Rumphius for a list of math books incorporating poetry.

With my book Tyrannosaurus Math I hope to bring cheer to the word problem genre (subject of several postings here). For more information about how that book was written please visit Cynsations Craft, Career and Cheer. Thank you Cynthia!

P.S. Please revisit this wonderful math themed poem by Mary Cornish at Poetry 180. HAPPY NEW YEAR from TC&TF!

Dinosaurs in the Library

2009-12-17T14:01:00.000-08:00

Where has the year gone. On Saturday I did my last author program of 2009 at Los Angeles Public Library's (Central Branch) KLOS Theater. After reading Tyrannosaurus Math,

I had fun talking about dinosaur fossils (Boy, has T-Rex been in the news lately! My favorite article was about the tiny ancestor Raptorex) and math. I have kids draw objects/clues out of a bag. What would a ruler, a calendar, a map, and a $100 bill have to do with paleontology?

We made a leaf pictograph, just like T-Math did in the book, and also grouped members of the audience to show different number combinations that add up to ten. I love getting the kids involved.

Thanks, FOCAL, for inviting me and my imaginary dinosaur into this classy venue. As always, it was a pleasure.

Happy Holidays to all from The Cat and The Fiddle! May 2010 bring you health, happiness, and delightful stories.

Math Stories

2009-11-30T00:01:00.000-08:00

For Non-Fiction Monday, one last nod to William Steig (on the last day of his honorary month) in the form of a math lesson:

Read Amos and Boris. (Enjoy!)

Make a list of what Amos loaded on the ship: cheese, biscuits, acorns, honey, wheat germ, two barrels of fresh water, a compass, a sextant, a telescope, a saw, a hammer, nails, a needle and thread, bandages, iodine, a yoyo and playing cards.

How many items were food/drink? How many were tools (both for navigation and repair)? How many were for first aid? For play? How many total?

(One could do this lesson, for example, in conjunction with the Open Court Literacy Program’s Grade 1 story on Captain Bill Pinkney’s Journey. Fiction, math and social studies, in one coup.)

A fantasy story with math potential…makes me think of :

DIY Fantasy Word Problems

1.    Pick a fantasy character (princess, superhero, alien. I’ll pick the princess)

2.    Brainstorm people or things that would be in their setting.
(fancy ball, prince, knight, dragon, castle. I’ll pick the ball)

3.    Brainstorm activities that character might be involved in. What would be fun? What would be dangerous?
(Getting rescued, getting dressed up, picking a prince. I’ll pick “getting dressed up”)

4.    Brainstorm how math could be involved in that activity.
(Counting jewels. Going shopping. Measuring cloth for a gown. I’ll pick “going shopping”)

Here’s a simple word problem:

A king gave the princess $500 for her outfit to wear to the ball. She picked out a gown that cost $80, a ruby necklace that cost $100, a diamond ring that cost $300, and a pair of satin slippers that were $70. Will she have enough money to buy her outfit?

Draw a picture. Customized high interest subject + word problems = fun!

Here we are having fun at the CSLA conference last weekend in Ontario. You can't see any copies of Tyrannosaurus Math because they were sold out! Librarians rock.

Your Book - On the Analyst's Couch

2009-11-21T11:15:00.000-08:00

Have you ever put your manuscript or book under psychoanalysis?

I asked myself why I wrote Tyrannosaurus Math – which is a very different question than how I got the idea. As I told Rex Green during our interview, I’ve always been a huge fan of Tyrannosaurus Rex. But why did he pop up as the main character in my book? He was a symbolic way of “attacking” math (my least favorite subject in school). He was a joyous way of channeling years of pent up frustration with boring word problems. For me, it was perfect casting.

What is the personal connection between you and your book(s) ? Are you reflected somehow in the main character? I posed these questions to my fellow authors in the Children’s Authors Network

Alexis O' Neill on The Recess Queen

I have to tell you – bullies infuriate me! I hate (yes, hate!) people who push others around either physically or verbally. As an adult I worked for a doozy of a bully once (who knew that adults could be bullied by other adults? I thought this was just playground stuff!) So, I had the right emotion for a bully book – but how was I going to get the bully in my story to stop being a bully? In life, things are messy and don’t tie up neatly in pretty bows. (At least not always.) So I thought I’d create a perfect world in my story. In a perfect world, a bully can change. And even in a messy world, there's always the hope that just the right gesture (like inviting someone to play) can make a difference.

