Category: contests

Birthday Contest For Children’s Writers!!!

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Monday May 21 – The contest is going strong!  11 links so far, plus 4 or 5 entries in the comment section below!  Read!  Enjoy!  Enter 🙂

Woo-hoo!  It’s finally here!  The Birthday Contest!  Although, due to the busy-ness of April we had to push the contest back to a month that is no longer my birthday, surely someone is celebrating! 🙂  Let the games begin!

For anyone who hasn’t seen the rules, here they are:

The contest is to write a children’s story about a very creative and/or unique birthday celebration in 300 words or less.  Poetry or prose, your choice.
Entries must be posted on your blog (or in the comment section of this post if you don’t have a blog) between right now this very minute and 11:59 PM EDT Tuesday May 22.  Please add your entry-specific link to the list below (or, as mentioned, if you don’t have a blog and want to enter, just copy and paste your entry in the comment section below.)
If there are fewer than 20 entries there will be one prize.  If there are more than 20 entries there will be 1st, 2nd, and 3rd prizes!  Finalists will be chosen by me and my assistant judge and will be posted for you to vote on Monday May 28.  (I’m trying not to skip Would You Read It or Perfect Picture Books, or overload you with extra posts, hence the wait til Monday the 28th, which I realize is Memorial Day so the voting will stay up throughout Tuesday May 29!)
If there are fewer than 20 entries, and therefore one winner, the winner may have his or her choice of the following 4 options.  If there are more than 20 entries, and therefore a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place, 1st place will get 1st choice, 2nd place will get 2nd choice, and 3rd place will get 3rd choice of the following 4 options:
#1- a PB ms critique by me
#2 – a 3 pack of Perfect Picture Books including Chloe, My Side Of The Car, and Z Is For Moose
#4 – a $15 gift certificate to Merritt Bookstore.
So now, to get the party started, I will share a sample entry.  As I mentioned yesterday, my original idea did not pan out and I was VERY pressed for time this week, so don’t expect literary brilliance.  And what I mean by that is please don’t throw rotten tomatoes at me!

Hoppy Birthday!
(206 words)
Joey said, “My birthday’s coming!  I can hardly wait!
Here’s an invitation.  I sure hope you’ll save the date!
We’ll have silly hats, and blowers that make noise like a kazoo!
Balloons – at least a hundred! – orange, yellow, red and blue!
We’ll play games like Duck Duck Moose and Pin The Tail On Cousin Fred.
We’ll have contests to see who can stand the longest on their head!
If you happen to like water we’ve got lots of room to swim!
But if you’d rather climb and hang then try the jungle (gym).
I’m just hopping with excitement for my party – how ’bout you?
After all it isn’t every day that you turn 2!
Mom will make a birthday cake like you have never seen!
Seven luscious layers filled with icing in between!
All my friends will sing the Happy Birthday song to me.
I’ll make a wish and blow out all my candles – one, two, three!
We’ll serve up cake and ice cream by the gallon and the ton.
We’re going to need a LOT to have enough for everyone!
So won’t you please come join your little friend the kangaroo
For my Hoppy Birthday Party at the San Diego Zoo?
So now that you’re filled with confidence about how good your entry is compared to that! 🙂 please add your entry-specific post link to the list below, or copy and paste your entry into the comments.  I can’t wait to read them!

Perfect Picture Book Friday – Chloe

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I LOVE school visits.  Almost without fail, someone, at some point, makes me laugh!

Yesterday I visited with about 100 first graders.  They were a lively crew and we had tons of fun.

photo credit Pam Lawrence

Somewhere along in the proceedings, one alert audience member piped up with, “How old are you?” (a favorite question!)  “How old do you think I am?” I asked him.  Now, usually the answer to this question ranges from 20 to I-don’t-know, but this boy tipped his head to one side, considering, and then guessed – I kid you not! – “80?”

So apparently I look nearly twice my actual age 🙂

I think these kids thought 80 was a wild guess too 🙂
photo credit Pam Lawrence

I am so excited to share today’s book with you!  It is by one of my favorite author/illustrators and it was just released on Tuesday so it’s only 4 days old!  (Nowhere near 80 :))

If any of you have had the pleasure of reading Henry In Love, you will recognize young Chloe as the object of Henry’s affection and the recipient of the coveted blueberry muffin 🙂

Chloe
Written & Illustrated By: Peter McCarty
Balzer & Bray, May 15, 2012, Fiction
Suitable For: ages 2-8

Themes/Topics: family, imagination, love

Opening:  “Chloe loved the end of the day, when her whole family was together.  She called it family fun time.“

Brief Synopsis:  Chloe has 10 older brothers and sisters and 10 younger brothers and sisters.  She loves being in the middle.  But one night Dad brings home a surprise – a new TV! – and Chloe finds that she is no longer in the middle as everyone gathers around the TV instead.  Luckily it doesn’t take Chloe long to get everyone back on the right track!

Links To Resources:  The Five Best Toys Of All Time (so funny that it’s worth it just to read :)) puts “Box” at number 2.  Give your kids any of the items on this list and watch their imaginations soar as they come up with innumerable ways to play with these simple things.  In this day and age of specialty toys and electronic gadgets, there is nothing better than letting your kids (or students) take a box and turn it into a rocket ship, a castle, or a fort, and themselves into astronauts, princesses, or cowboys!

Why I Like This Book:  First of all, is it even possible to look at this art without feeling happy?  There is such exuberance in these bunnies, each with his or her own special details!  I think it’s something about the ears 🙂  But I also love the story.  I love that the rest of the family initially succumbs to the lure of the new TV, but Chloe and baby Bridget have no use for it.  Instead, they discover the bubble wrap in the box, and pretty soon the other kids are losing interest in the TV and coming over to Pop! Bip! Pap!  Next thing you know, they’ve found an entertaining use for the box, putting on their own TV show.  The message that family fun time can be family fun time without a TV is refreshing 🙂  I won’t give away the very last page, but it’s a hoot and you should get a copy of the book and see it for yourself! 🙂

For the complete list of books with resources, please visit Perfect Picture Books.

