I am delighted to announce that I am now the Patron of Reading at Forthview Primary in Edinburgh!
In three very packed events last week, I chatted about books and stories with EVERY SINGLE CLASS in the school (more than 400 kids in one day) and I was really impressed by their passion and their imaginations and their brilliant questions.
I was also extremely impressed that parents turned up to each session and sat at the back of the hall (they got chairs, the pupils sat on the floor…) watching as their kids discussed books and reading, and came up with story ideas.
That was particularly important because what the school really want to achieve is a Reading Community, where everyone – pupils, teachers and families – share their enjoyment of books and reading for pleasure.
I am a huge fan of reading for pleasure (I do it myself as often as I can!) but I’m also a huge fan of writing for pleasure, making stuff up for pleasure, and playing with stories for FUN!
So when I visited, the nursery and P1s read The Magic Word and brought a toy pony to life with some magic ingredients and a bit of stirring.
The P2s and P3s read Never Trust a Tiger and helped a tricksy little rabbit escape several times from a hungry cobra.
And the P4s to P7s read a bit of Storm Singing from the Fabled Beasts series, and worked out lots of different and dramatic ways to rescue someone from a cliff edge.
I also met some of the teachers, some of the parents, and some of the council and library staff who will be working wit the reading community. And I heard about lots of the brilliant ideas the school are coming up with, like a reading group for dads.
And I want to go back! I want to go back and chat to smaller groups about what they love reading, what they love writing and possibly give them sneak previews of what I’m writing too. And that’s the great thing about being Patron of Reading – I will go back!
It’s amazing to be invited to be part of such an ambitious project, and I’m really looking forward to it!
Thanks Forthview Primary, and hope to see you again soon! (Keep reading! And keep away from cobras and cliff edges…)
Here are some pictures of the launch:
I think this was when I asked who loved stories! (Or it might have been when I asked for ideas about how to escape from a cobra. They’re resourceful kids in Forthview…)
This is inspirational headteacher Mrs Littlewood talking about how much she loves reading.
This is me grinning like a loon in front of a table of books.
And finally, a slightly odd picture of me either doing a wee dance, or pretending to kick a tree trunk into a pit to save a tiger.
2013 has been a weird year for me. I moved house twice and had six books published, but not one of the six was a new novel.
So in 2014, I plan to stay put, publish fewer books and get stuck into some serious novel writing.
It seems weird that I published more books than even before in a year when I was distracted by house moves (and selling and buying and decorating and lawyers and packing and unpacking – all of which manages to be both boring and stressful.) However almost all the books I published in 2013 were written in 2012 or even 2011, and not one of them was a novel.
I was delighted with the new books though: The Magic Word has the most amazingly magical and funny pictures by Claire Keay and my first proper cat character (hello Beanie…); Masha and the Bear is possibly my favourite of the Barefoot Animal Stories so far, because I think Masha is the cleverest little heroine (nothing like Little Red Riding Hood – she doesn’t need anyone to rescue her from the animal she meets in the woods); but I love the Hungry Wolf too, because the lamb in that is so cheeky that you almost feel sorry for the wolf, and Melanie Williamson’s pictures of the daft wolf still make me laugh out loud.
2013’s picture books
So, three beautiful books with great pictures and stories that I’m proud of. I hope I’ve done that before though.
The big change for me in 2013, apart from the constant house moves, was the publication of my first (and second and third) collections of myths and folklore. I’ve retold old stories before, in the Mountain’s Blood, or the gorgeous Little Red Riding Hood. But this year, full length collections of Scottish stories (Breaking The Spell), heroine legends (Girls, Goddesses and Giants) and winter stories (Winter’s Tales) all came out. I wrote the Scottish stories a couple of years ago, and the heroine tales last year. Winter’s Tales is the only book out this year which I actually wrote this year – it was pulled together in the spring before the first house move.
And I am so happy about these collections. Every single one contains stories that I love sharing with children, stories which inspire the fiction and novels that I write, and it is wonderful being able to share them with even more people.