April Halprin Wayland on New Year At The Pier

Every Jewish New Year I join 200 singing friends from my synagogue as we walk to the end of the pier in Manhattan Beach, CA.

There we take pieces of bread and toss them into the ocean to symbolically let go of any thing we wish we hadn't done in the past year. To clean our slate for the new year.

The wind, the songs, the sea, the gulls...it feels so wonderful. If I couldn't bring readers to the pier myself, I wanted them to feel the poetry of this joyous ritual called tashlich. What better way than a picture book?

Janet Wong on Homegrown House

The girl in HOMEGROWN HOUSE is me in two ways: I am both the girl in the book, who is tired of moving, and also the mom who wants to move to a “better” house. I lived in eight different homes by the age of fifteen. I realized only about ten years ago how much moving from house to house had formed me. I was living in a perfectly good house in Seattle, but rather than settle in and make it “homegrown,” I found myself itching to move to a “better” house—something with a water view. We ended up moving just ten blocks away! In hindsight the little girl in me was right, and we should not have moved to the house with the lake view. We have since moved once again, for my husband’s work, and will move again next year, to a house we are building.

Jeri Chase Ferris on Demanding Justice and other titles

I like to be treated fairly, and I’m pretty sure you do too. When people are not treated fairly I like to make it right, and I’m pretty sure you do too. I write books about people who lived dangerous and exciting lives, who worked hard and made our country a better place – Benjamin Banneker, Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Biddy Mason, Matthew Henson, Marian Anderson – but because of the color of their skin they were treated most unfairly. In telling their stories, I want to bring them back to life and let you (and everyone) see what they did for America. I want them to be given fairness and justice, recognition and thanks. My most recent book is the biography of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, a free black woman who lived during the time of slavery and spent her entire life fighting for justice. The title of her story is DEMANDING JUSTICE, and that is what I want to do with each book I write.

Joan Bransfield Graham on Splish Splash and Flicker Flash

The characters in my books are water (SPLISH SPLASH) and light (FLICKER FLASH). What better way to explore their varied shapes than with shape itself--

concrete poetry. Growing up on a barrier island along the southern coast of New Jersey, I was always fascinated with the ocean and water in general. From the Atlantic to the Pacific (I'm now in California.) with some sailing on the Chesapeake and a five-year stop near Lake Michigan, I am definitely a water person. Studying photography for many years, developing my own black and white prints, and now having fun with my digital camera and Photoshop, I am always sensitive to the effects of light and shadow. I think my characters picked me.

Off to the CSLA conference in Ontario, where Alexis, April, George Pilling and I will be talking about "Serendipity: Happy Accidents in Writing." More on that later!

Ten Things Picture Book Writers Can Learn From Shrek!

2009-11-10T12:51:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, teacher extraordinaire Daniele Della Gala and I did a presentation called “Tyrannosaurus Math: Crunching the Numbers with Stories” at the California Math Council Conference in Palm Springs. After the talk, one of the attendees appreciated the sophisticated language in the book, at which point I expressed my debt to William Steig. Who has been on my mind lately because, by felicitous circumstance, November is William Steig Month.

Author/illustrator Barney Saltzberg and I have used Steig’s work in our picture books classes at UCLA Extension’s Writer’s Program. “The reason I write and illustrate picture books is because I fell in love with The Amazing Bone,” Barney said. "As a writer, I marvel at the predicaments that Steig puts his characters in. I never in my wildest dreams figure out what the solution will be.”

In honor of William Steig, TC&TF offers thoughts about one of his most successful books:

10 Things Picture Book Writers Can Learn From Shrek!

1. Stay true to your roots. “Shrek” means “fear” is Yiddish. Steig was raised by Eastern European Jewish immigrants who settled in the Bronx.