Before we all head off to read all the other PPBs, I’d like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that the Birthday Contest is just hours away!!!  (I’m feeling a mite panicky, actually, because I don’t yet have a sample entry prepared.  I thought I had an idea, but it didn’t pan out.  In the midst of this hectic week, I haven’t had time to work on a new one, so I’m seriously down to the wire and not hopeful for anything brilliant!)

Anyhoo, even though Saturday is not a usual posting day, please come on over tomorrow to start the Birthday Contest fun.  The link list will be up so that as people’s entries are ready they can put in their post specific links or, if you want to enter and don’t have your own blog, you can copy and paste your entry in the comment section.  That post will stay up until midnight Tuesday night (no new post Monday) so everyone can add their links and come back and read everyone else’s.  It will be a party 🙂  (Just make sure you’re linking on Saturday’s Birthday Contest post.  I don’t want anyone to get confused and link on PPBF – we’ll miss it!)

If you have any questions because I’m not being clear in my current fog of fatigue, please email or ask in the comments! 🙂

PPBF bloggers, please add your post-specific links to today’s link list so we can all come visit!

Looking forward to seeing you all tomorrow, and starting in on reading what I’m sure will be fantastic contest entries!  Happy Weekend, Everyone!

Oh Susanna – Are There Taboo Subjects In Picture Books?

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OK.  Twitter?

Here’s the problem:

I could spend ALL DAY there!!!

Seriously!

Everybody posts all these awesome links to fascinating, must-read articles and blogs and photos and etc. etc. etc. and no sooner am I done with one there are 20 more I’m dying to check out.

How do y’all get any work done?

Twitter is the Anti-Work!

Clearly there are going to have to be some strict ground rules or there’s going to be some world-class time-frittering going on over here 🙂

So which one of you self-disciplined types is going to lay the rules out for me?

And enforce them?! 🙂

Alrighty then.  Now that that’s out of the way, I hope you all had wonderful Mother’s Days however you may have celebrated!  I spent mine like this:

(Well, not really, but I would have if I could have :))

I hope you’re all as excited as I am about the Birthday Contest coming up at the end of this week!!!

And I must apologize in advance if I’m a little behind in visiting you all this week.  I have three days of back-to-back school visits, so my time will be limited.  But be assured that even if I don’t have time to comment I will be reading!  (I am abysmal at trying to comment from my phone… whilst driving… and trying to listen to my GPS… also the police frown on such multitasking and it is of course illegal so I would never do it… even if I was coordinated enough. :))

So stop encouraging me to break the law and let’s get onto today’s Oh Susanna question.

I have actually chosen two questions which I will address together because I think they are related.

First is Saba’s question:  Are there any subjects that are considered taboo in the picture book industry that children’s writers should stay away from?

And second is Catherine’s question (which I’m paraphrasing slightly): [In my story] Cheeku the Cheeky Chinese Chicken… I took out the chef because someone said kids can’t think about chickens going to be killed… The motivation for Cheeku to run away was so as not to be eaten. I had to change it to he didn’t want to be cooped up forever, but although it’s fun, it has no story as such. Do you think i should put the chef stuff back in?

These are interesting and related questions, I think.

Saba, I’m sure you aren’t referring to things like graphic violence, murder, torture, what I will refer to as “adult topics”, and things of that nature.  I don’t think any of us would ever consider writing a picture book about a subject that was so obviously inappropriate for children.  I think what you might mean is what I would call sensitive topics.  For example, is it appropriate to write a picture book about a family with same sex parents, or a picture book about war, death, or serious illness?

And that is a question that I think different people might give you different answers for.  Some would say those topics should be avoided – that they’re not appropriate.

But I think most would say that picture books are badly needed on those topics, because children who are experiencing those situations have just as much need (possibly more) to explore their feelings and feel validated, understood, comforted, and reassured as children who read books about being scared of the dark or getting a new sibling.

One glance at the Perfect Picture Book list will show you that there ARE picture books about war, poverty, illiteracy, death, illness, disability, non-traditional families, slavery, and a host of other sensitive and difficult topics.

To a large degree, I don’t think it’s the topic that is the issue, but more how it’s addressed.  Pretty much any topic – even a story about bears – can be written so it’s not appropriate for the picture book audience.  But by the same token, pretty much any topic can be written about in a sensitive and careful way so that it is not only appropriate, but valuable for this age.  For example, a book like Beatrice’s Goat most certainly addresses poverty, but in a way that is very palatable to children and filled with hope.

It all depends on how it’s written.

This is not to say that every book is appropriate for every child.  What’s right for one family may not be right for another.  Parents, teachers, and librarians must use their discretion.  While a book about a child losing his mother (as a very powerful example, I would cite the picture book The Scar by Charlotte Moundlic) might be terribly upsetting to many children, it might be just exactly what a boy or girl who has just lost a parent might need to hear to feel that they are understood in their grief and loneliness, that others have gone through this, and to help give voice to their emotions.  And while some families might welcome a book that addresses where babies come from in a very exact way (for example, Where Did I Come From? by Peter Mayle) others families might prefer to preserve the mystery a little 🙂

As writers, we want to reach all children, the ones that struggle with the hard things as well as the “every day” things (and I put “every day” in quotes because nothing feels every day to a person who is going through it, but as adults we know that there are some experiences that are normal and common for childhood and others you hope no child will ever have to bear, yet some of them do.)

Catherine’s question about her manuscript I think ties into this discussion.  Is it appropriate to write about a chicken who is afraid of being eaten?  I think it can be if it’s done right.  If there is humor, if the emphasis is more on the escape then the reality of being eaten, if it ends happily, and if there is a level at which it relates to common childhood experience – perhaps having to do something you don’t want to do, or needing to find a better way to do something, or finding your place in the world – then I think it can work.  There are certainly a host of fairy tales where some pretty scary stuff goes down if you think about it too carefully (Red Riding Hood, anyone?!) but that hasn’t stopped parents from reading them or children from enjoying them.  And anyone who has seen Disney’s Little Mermaid has seen the chef singing “les poissons, les poissons” merrily preparing to cook Sebastian the crab and I think most kids find that scene deliciously fun 🙂  So again, I think it’s all about how it’s written.  And again, depending on how it comes out, it might be a story that is not be appropriate for every child (perhaps more sensitive children would be better steering clear) and that parents, teachers and librarians might want to be selective about.