Breaking The Spell includes the legend of Tam Linn, Girls Goddesses and Giants includes a seven-headed dragon, and Winter’s Tales includes Loki the Viking trickster god – all stories I love sharing, all stories which have inspired plots and scenes in the First Aid for Fairies series.
2013’s myths, legends and folktales
Though it was weird writing these stories down! These are stories that I tell all the time in schools and libraries and at book festivals, to show what inspires my fiction, so I was typing exactly what I tell. And I think that’s worked (the books are getting really good reviews and reactions anyway…) It was also a fascinating challenge choosing the right balance of stories – dark and light, long and short, gory and funny, stories from lots of different places – and researching the background to them all. It felt like being a student again, only getting to choose my favourite thing in the world (stories!) to write my essays on.
So, lots of new books this year. Which is great. But unfortunately, there wasn’t much new writing in 2013. I often say that I can write anywhere: trains, staffrooms, cafes, outside dance studios… but that only works so long as I have my own study to go home to at night, so I can pull it all together. But when I didn’t know where I’d be writing next, and when all my stuff was in boxes, it was really hard to see ahead in novels, to concentrate on what happens next. So my writing this year has been a bit stop start…
Anyway, that was 2013. Three different studies and six different books. But no novels. I do feel bad about that.
However, 2014 is nearly here. And there’s a novel!
In March 2014 my first teen novel, a thriller called Mind Blind, will be published by KelpiesTeen. And I am SO excited.
Mind Blind
This is another big change for me. Mind Blind is for older readers, it’s not about magic, it has some very nasty characters and some very dark and dangerous scenes. I loved writing it (last year…) I loved editing it (this year, on lots of different floors in lots of different houses) and I am so excited about what readers will think of it (next year!)
And also, now that I’m settled in my lovely new bigger brighter study, I’m working on a new adventure. But I can’t tell you about that yet. You’ll have to wait until next year, or maybe even the year after….
(And yes, those are not-yet-unpacked boxes in the background of the photos. I’d rather write than unpack…)
I’ve now written six books with wolves inside, five of which have a wolf on the cover, and two of which even have a wolf in the title.
Just last week, the wolfiest book of all was published. The Hungry Wolf is a retelling of all the best ‘daft wolf tries to eat clever lamb’ stories I could find, stunningly illustrated by Melanie Williamson.
But there are lots of wolves in my other books too:
There’s a helpful wolf in the last story in Girls, Goddesses and Giants, my recent collection of heroine stories.
There’s a smooth-talking sharp-toothed wolf in Little Red Riding Hood.
Sylvie, the rather snappy wolf girl, appears in both Wolf Notes, the second novel in the First Aid series, and Maze Running, the last of the series.
And I have a collection of Winter’s Tales coming out later this year (just in time for the first frost and snow!), which has a lovely lemon-yellow wolf on the cover and a howling wolf story inside.
There is no one other creature, apart from possibly 11 year old girls, that I have written about as often as I have written about wolves.
So what is it about wolves that draws me and so many other writers to them? (Many of my favourite kids’ books are about wolves, like Michelle Paver’s Wolf Brother, or werewolves, like Roy Gill’s Daemon Parallel… To save me listing lots more, here are seven of my favourite wolf books for adults from the Scottish Book Trust website…)
So, what is it about wolves?
There are many theories about people’s fascination with wolves, but I think I know why I’m drawn as a writer to stories about wolves, why I love retelling ancient wolf stories and creating new wolf stories.
Wolves are both cool and scary. They are beautiful creatures, but they are also dangerous. And what’s so handy for writers is that EVERYONE has a reaction to wolves. Wolves are story shorthand for lots of useful, dramatic things. We don’t need to explain wolves. So wolves are a bit like dragons, which are also fascinating, beautiful and very dangerous. Perhaps wolves are the real world equivalent of dragons…
In stories, wolves can be equally convincing and equally useful to the plot as either a friend or an enemy (or, like Sylvie in Wolf Notes, as a mix of both.) So wolves can be tricksters: never entirely trustworthy, just as likely to be a baddie as a goodie, and very likely to move the story in unpredictable ways. That’s why one of my favourite mythical wolves is Fenrir, the son of Viking trickster god Loki.