2. Create an original, irresistible character. Shrek has a funny name, he’s funny looking, fearless, lovestruck and possesses superpowers! He also furnished material for three movies -and a fourth in production.

3. Write a great first line: “His mother was ugly and his father was ugly, but Shrek was uglier than the two of them put together.” And a killer first paragraph: “By the time he toddled, Shrek could spit flame a full ninety-nine yards and vent smoke from either ear. With just a look he cowed reptiles in the swamp. Any snake dumb enough to bite him instantly got convulsions and died.”

4. Honor the classics. The exaggeration of Shrek’s revolting qualities and his strengths borrow from the tall tale tradition, while the quest frame, the seven-incident plot, the animism, the witch (and her chant), dragon, knight, and princess belong to fairy tales.

5. Honor the classics, but make the story your own. Steig was raised by parents involved in the social justice movement. Sympathetic to the underdog, Steig made the hero of his tale an ugly monster (with a donkey instead of a handsome steed) who finds love in the end, warts and all.

6. Choose your nouns and verbs wisely. Shrek toddles, slogs, stalks, swaggers. His head is his noggin, topped by a knob. Steig deftly uses long or unfamiliar words and stylish language in a way that’s accessible to children.

7. Use humor, both verbal (one day his parents “hissed things over,” “they kicked him goodbye,” etc.) and visual/situational (Shrek has a nightmare of kids hugging and kissing him).

8. Incorporate poetic language. Several characters speak in rhyme, and the warning on the tree is in rhyme. Many of Steig’s sentences are patterned and/or rhythmic.

9. Make it dangerous, but don’t kill anyone. Despite Shrek’s superpowers, characters only faint, become unconscious, or get so hot they dive in the moat.

10. Write with joy. Steig’s musings about art can be applied to literature as well: “(The spectator) experiences again what the artist experienced in making the painting: movement, emotion, a glorying in man’s boundless creative power, and wonder - which is respect for life.” (From Pipers At the Gates of Dawn by Jonathan Cott.)

If you’re a Steig fan, treat yourself to the on-line feature from the Jewish Museum’s 2007 Exhibit “From The New Yorker to Shrek: The Art of William Steig.” It includes an adorable illustration called “Family Reunion” that brings together many of the characters from his books.

November 14 is the 102nd anniversary of Steig's birth. We love you, William!

Poetry Friday 2009: Halloween Word Problems

2009-10-30T09:45:00.000-07:00

To celebrate the occasion, The Cat and The Fiddle recommends a Halloween word problem:

A mother spider told her twins
Beneath a dusky sky,
“I’ll take you out to trick or treat,
You’ll dress as octopi!”
She basted silk from spinnerets
Each stitch was close and small
And wove two teeny purple suits-
how many legs in all?

Holidays are naturals for word problems, and Halloween is probably the richest source for subject matter.

DIY (Do It Yourself) Halloween Word Problems.

1. Read some Halloween picture books with lots of characters.

2. Brainstorm subjects (ghosts, mummies and all the usual suspects) and/or items in their setting (coffins, tombstones etc.) for the word problems.

3. For mathematical action, creatures can go to, or leave, parties/cemeteries/haunted houses (addition and subtraction). They can scare, haunt, fly over things, etc. Groups can be used for multiplication or division. If a mummy needs 12 yards of bandages, how many yards do four mummies need? If three vampires share a bag that has 18 candy eyeballs, how many eyes will they each get? I could go on and on. It’s just too much fun.

4. Draw the picture and decorate your house with it!

SCBWI Writer's Day

2009-10-26T16:39:00.000-07:00

Thanks to all the crew at Ventura/Santa Barbara SCBWI Writer's Day! Gracious hosts, great esprit de corps. On Saturday I gave a spotlight presentation called "How I Sold My Talking Dinosaur and Other Tales of a Picture Book Author," in which T-Math made his Powerpoint debut.

My favorite part of the conference was listening to the brisk, astute responses of the panel (Suzy Capozzi from Random House, Marilyn Mark from Marshall Cavendish, and Mark von Bargen from MacMillan) to the first pages. For picture books, the right equation was:
fresh characters + colorful writing + action propelling plot = a compelling Page One.