Saba and Catherine, I hope that answers your questions.  If not, please feel free to clarify or ask follow-ups in the comments!

Everyone else, Saba, Catherine and I are all VERY interested in your thoughts on this matter.  Are there subjects that are taboo in picture books?  Or that should be?  Should a writer stay away from the topic of a chicken who is afraid of being eaten?

I will look forward to your thoughts!  Especially if you have first-hand experience with having a story turned down by traditional publishers only because of topic.

Have a wonderful day! 🙂

Perfect Picture Book Friday – The Camel Who Took A Walk, And The April PPBF Prize

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Happy Friday, everyone!  Would anyone care for a donut?

Please!  Help yourselves!

For those of you who expressed concern, thank you, my sprained pancreas appears to be on the mend 🙂  But there will be no more interpretive dance for a while… 🙂

I’ve been trying to resist posting today’s Perfect Picture Book for a while because it is out of print.  But it is one of my all time favorite books ever, and since I got notification this week that one of my books is going out of print, I thought this would be a nice time to celebrate books that don’t always get as much recognition as one might hope.  This is a story my parents read to me, and that I read to my kids.  It was always a favorite in our house.  I hope you’ll be able to find a copy at your local library, or get a used one through some channel or other.  It’s really wonderful!

The Camel Who Took A Walk
Written By: Jack Tworkov
Illustrated By: Roger Duvoisin
Aladdin Books, 1951

Suitable For: ages 4-8

Themes/Topics: expectation/suspense, cause & effect/chain reaction, unexpected outcomes

Opening:  “The forest was dark and very quiet.
Not a creature was stirring.
Even the wind had stopped breathing.
Not a leaf was falling, not a blade of grass was moving.
And do you know why this was so?
Because
it was just the time between night and day,
when night was ending
and day was about to begin.”

Brief Synopsis:  A very beautiful camel goes for a walk in the forest.  Unbeknownst to her, a tiger waits hidden “by leaves, flowers, vines and grasses.  He was hidden also by the darkness.”  But the tiger is not the only one waiting and watching.  Each of the creatures hidden in the forest has its own secret plan.  What will happen to the very beautiful camel?

Links To Resources: Camel Coloring Pages, Tiger Coloring Pages, Monkey Coloring Pages, discuss cause and effect, read other books where one thing leads to another, like If You Give A Pig A Pancake or Stuck.

Why I Like This Book:  For starters, the language is lyrical.  Just read that opening aloud to yourself and hear the music of those words!  The whole book is like this – simply a delight to read aloud because of the rhythm of the language.  For writers, it’s a great example of how to do language really well.  The description is also beautiful, and not the kind of thing we find so much in PBs these days:
“Night in the forest is very dark, and it creeps away slowly.”
“Suddenly the first glimmer of light trembled in the sky.“
“Her nose smelled the early morning sweetness, and her eyes took in all the blue and pink colors of the sky.”
Isn’t is beautiful?  But aside from the exquisite language, I love the way the book builds tension.  The camel approaches the hidden tiger.  She comes closer… and closer… and you just have to wonder, how will she get out of this?  The ending is deliciously unexpected!

For the complete list of books with resources, please visit Perfect Picture Books.

Also, as you know, I like to thank all the wonderful participants in PPBF for their hard work each month by randomly selecting a blogger to receive a prize!  The winner for April is and the prize is JOANNA!!!  (And lest there be any confusion, as there was with Beth Doozenfloofer, that’s Joanna Marple :))  Please email me, Joanna, and let me know which you would like for your prize: *rummaging in my bag of goodies…* let’s see… your choice of The Writer’s Guide To Crafting Stories For Children by Nancy Lamb, Chloe by Peter McCarty (which I will be posting on PPBF next week or the week after – it doesn’t come out until May 15 but it’s really good!), or a $15 gift certificate to Merritt Bookstore (my own beloved local indie :))

Phyllis is still traveling – I hope you’ve all had a chance to keep up!  There should be posts from North Carolina and Italy, and maybe another from St, Lucia coming up soon!

I also hope you’re all hard at work on your Birthday Contest entries!  I am mulling… and hoping I’ve come up with an idea for the sample… but it remains to be seen 🙂

For those of you interested in Would You Read It (or simply in learning how to write a good pitch) there was an excellent post on Cheryl’s blog: How To Pitch Your Book.  The post uses a novel as an example, but it can easily be applied to picture books.  If you follow the basics rules, it will help you come up with a beautiful 3 sentence pitch.  Just right!

And as for NaPiBoWriWee, I’m happy to report that I’m technically ahead of schedule since as of this writing (on Thursday evening) I have already completed 4 PBs (which means I’m up-to-date until bedtime Saturday when I should have a fifth… which heaven knows how I will get written Saturday… Sunday either… hmm… maybe I’d better stay up a little longer!)  But RIGHT THIS SECOND, I’m ahead of the curve!

Now off you go to hop around the blogosphere and see all the Perfect Picture Books posted today.  PPB bloggers, please add your post-specific link to the list below.

Have a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious weekend everyone!  (I’m allowed to say that because Beth has dubbed me Susanna Poppins! :))

Oh Susanna – How To Explain Your Vision Of Marketing Strategy To A Publisher That Requests It?

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Wow!  That was such a long title I feel like I’ve already written the post! 🙂

How is everyone this morning?  Feeling bright-eyed and bushy-tailed?  I will readily confess to “bright-eyed”, but I’m not sure I’m up for discussing the rest of that question at this hour on a Monday morning 🙂  (Who thought up that question anyway?  I have a feeling it was a member of the marmot family…

… not that I’m mentioning any names…. :))

So anyway, being as how it’s Monday, which means the first day of May is on a Tuesday when I don’t post, I wanted to take this opportunity to remind you all, so that you’ll have plenty of time to work on it, that we’re having a contest this month!!!  I’m so excited, because we haven’t had a contest since the Valentines one which was AGES ago and I miss them! 🙂  I do so hope someone will want to enter! 🙂

The contest is to write a children’s story about a very creative and/or unique birthday celebration in 300 words or less.  Poetry or prose, your choice.