One of the reasons I tell so many wolf stories is that so many cultures tell wolf stories. Almost every part of the world has had wolves as a main predator at some time, so wolves appear in lots of stories. This is another similarity between wolves and dragons, which are also an almost universal story baddie. (I know Irish dragon stories and Chinese dragon stories, Greek dragon stories and Scandinavian dragon stories; but I also know native American wolf stories and Viking wolf stories, Scottish wolf stories and Sanskrit wolf stories.) It is fascinating to see how the role and character of the wolf changes across cultures: almost always a baddie in Europe, often a wise goodie in native American culture.
I have a personal reason for feeling strongly about wolf stories too. I used to be scared of dogs, ‘cross the road if a dog was walking towards me on a lead’ type scared. Then I spent months researching wolves’ social organisation and intelligence for Wolf Notes. Once I understood a bit about wolves, I suddenly realised that I understood a bit about dogs too – mainly that they weren’t remotely interested in me because I was neither another dog nor their owner / pack leader – so I stopped being scared of them. Which just shows that writing books about wolves can change your life.
So, now I have six wolf books on my shelves. I wonder what wolf I will write next…
What animal are you particularly drawn to writing (or reading) about, and do you know why?
I have a bit of a traffic jam of books waiting to be published over this summer and autumn.
It looks like I’ve been writing a lot of myths, legends and magic this year, but in fact, THIS year I’ve mostly been writing novels. It was last year and the year before that I was researching and writing lots of myths and legends, but some books take a while to be edited and illustrated. However, I think they are all very much worth waiting for.
So here are the books being published in 2013, and possibly a hint about what’s coming up in 2014:
Girls, Goddesses and Giants: Tales of Heroines from Around the World (A&C Black, July 2013)
This is my first ever collection of myths and legends, and I’m so proud of it. I have always been slightly disappointed that so many really exciting adventure stories are about boys, so I’ve spent years searching for authentic old stories with girls who fight their own battles. And now here are all my favourite heroines gathered together in one book! There is a Japanese girl who meets a sea monster, a Viking warrior who braves ghosts, a Hindu goddess with 10 arms, a Sumerian goddess who meets 52 monsters in one journey, and an early version of Little Red Riding Hood which I’m sure will surprise you! This book is illustrated beautifully by Francesca Greenwood.
Masha and the Bear & The Hungry Wolf (Barefoot Books, August 2013)
The third and fourth books in the Animal Stories series I’ve written for Barefoot Books, short chapter books retelling traditional tales from around the world, designed for newly independent readers. Melanie Williamson’s amazing pictures bring these stories to life beautifully.
Masha and the Bear is about a little girl who gets lost in the forest, then gets trapped by a bear in a cave. But she doesn’t need a woodcutter or hunter to save her, she gets home all on her own using brains and baking skills!
The Hungry Wolf is about a wolf who wants to eat a little lamb, and about all the ways the tricky little lamb fools the wolf and saves herself. It’s a combination of many of my favourite trickster tales, and was great fun to write!
Breaking The Spell: Stories of Magic and Mystery from Scotland (Frances Lincoln, September 2013)
I am so excited about this book – it’s a collection of all my favourite Scottish stories, illustrated by the fabulous Cate James. There are selkies, kelpies and fairies, but also witches, warriors, riddles and baby monsters. There are stories you might know, and stories I’m sure you’ll never have heard before, and one story that comes directly from my own family’s lore. And you might even recognise where the inspiration for some of my novels comes from…
The Magic Word(Picture Kelpies, September 2013)
Not a retelling! This is an original picture book, my only fiction of the year. The Magic Word is about a little girl who can’t be bothered to write her birthday thank you letters, and tries to take some unusual short cuts. The pictures by Claire Keay are really magical, and I’m very much looking forward to reading this to little ones!