2009-10-19T07:03:00.001-07:00

Today at The Cat and the Fiddle we reveal one of our secret recipes for creating (and showing kids how to create) fun word problems.

They’re easy to whip up, once you’ve chosen an appealing subject in his/her typical setting.

Word Problem Lesson with Dinosaurs

1. Read Tyrannosaurus Math.

2. Make a list of the animals and objects that were used in the math problems (other dinosaurs, teeth, bugs, footprints, leaves, rocks, a tree, etc.).

3. Look at the pictures in the book and come up with other things T-Math could have counted (horns, bony plates, petals on flowers, etc.).

4. Pick one of these things and make your own word problem, using the math operation of your choice.

5. Draw a picture to illustrate the problem.

Any good non-fiction book that has lots of detailed illustrations can be a rich source for word problems. In the following example, I’ll use pirates.

Word Problem Lesson with a Fun Main Character: Pirates

1. Pick a math skill, (I’ll choose triple digit addition.)

2. Read or browse: Jan Adkin’s What If You Met A Pirate.

3. You’re going to write a word problem about a pirate. Brainstorm a list of items or people that might be in his setting - ships, sails, parrots, gold coins, etc. (My character will be Captain Jack, and the items will be treasure chests.)

4. Think of an action that could involve math, using that item. (A pirate needs to travel a certain number of miles to chase the galleon with the treasure chests. Or it will take him a certain number of days. Or he will count up the money in the chest. I’ll pick the money.)

5. Write the problem. (Captain Jack and his crew captured a galleon. There were two treasure chests on board. One had 715 gold pieces, and the other had 826. How many gold pieces were there all together? )

6. Optional: Add details and description to your problem to make it more fun:

Captain Jack and his crew chased a galleon. After a heated battle that lasted six hours they captured the ship. The men could hardly wait to open the treasure chests. There might be diamonds, rubies, and lots of gold. Actually there was 715 gold pieces in one chest, and 826 in the other. How many gold pieces were there all together?

7. Illustrate the problem.

And that, me hearties, is just one way to combine non-fiction, writing, math, and art. If you're a parent and/or a teacher, what non-fiction books might you use? If you're a non-fiction writer, what cool word problems could arise from your book(s)? AARGH!

Word Problems With Bite

2009-10-09T09:52:00.000-07:00

I wrote Tyrannosaurus Math (reviewed this week at Miss Rhumpius) before discovering Susan Gerofsky’s A Man Left Albuquerque Heading East, (mentioned in an earlier post). But it confirmed what I already knew: kids crave word problems with appealing imagery.

As part of her research Gerofsky asked a group of 5th and 6th graders to discuss three similar story problems in which Mike, Susanne or Sandra put some tomatoes, plums and apples into a number of bags or cartons.

“It would be better if it was about rocket blasters,” one child said.
“You’d have a better question, like if it’s candy,” said another. Sometimes you think of that when you solve a problem. Then when you go home you want to have candy. So your mouth just makes you do the question.”

Publishers of math books for the young get it. A search for “counting books” on Amazon turns up books with chocolate, icky bugs, crocodiles, fairy tale characters and more. Why shouldn’t older children get equal treatment? Why not serve them word problems with high interest topics?

In honor of Poetry Friday:

Max came upon five wild beasts,
They had fur, and scales and feathers,
Two terrible eyes shone from each,
How many eyes all together?

In my next post, a lesson on getting children to write their own jazzy word problems. Let the rumpus begin!

Word Problems- A Bit of History

2009-09-21T18:00:00.001-07:00

Now that the kids are back in school, The Cat and the Fiddle would like to dish out some thoughts about word problems.

When doing research for a historical project some time ago I stumbled across this one, dating from 1581:

“A drunkard drinketh a barrel of beer in the space of 14 days, and when his wife drinks with him then they drink it out within ten days. In what space will his wife drink that barrel alone?”