Entries must be posted on your blog (or in the comment section of my contest blog post on May 19 if you don’t have a blog) between Saturday May 19 and 11:59 PM EDT Tuesday May 22.  Add your entry-specific link to the list that will go up with my special post that Saturday.  I will not post on Monday May 21 so the list will stay up.)  I’m still picking out prizes, but there will be prizes and they will be good and they will include things like a 3 pack of Perfect Picture Books, a duo of craft books, and/or a PB MS Critique by Yours Truly, or maybe something else awesome that I haven’t thought of yet… 🙂  (You are invited to suggest prizes if there’s something your little hearts especially desire :))  If there are fewer than 20 entries there will be one prize.  If there are more than 20 entries there will be 1st, 2nd, and 3rd prizes!)  Finalists will be chosen by me and my assistant judge and will be posted for you to vote on Monday May 28.  (I’m trying not to skip Would You Read It or Perfect Picture Books or overload you with extra posts, hence the wait til Monday the 28th, which I realize is Memorial Day so the voting will stay up throughout Tuesday!)
I hope we’ll have lots of enthusiastic participants!  Remember, 12 X 12ers, this can do double duty as your May MS! 🙂
I would also like to take this opportunity to announce that I’m planning on taking a stab at NaPiBoWriWee this week… anyone else a glutton for punishment feeling motivated?
Also, Phyllis had an awesome Visit to Seattle where she made friends with A-Wall (gorgeous!) and saw the Space Needle 🙂  Please hop on over to Saba’s and read all about it!  And, if all goes according to plan, there will be a post up tomorrow (Tuesday May 1) about Phyllis’s Visit to Rosalind in England! (But it’s not there yet because she’s finishing A To Z!)
Now then!  Onto today’s Oh Susanna question, which comes to us from the lovely Jen:
“Submission guidelines to Sylvan Dell Publishing request that you include an explanation for how you envision the marketing of your book.  Besides stating that your marketing strategy would consist of book signings, blog tours, using various social media, and press releases, how else would you state on a query letter how you would envision the marketing of your book? Also, I’m not sure how to go about targeting an audience for my “platform” part of marketing my book. Any suggestions?”
Well, Jen, as to the first part of your question, I think you’ve covered most of what they would be looking for.  Certainly you would want to mention book signings, blog tours, social media, and press releases.
I would also mention school and library visits if you plan to do those.
But I think they’re looking for you to go a little further than that.  The publishing world is in a state of flux these days.  No one is anxious to take too much of a risk.  If possible, they’d like to know who exactly you think is going to buy your book – in other words, where you think the market is.
Identify the themes/topics/subjects of your story and present them in terms of market.
Is your story about a new baby?  Then it will appeal to parents who are expecting a second or subsequent child, be useful to preschool teachers, and make a great gift for relatives and friends to give to new big siblings.
Is your story about a very hungry caterpillar?  Then it will be useful in preschool and early elementary curriculum units on science, insects, metamorphosis, nutrition, and basic concepts like color and food types.
Is your story about a child in a non-traditional family?  Then it will be valuable to non-traditional families where children will be helped by knowing they aren’t alone, useful in curriculum units on family or acceptance/tolerance/difference, and helpful to traditional families who want to expand their children’s understanding of what makes a family.
Think about who your book would appeal to AND think specifically about the types of books this publisher tends to publish and where they market other books on their list.  Are they a big publisher with traditional marketing, or are they a smaller publisher who might only publish books about Maine (like Down East) or who might sell their books in zoo or museum gift shops, or other types of niches?  Make sure you’re directing your helpful marketing ideas in the right area.  A niche publisher might be thrilled to know that your book will appeal to everyone who has ever spent time on Monhegan Island, but a big six publisher isn’t going to want that book unless the setting is more incidental to a story with a much broader theme and appeal, in which case you would emphasize the broader theme rather than the niche setting… if that makes sense.
As to the second part of your question, about targeting an audience for your platform, that is something I think a lot of writers struggle with.
Writers tend to gravitate toward other writers.  If you’re a writer who writes a blog, chances are high that the vast majority of your followers are other writers, and a significant portion of the blogs you follow are also writing blogs.  Many of these people may also be parents or teachers or librarians or grandparents or others who have children in their lives for whom they buy books, but they may just as easily be people who don’t have kids yet, or whose kids have grown past the picture book age, or who aren’t around kids much.  I think it’s hard, as a writer, to get a huge following of your target audience in this instance which is, bluntly put, consumers.
The easier answer is for people who write non-fiction.  In that case, you always have a topic.  You are something of an expert on that topic (because hopefully you did your research well :)) so people may seek you out and you can also look for blogs and groups who are interested in that topic and get to know people there so you can eventually spread word of your book about butterflies, Martin Luther King Jr., saving wetlands, or whatever you happen to be writing about.
But for those of us who write children’s fiction, it’s much harder.  Our target audience is two-fold: the kids we write for who, unless we write upper middle grade or YA, are most likely not online, and the parents/teachers/librarians who buy books for them and read to them and who may or may not have much time in their busy days to be online.
It is great to connect with teachers and librarians who blog, as well as with mommy bloggers out there, but it is hard to do and it takes a lot of time – time to research which blogs might fit with your personality/style/books, time to forge relationships with those blogs, and time to see if and when a review of your book might fit into those blogs’ schedules.  And it can be hard to find that kind of time and still have time to write.  It’s a work in progress for most of us, I think.
I hope that answers your questions, Jen!  If you have any follow-up questions, please ask below.  As always, I would be thrilled if readers with experience in these areas would chime in with their thoughts – please comment!  It takes a village 🙂 and that’s one of the nicest things about the writing community – we are a village! 🙂

Perfect Picture Book Friday – My Side Of The Car

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Happy PPBF everyone!  I’ve got such a good one today – I think you’re going to love it 🙂  And please stay tuned afterwards for the winner of the Lisa Thiesing giveaway, as well as the winner of the Puzzled By Pink giveaway!

OK.  Ready?  Fasten your seat belts because here we go! 🙂

My Side Of The Car
Written By: Kate Feiffer
Illustrated By: Jules Feiffer
Candlewick, April 2011, Fiction
Suitable For: ages 4-8

Themes/Topics: patience, imagination, father-daughter love, optimism

Opening:  “My dad and I are going to the zoo.  We’ve tried to go to the zoo before.  But we never get there.  Something always happens.”

Brief Synopsis:  Sadie and her dad are going to the zoo.  Their plans have been thwarted three previous times, but this time they’re really going.  Except… on the way… it starts to rain.  They can’t go to the zoo in the rain.  But Sadie’s not about to let the fact that her dad sees rain deter her.  “I look out my window, and the sun is shining on my side of the car. People are putting on their sunglasses and heading to zoos all over the world on my side of the car.” While her dad sees nothing but rain, Sadie sees people mowing their laws and eating ice cream.  Is it raining or not?  Will Sadie and her dad get to the zoo this time or will they have to wait for another day?

Links To Resources:  Fun Zoo-Related Activities, Zoo Lessons And Activities, a page in the back of the book tells the true story of what happened (which is always fun :))

Why I Like This Book:  Anyone who has lived with kids knows that their perception of reality is not necessarily the same as yours… especially when they really want something! 🙂  What’s wonderful about this book is both Sadie’s determined optimism and her father’s patience and his loving understanding of how she needs to cope with her disappointment.  This book is also delightful because it’s written and illustrated by a father-daughter team about an incident that actually happened.  I’m not going to tell you whether they get to the zoo or not, though.  You’ll have to go read the book 🙂

For the complete list of books with resources, please visit Perfect Picture Books.

Now then!

I know you’ve all been holding your breath in anticipation of the winner announcements, so I won’t make you wait any longer 🙂

The winner of a signed copy of Lisa Thiesing’s wonderful book, A Dark And Noisy Night, is Catherine Johnson!  Catherine, come on down!  Pleas send me an email with your address and who you’d like the book signed to and Lisa and I will get right on the job of mailing it out to you!

And I want to extend a hearty thank you to everyone who tried to help me with my theme struggles.  I got quite a few good examples, and also discovered that I am not alone in my inability to articulate theme in a meaningful way, so all in all, it was a good exercise 🙂  And the winner of Puzzled By Pink is Beth!!!  Thank you ALL for your help! and Beth, you’d better email me your address…. 🙂

PPBF bloggers, please add your post-specific link to the list below so we can all come visit you 🙂

Have a great weekend everyone!

Would You Read It Wednesday – The 37th Pitch… And A Challenge!… With A Prize :)

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YIKES!

I moseyed on over to my blog to write today’s post and everything looks totally different and unfamiliar!  We’re not in Kansas anymore!

What happened to blogger?

I guess this is that new format they’ve been threatening and I’ve been avoiding.

Well.

Let’s just hope this post goes up the way it’s supposed to!

Harrumph!

First things first.  Your friend and mine, Phyllis, cutest and fuzziest of all groundhogs, is still on tour.  Wonderful, amazing, awesome people are still hosting her and putting up terrific posts about her visits.  So if you have a second, please hop over and see what kind of high jinx and shenanigans she got up to with Saba in Washington!

Next, I’d like to throw out a challenge to all of you – and this is for everyone because you don’t have to be a writer to do this.  In fact, some of you teachers might be really good at this!

It has come to my attention that I’m very bad at distilling picture books (or any other books for that matter) down to the nitty-gritty of their themes.  So for anyone who would like to take pity on me (and I’m guessing there are a fair number of others out there who could benefit from this as well :)) please be so kind as to give the title of a well-known picture book in the comments today along with a few words or a sentence that crystalize the theme of the book.  You may also do the plot if you want, but it’s really the theme I’m interested in.

So, for example, what the flinging’-flangin’ heck is the theme of Fancy Nancy?  Pinkalicious?  I Want My Hat Back?  I mean something like “love conquers all” or “if at first you don’t succeed, keep trying”… that kind of thing.  Gosh.  They sound like proverbs.  Is that how this works?  You can see I need help 🙂  So PLEASE help!  For every book you put with a theme in the comments below today or tomorrow, I will put one entry into random.org and then on Friday, during Perfect Picture Books, I will give one lucky winner a copy of the brand new and fabulous Puzzled By Pink (of which I also can’t state the theme) by Sarah Frances Hardy!!!

See how this works?  My desperation equals a great exercise for you and the possibility of an awesome book! 🙂  Nice, no?

Third, by popular demand, we will be doing one (or possibly a couple) of Q&A posts with editor Erin Molta, so if you have questions for her, please get them to me ASAP, either in the comments or by using that handy Email Me button over there on the right 🙂

Now then.  Time to get down to business.  Would You Read It business, that is.  Today’s pitch comes to us from Anna who has a background in teaching and strives to entertain and teach children about different cultures in her writing.  (I believe this book has been self-published, but Anna is still hoping to strengthen her pitch for marketing purposes.)

Ready?

Working Title:  A Bug Who Needs A Hug
Age/Genre: Picture Books (ages 2-7)
The Pitch:  A Bug Who Needs A Hug is about a fuzzy little bug that goes out into the forest looking for someone to hug. The vivid and colorful illustrations in the book emphasize the importance of friendship and leave a positive message for children at the end of the story.

So what do you think?  Would You Read It?  YES, MAYBE or NO?