(from Elizabeth’s London: Everyday Life in Elizabethan London by Liza Picard)

Hopefully the scholars were sober whilst they tried to figure it out. Eager to know more math history, I read Susan Gerofsky’s fascinating A Man Left Albuquerque Heading East: Word Problems as Genre in Mathematics and learned that word problems are as old as the earliest human records (they show up on 4000 year old Babylonian cuneiform tablets) and have been employed continuously ever since. Some of the old chestnuts are even included, with alterations, in textbooks today. An Italian Renaissance math textbook contains an early version of the “two trains crossing” problem, using couriers dispatched from both the Holy Father in Rome and a certain Signora of Venice.

In her book Gerofsky analyzes and critiques word problems and makes recommendations for how to improve them. Hallelujah! Gary Larson spoke for most of us with his legendary cartoon that depicts a library in hell stocked with books like "Story Problems Galore.” Why did we dread them when we were in school? For their often preposterous scenarios. For their two dimensional characters. Who really cared about the number of fabric squares Jane needed for her quilt, or the length of the shadows cast by those flagpoles? Nobody did. Everyone knew word problems were cheap instructional set-ups, math not even thinly disguised as story.

Why is this my business? Because I’ve worked, as a substitute teacher, with hundreds of students in elementary classrooms. I’ve felt their pain. And I say, along with Gerofsky, that word problems don’t have to be lifeless. We can do better. Together, we can build exciting story problems for tomorrow’s children. Or at least we can have fun with them on this blog.

As I was going to St. Ives,
I met a man with seven wives,
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats.
Each cat had seven kits.
Kits, cats, sacks and wives,
how many were there going to St. Ives?

Elsewhere, in Tyrannosaurus related news: "Fossil Identified as mini-T-rex" What a story! Anastasia Suen featured Tyrannosaurus Math as a Picture Book of the Day, and it's now part of the 2010 California Collection by California Readers. Roar!

Booksigning at Chevalier's

2009-09-13T13:12:00.000-07:00

Sending out a group hug to supporters who came out yesterday to encourage Tyrannosaurus Math as he took his first lurching steps out into the public! It was great fun dedicating books for you in the sunlit window of Chevalier's.

I'm 4tunate 2 have fan who are gr8 writers, 1derful teachers, steadfast friends-

and thank you from the bottom of my prehistoric heart.

2009-09-05T13:19:00.000-07:00

We're planning to serve freshly baked dinosaur cookies at the inaugural book signing for TYRANNOSAURUS MATH

Saturday, September 12
11 am - 1 pm

Chevalier's Books
126 N. Larchmont Blvd.
Los Angeles CA 90004

(323) 465-1334.

A big thanks to gracious blog hostess Tina Nichols Coury for posting our Q and A on her site.

In other news, I taped an exclusive TV interview with dino host Rex Green! I nearly got my fingers nibbled off, but I'm hoping it's a good career move.

2009-08-31T17:24:00.000-07:00

So here at The Cat and The Fiddle thoughts drift to the end of summer, of summer fruit, and fresh fruit pies. Which brings back memories of EACH PEACH PEAR PLUM by Janet and Allan Ahlberg (Viking), a perfect confection of a children’s book.

My daughters and I loved the sweet and humorous illustrations, the little poems, the hunt for the hidden nursery rhyme and fairy tale characters, and the comforting ending where the whole gang eats their wedge of plum pie together on a checkered tablecloth under the fruit trees. (What a classic last scene, characters communing over food...)

I’m a fan of fairy tale retellings, (including fresh POVs), but this book revealed how characters behave in their down time, when they’re not busy resolving conflict in their narratives. It was a surprise, for me, that Robin Hood, Cinderella, The Three Bears, Mother Hubbard, Tom Thumb, Jack and Jill, Baby Bunting and even the Wicked Witch were all part of the same social network. I suspect I’m not alone in wanting to know more about the secret lives of these beloved characters. Who’s eating tarts with whom. “Behind the Nursery Rhymes” if you will.

And while we’re on the subject, why don’t we hire these kid lit celebrities to liven up some “story problems” in the classroom. If Cinderella arrives at the ball at 10:15, how much time will she have before her coach turns back into a pumpkin?

More on story and math, later. I’m going out for one last piece of peach pie, before summer's over.