If your answer is YES, please feel free to tell us what you particularly liked and why the pitch piqued your interest.  If your answer is MAYBE or NO, please feel free to tell us what you think could be better in the spirit of helping Anna improve her pitch.  Helpful examples of possible alternate wordings are welcome.  (However, I must ask that comments be constructive and respectful.  I reserve the right not to publish comments that are mean because that is not what this is about.)
Please send YOUR pitches for the coming weeks!  For rules and where to submit, click on this link Would You Read It or on the Would You Read It tab in the bar above.  There are openings in early July – not that far away! – so go ahead and send your pitch for a chance for it to be read by editor Erin Molta!
Anna is looking forward to your thoughts on her pitch!
And I am looking forward to your succinct statements of picture book themes and your questions for Erin!
Have a happy Wednesday everyone! 🙂
Wait!  Stop the presses!  I forgot to say that if anyone hasn’t had a chance to read Monday’s interview with Lisa Thiesing and enter the awesome book giveaway, there is still time!  Hop on over!

Oh Susanna – What Should A New Author Look For/Watch Out For In A Contract?

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I am so full of happy announcements today!  I like to think I’ll be spreading joy and cheer like sunshine 🙂

I assume you all have plenty of Easter candy left over, so feel free to snack while I spread cheer 🙂

First off, I would like to announce the winner of the March Pitch Pick!  As always, all the entries were terrific, and all the entrants were so brave to put their work out there for everyone to comment on.  Thanks to you, we all learn something new each week.  It would be lovely if everyone could win, but since we have to pick one each month, the polls have spoken and this month’s winner is………

Miranda, with Reef Stew!

Congratulations, Miranda!  Your pitch has already been sent to editor Erin Molta for critique, and we will all look forward to her comments!

Next, as you may or may not remember :), I so appreciate all the work the devoted Perfect Picture Book bloggers do each week that I like to spread a little thank-you cheer by randomly selecting one person each month to win a little prize.  Bloggers get one entry for every Perfect Picture Book they post that month, so in March quite a few people got 5 entries!  In case you are wondering, this month 33 bloggers posted anywhere from 1-5 books each, resulting in 128 new books being added to the list!  I didn’t do an exact count, but we now have upwards of 450 books on the list all together.  It’s getting to be quite an impressive resource!  Hopefully, parents and teachers out there are beginning to discover it and put it to good use 🙂

But I digress… 🙂  I was announcing the March gift winner which is

… dddrrruuummm rrrooollllll…

Thank you so much, Kirsten, for your wonderful additions to the list this month, and thank you to EVERYONE who participates in PPBFs – you are all wonderful!!!

So, hmm… let me rummage around in my goody bag and see what I come up with for this month’s prize…  Kirsten, you may email me to receive your choice of one of the following:  The Giblin Guide To Writing Children’s Books, An Egg Is Quiet, or Little Bunny Foo Foo: The Real Story.

My next happy announcement is that you folks seem to like the writing contests over here – thank you so much!  Quite a lot of people voted, and the general sentiment seems to be that we should have the birthday story contest in May because April is just a little too busy.  I am happy to oblige.  I want it to be fun for everyone, not stressful :), so if more people will enter and everyone will enjoy it more in May, than May it shall be!

Next on the happy announcement list is that we should have 5 or so new Tour Posts coming from Phyllis in the upcoming week from Vermont, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Australia, and 2 from the UK… if all goes according to plan… which it doesn’t always 🙂  But do stay tuned 🙂

Also, for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet, Phyllis now has her very own Punxsutawney Phyllis Face Book Page for anyone who wants to like her!  She’s very excited and hoping to become more popular than Punxsutawney Phil, who currently has 20,885 “likes”.  Phyllis currently has 48 “likes” so she has a ways to go, but she is very optimistic 🙂  Phyllis’s page is still evolving, but she will certainly be featuring a Fun Fact Friday!

Finally, my last happy announcement for the day is that I get to babysit for my granddaughter today… which also means I will not be online much as she is 8 months old and crawling 🙂  So please forgive me if I get a little behind in blog post commenting!

Now that you are all hopefully feeling very cheerful, we shall move on to today’s Oh Susanna question.  Donna has a good one.  She asks:

What are some of the key things a new author should find in a “good” contract? The flip side to that would be what are some of “bad” things in a contract that should set off warning alarms for a new author to run for the hills?

Donna, my experience is that contracts are not all that different from publishing house to publishing house. I have dealt with 5 different houses, and they all seem to cover the same basic, standard things.  These include (but may not be limited to):

  • where the publisher has the right to publish your book (USA only, or foreign?)
  • your assurance that your work is original
  • when your manuscript is due in final form
  • the time frame the publisher agrees to publish the book in and at whose expense
  • when galleys and/or proofs will be delivered by the publisher and how much time you have to review them and make any corrections, as well as how much you can change the work without incurring cost to yourself
  • the amount of your advance and when and how it will be paid (full amount on signing, or half on signing, half on delivery of ms, etc.)
  • subsidiary rights (such as book clubs, audio, film rights etc.)
  • how many free copies the publisher will supply the author
  • when statements of account and royalties if they are due will be delivered (usually semi annually, and the publisher will supply the dates)
  • author’s right to examine publisher’s accounts
  • agreement by author not to publish competing work
  • reversion of rights and termination

I don’t think any reputable publishing house would try to hoodwink or cheat an author, but there’s no doubt that publishing is a business. The publisher is laying out the money to produce your book and they want to make sure it’s worth their while, so the contract will likely be written in their favor.  You as an author, especially a first-time author, may have to consider how hard you want to push for things.  Do you really need a bigger advance/higher royalties/to keep the audio rights etc. if by insisting on such things you may cause the publisher to withdraw their offer?  Many people do push.  Other’s (like me) tend to be more complacent.  This is a reason many authors like having an agent – it is the agent’s job to negotiate higher advances, better royalties etc.

I’m generalizing here to give you an idea of what to expect, but I think a typical advance to a new picture book author can be anywhere from $1000 – $5000 (depending on the book and the size of the publishing house and other factors), royalties of 5% on hardcover, 6% on paperback are common, publication in 12-24 months (but it can be shorter or longer), and 10-15 free copies of your book are typical.  I don’t know how frequently you can expect to get audio rights, or foreign rights, or things like that – sometimes I get them, sometimes the publisher does and I don’t have enough data to make a guess.