2009-08-22T10:29:00.000-07:00

So you've pointed your mouse to The Cat and The Fiddle, where I'll be serving assorted thoughts on children's books, writing, and teaching.

Today the specialty of the house is:

ROARRR! My new book Tyrannosaurus Math, illustrated by Doug Cushman (Tricycle Press/Random House.)

We've got five fresh copies of T-Math to offer in a book giveaway, courtesy of my publisher.

To enter the contest, blog about this post and send me the link, OR
post a comment to this thread, recommending your top five trade math books for kids published within the last five years. Use only a valid email address! Winners will be selected at random in two weeks.

To get you up to speed about the book, here's most of the review from SLJ:

From the moment Tyrannosaurus Math (T-Math for short) is hatched, he views the world in mathematical terms. He begins with simple addition (how many siblings have also hatched) and proceeds through such skills as grouping (counting a herd of triceratops, though he’s not yet old enough to consume them), ordering and comparing (who ate the most dragonflies), and geometric shapes (is that meteor a sphere or a cube?). In all, 15 concepts are demonstrated with clear, logical, and amusing examples...

Markel never misses an opportunity to weave math into the lively text: “At his full size, nothing was scarier than the sight of T-Math thundering through the forest, chewing on a problem in his head.” Cushman’s acrylic cartoons, with their clean lines and vibrant colors, add considerably to readers’ enjoyment....This is a clever addition to the growing number of books that make a sometimes daunting subject both more understandable and just plain fun.   

The book is riddled with puns, and I love how other reviewers have gotten into the spirit:

"T-Math's enthusiasm for numbers and solutions to real-world problems makes this a title that math teachers can sink their teeth into." -Kirkus

"Roaring, rampaging, and arithmetic. Markel uses a perennial favorite—dinosaurs—to introduce basic mathematical concepts through word problems featuring a young T. rex with a head for numbers." -Booklist

I'm delighted to share this interview with Doug Cushman, my wonderful illustrator.

What kind of research did you do for Tyrannosaurus Math?

When I was working on the sketches for this book, I had already planned a trip to London so I took the opportunity to go to the Natural Science Museum there and go through their extensive research library. I was mainly concerned about foliage, plant life, different kinds of insects, etc during the late Cretaceous era (where you set your story & I know how particular you were about all of that, rightly so). I always like to add special detail and asides in the pictures. And of course I took photos of the T-Rex automaton they have on display there.

What was the most challenging aspect of illustrating the text? The most fun?

Just drawing and painting all those wonderful dinos was a kick. I confess I especially enjoyed the spread during the hurricane. The painting style I used was fairly new for me, I’d only used it twice before. But the bright colors and shapes seemed appropriate for your text. It was fun painting again in a different way. I’m no math scholar so trying to figure out a good way to illustrate simple math concepts was a real challenge. The hardest was designing those groups of triceratops. T-Math was a little kid so how to show the four groups of five but keep the size relationships real? It took weeks before I finally hit upon the idea of standing T-Math on a cliff overlooking the herds. Duh!

How do you decide what chunks of a manuscript to illustrate? Which ones will be 2-page spreads?

Pacing a picture book is the most important part of the process in my opinion. You want to make each page flow naturally into the next one but be true to the pace of the text as well. Your text was fairly easy as each page illustrated a single math idea. It was actually an easy manuscript to pace out. The challenge was to clearly present the math.

What was the role of the art director?

I worked mainly with the editor on this book. The AD is responsible for the whole look and feel of the book, choosing the font for the text, etc. She let me hand-letter the display type and the speech bubbles which was more work for me but I wanted to do it; it made the look of the book more fun (at least I hope it did). She also sent me the final layouts so I could design my illustrations with a better idea where she was going to place the text. A book is really a team effort!

If T-Math was your guest in Paris, what spot would you take him to?

Paris is a carnivore's paradise, lots of meat-eaters. I have a great little restaurant I go to every Thursday that serves an entrecote pour deux, a rib steak for two (though we'd probably have to order a couple extra). T math would be able to figure out the bill and the tip...he'd be the perfect dining partner!

More later!