I’m not really sure what to tell you to be wary of –  certainly any situation where the publisher asks you to pay for things.  Many vanity publishers will do this, but it’s not something that should show up in a traditional publishing contract.  And I guess a contract that varied hugely from the generalities above might be something you’d want to look at pretty carefully.

I would recommend having someone look over your contract if you’re not familiar with publishing contracts.  I believe there are even resources in SCBWI for this, although I’m not sure.

So I hope that answers your questions somewhat, Donna, and I would be most appreciative of any readers who have knowledge or expertise in this area who would be willing to chime in in the comments!

Have a great Monday, everyone.  See you Wednesday for the next pitch – this one a picture book from Rebecca C!

So Many Surprises!!! And Oh Susanna – How Many MSS For Agent Querying?

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Raise your hand if you’re happy it’s April!!!

April happens to be my favorite month.  The air is warmer and softer.  The light changes.  Nature is trying on all her new finery.  And some of my favorite people have birthdays this month 🙂

So in honor of April, I have surprises for you, my friends!  (And may I just say, I hope you all ate your Wheaties this morning because I have a lot to say – which I know you’ll find shocking since I’m normally such a model of succinctness :))

Surprise #1!

First, after much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments, I have managed the MAP OF MY DREAMS for Phyllis’s World Tour.  It is so cool that you will be amazed!  Here’s what you can do:

You can zoom out and see all the places in the world she’s been at one time, or zoom in so you can easily click on each marker.

You can change the view from map, to satellite, to hybrid, to terrain!

You can click on the individual markers and they will tell you who she visited in that spot, show a photo you can click to enlarge and clarify, give a short description of her visit, and include a link directly to the associated blog post (it says website which I couldn’t change but click on it and it will take you to the blog post.)  (Also, I could only attach one link per marker, so for a couple people who posted 2 or 3 times, I put the main post.)

And it has purple markers for the main tour and yellow markers for the school tour!

Check it out!  (The only annoying thing is the ad I can’t get rid of!)
http://www.zeemaps.com/pub?group=338173&x=-68.5547&y=20.6328&z=15

Here’s a screen shot that shows you the whole map without the ad 🙂

click HERE for interactive map

Seriously.  Is this a wonder or what???!!! 🙂  (and if anyone finds glitches, you must break it to me very gently because this took me a Very. Long. Time!)

Of course, it makes me notice all the empty areas, so if you know anyone in South America or Greenland or Turkey or such like who wants to join the tour, let me know 🙂

I know you will all want to try it out right away, but come right back, because more good stuff is coming!

In case you missed it over the weekend, Phyllis visited Rena in Alberta, Canada, (there was an enchanted castle and bull riding involved!) and one of Pam’s literacy groups in Atlanta, GA (very cute kids and Phyllis learned a lot about Dr. King, Ghandi, and Rosa Parks!)!  Pam will have more posts to come as Phyllis visits with other kids.

Surprise #2!

It’s been a while since the Valentines’ Contest, so what better way then a Fabulous Fun-Filled Contest to celebrate spring, and April, and writing for kids, and all the awesome April Birthdays (mine, my dad’s, my niece’s and my nephew’s, your friend and mine Renee’s of No Water River, and please, if anyone else celebrates this month let me know and I’ll add you to this celebrity list :))

Here are the rules:

Write a children’s story about a very creative or unique birthday celebration in 1-300 words!  (The 1 is for Cathy if she needs an extra challenge.. and Cathy? it also has to rhyme! :))

It may be prose or poetry, so those of you participating in Poetry Month can join in.  Those of you who are participating in the A To Z challenge may title it with anything you want to fit your letter of the day 🙂  Those of you who are participating in 12 X 12 will have your manuscript for the month!  And for those of you not participating in any of the above and feeling a little left out, this is your chance to be part of something far less time-consuming 🙂

Entries must be posted on your blog (or in the comment section of my contest blog post on April 21 if you don’t have a blog) between Saturday April 21 and 11:59 PM EDT Tuesday April 24.  Add your entry-specific link to the list that will go up with my special post that Saturday.  I will not post on Monday April 23 so the list will stay up.)  I’m still picking out prizes, but there will be prizes and they will be good and I will let you know when I decide what they are 🙂  (You are invited to suggest prizes if there’s something your little hearts especially desire :))  If there are fewer than 20 entries there will be one prize.  If there are more than 20 entries there will be 1st, 2nd, and 3rd prizes!  The number of entries will also determine the number of finalists that will be posted for you to vote on Monday April 30.  (I’m trying not to skip Would You Read It or Perfect Picture Books or overload you with extra posts, hence the wait til Monday the 30th!)  (And if more than 20 people comment that they have too much to do in April and won’t enter, I will move the contest to May, even though *sob, sniff* it will no longer be The Birthday Month!)

Surprise #3!

I have a very special extra post that will go up tomorrow!  (Yes, tomorrow, even though I usually don’t post on Tuesday – it was either that or stuff it into this already overly long post!)  But you’re going to want to see this one.  It is a guest post from the lovely Cori Doerrfeld in which she will share with us how she created her newest book, Little Bunny Foo Foo!  Original and published mss will be included so you can see the difference, as well as her first vision of the art and how it morphed into the final version!  It’s not often you get to see so much process, and Cori has been very kind to share, so I hope you’ll all find a little time tomorrow (or when you have a few minutes) to read it.

Now, to finish up this very long post (I always have so many things to share, and only 3 days a week to do it!) we have a quick Oh Susanna question.  (The inclusion of Oh Susanna isn’t a surprise on Monday, but the question is always a surprise, so it still counts :))

Carter asks, “How many submission-ready manuscripts should I have in my pocket before I begin querying agents?  I know which one I want to lead with, but I assume I should have a number of others for an interested agent to read when considering representation.”

I would say that, as with so many things in this business, a lot depends on the agent.  For some agents, one strong manuscript is all they need.  But I think most will want to see more, especially with picture books.  My answer would be, lead with your strongest manuscript and have 3 others waiting as back up – enough to show that you’ve got more than one story in you, and preferably a little bit of a range of your style (if you have a range of style.)  For example, if your lead manuscript is roll-on-the-floor funny, maybe one of your others should be a quieter/more thoughtful/different emotion type of story if you also write that kind of story.  However, that very much depends on your writing style – some authors produce funny, or emotional, or whatever every single time and that’s what they’re known for.  Basically, you want to have enough to show that the agent will hopefully like at least a couple.

What do the other writers out there think?  Would you recommend more than 3 back-ups?  Less?

Thank you all for sticking it out to the end of this post! 🙂  Please, have an extra donut on me!  See you tomorrow with Cori, and Wednesday with the March Pitch Pick and Delores’s Would You Read It pitch.  I hope you all have LOTS of fun with the map! 🙂

Perfect Picture Book Friday – The Monster Returns

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Oh, boy, do we have fun in store today!

But you know the rules – Perfect Picture Book first, other stuff after 🙂  So let’s start with the book!  Today’s choice is by one of my favorite author/illustrators.  Don’t be surprised if some of his other books show up on PPBFs in the future 🙂

The Monster Returns
Written and Illustrated By: Peter McCarty
Henry Holt & Co., January 2012, Fiction
Suitable For: ages 3-7

Themes/Topics: art, friendship, imagination, surprises

Opening:  “One beautiful day, Jeremy was up in his room.  Jeremy didn’t like to be disturbed when he was drawing.”

Brief Synopsis:  (From the jacket copy) “Jeremy thought he’d seen the last of his monster when he sent him away with a one-way bus ticket.  But suddenly the phone rings… The monster has returned!”

Links To Resources: Mad Monster Activity, Monster Songs and Poems, have kids draw their own monsters or make them out of whatever craft materials you have to hand!

Why I Like This Book:  This is a sequel to Jeremy Draws A Monster (also excellent!)  Jeremy is perhaps a little too inclined to spend time on his own drawing, and this book shows both that it’s okay to spend time alone being creative and that it’s nice to have friends to do things with.  Jeremy is imaginative and resourceful in dealing with the monster.  The end is a fun surprise where the monster’s intent turns out to be different than the reader might have expected, with the message that everyone needs friends – even monsters 🙂  The art is simple and engaging with plenty of white space to draw your eye to the monster 🙂

For the complete list of books with resources, please visit Perfect Picture Books.

Before we get to the fun part (announcing the winner of the Valentines Day Writing Contest!) just a little business about Perfect Picture Books.

A few stats:

– This is PPBs 14th week.
– 37 Bloggers are participating, of which 25 have contributed at least 4 books and 5 besides me have contributed every week since the beginning.  (Also 1 has contributed 12, and 2 have done 11, so we have some very dedicated PPB bloggers! :))
– There are 245 books on the list before today’s go up.
– They fall across 145 categories/subjects/themes.
– With possibly one exception, every single one posted has resources!

So thank you all for your fantastic work.  We are building a great resource here for parents, teachers, home schoolers, writers, and gift-givers!  That said, I think we have enough of a list going now that we should all be talking this up to everyone we know who might find the resource useful – it’s only really great if people are actually  benefitting from it.  So I encourage you all to spread the word in whatever capacity you can.  Tracy (known to many of you as A2ZMommy) is writing a review about it for her local news site today!  You can read it HERE.

Since some bloggers are new to PPBFs, and some people may need a refresher, I’d just like to take a second to remind you all of a few key things:
1.  Please check the list on the Perfect Picture Book tab before you choose a book to post.  I try hard to keep it updated.  If I’m behind, it’s usually only by the previous week’s list, so check that too.  We are trying to avoid multiple postings of the same book.

2.  When you add your link to the list, please add the post-specific link (not the general link to your blog.)  It doesn’t matter that much for the actual day of posting, but for anyone who comes along afterwards, your link then links to whatever the next post you did was – not the PPB.  And for me going along updating, I then have to search for the post and get the right link for the archive page.

3.  Please only post favorite books WITH RESOURCES!  The resources are what set our list apart from many others.  The resources can be links online or things you make up, but there must be something that people can use to expand their use of the book.  Books without resources will NOT be added to the master list.

4.  Please follow the PPB format (available at the bottom of the Perfect Picture Book tab) as closely as possible.  This allows for consistency across blogs, making it easy for people using the list to find the information they want.

5.  Please make sure to post themes, age appropriateness, and fiction or non-fiction clearly.  It’s a lot of work updating the list, and if I have not read the book, I can’t guess where it’s supposed to fit or how to archive it.

Thank you so much for your attention to these details.  I’m sure it seems nit-picky, but it’s really about making the list as useful as possible and preserving my sanity in trying to keep it up-to-date 🙂

NOW.  AT LAST.  THE MOMENT YOU’VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR!!!

Who won the Valentine Contest?

Oh, wait.  I think I hear my doorbell.  I’ll be right back….

JK 🙂

Once again, I’d like to thank everyone for their terrific entries.  Many of us readers are writers.  We know how hard it is to put your work out there.  And we appreciate your bravery.  All the entries were worthy and fun to read, and I wish you could all win!

But I don’t have that many prizes…. unless you want raccoon nest material?  I think there’s some of that in the garage…

It was a closely contested race – the most competitive of any of the contests so far.  But eventually, someone pulled ahead and stayed there.  So, without further ado, the voters have spoken, and the winner of our Valentine Contest is:

PENNY!!!!! with Frankenstein Valentine!!!!!

Congratulations, Penny!  This is the second time you have won a contest here.  You may have a future as a writer 🙂  You get your pick of Ann Whitford Paul’s book, or a picture book ms critique from me.  Let me know via email what your choice is!

2nd Place goes to Erik for Love Has No Point.  He gets a copy of Spilling Ink (if he doesn’t already have it :))

3rd Place goes to Vivian for Whom Do I Love?  She gets our admiration for being 3rd out of 30 entries 🙂

Thanks again to everyone for making the contest such a success!

Now have a great weekend, and PPB bloggers, please remember to add you post-specific link to the list below, which I will hopefully remember to attach this week! 🙂  OH!  And remember our awesome interview which will take place on Sunday with Donna Farrell, website and blog designer for children’s authors and illustrators!