The Magic Word cover
Winter Tales: Winter Stories from Around the World(A&C Black, October 2013)
Another collection illustrated by the atmospheric silhouettes of Francesca Greenwood – this time a collection of winter tales. I’ve included some of the oldest and most exciting myths explaining the cycle of the seasons (yes, Persephone is in there, but so are some gods and goddesses you might not have met before) and also lots of folklore and fables about snow, polar bears and wolves from all over the world. I was particularly pleased to find winter tales from the southern hemisphere as well as the north. I hope it will be ideal for sharing stories by a warm fire with snow falling outside!
And this is the one book published in 2013 that I did write this year (earlier on, in that very long winter!) so I don’t have a finished cover to show you yet! But I’m hoping for a wolf…
And next year? Floris Books are bringing out the first three novels in their new young adult list, TeenKelpies, and I’m delighted to say that my next novel will be one of them!
And after that? Well, I’m currently writing a fantasy adventure set in the northeast of Scotland, so if you enjoyed the First Aid for Fairies series, you might want to read this adventure too…
I think I’m a novelist, who writes adventure books like First Aid for Fairies, Rocking Horse War and Maze Running.
I know I write a few other books once in a wee while, like the occasional picture book when I need a break from ambushes, and sometimes I gather together collections of my favourite myths and legends.
But mainly, I’m a novelist. Yes?
Well, maybe not.
I won an award last week, when Orange Juice Peas (written by me, illustrated by Lizzie Wells) won the Dundee Picture Book Award, which is voted for by local P1s and by the P6s who read the books to them. The other shortlisted authors were proper picture book writers, all of whom travelled up from the south of England to be in Dundee. It was a real award ceremony, for real picture books.
And my book won.
Just like The Big Bottom Hunt won the Hawick Picture Book Award a couple of years ago…
So perhaps I’m a proper picture book writer as well.
Perhaps I need to take being a picture book writer just as seriously as I take being a novelist (though I’ll still spend at least year on each novel and a few weeks on each picture book – the number of words just work that way!)
But of course, I won’t take being a picture book writer TOO seriously – picture books work better when they aren’t serious at all!
And it’s not just picture books which are muscling in on my novels. I have six books coming out this year. One of those six is a picture book (it’s called The Magic Word and I’m so pleased with Claire Keay’s lovely pictures, I think it’s going to be … magic!) and five are retellings of traditional tales. I have two retellings of animal tales coming out in short chapter books (Masha And The Bear and The Hungry Wolf, both illustrated by the wonderful Melanie Williamson, who also did Never Trust a Tiger and The Tortoise’s Gift) and three collections of myths and legends: a collection of heroine tales, a collection of Scottish stories and a collection of winter tales.
So am I now a reteller of old tales, as well as a novelist and a picture book writer?
Yes I am, and that’s fine too – because I love these stories, which are one of the main inspirations for the fiction I write, and it’s wonderful to be able to share them.
But don’t worry, I haven’t become any of these other kinds of writers INSTEAD of being a writer of adventures. I’ve just finished one novel and started another, and the oddities of publishing timetables means both novels might be published next year.
But in the meantime, I will enjoy the fact that I have the freedom and opportunity to write all sorts of books, and to be passionately proud of every single one of them.
And here, if you want to see just how seriously I take picture books, is me making a real mess of my kitchen while reading Orange Juice Peas:
What’s the most important part of a picture book?
The pictures! Definitely the pictures, rather than the words…
I’m a writer, so I’m a big fan of words. But I know the draft of a picture book is going well when I can slice words out because the pictures are telling the story so well.
That’s what I’ve been doing this week. I’ve spent the last couple of days working on my next Picture Kelpies picture book. It’s called The Magic Word, and this week for the first time I saw all Claire Keay’s draft illustrations, which meant I could work on the final edit of the text.
But I’ve not been working directly with Claire. I’d love to meet her sometime and chat to her about the story and the characters, but that’s not how picture books usually work. Writers and illustrators rarely sit down together to plan their books or inspire each other. The editor and the designer at the publishers talk to the writer and the illustrator separately, then make the pictures and words work together on the page.
So I’ve been working with my lovely editor Eleanor. We’ve looked at all Claire’s incredible, magical, cheerful pictures, then we’ve looked at the text we agreed months ago (the text which Claire has been working with) and finally we said, ‘Well, we can take that word out, or that phrase out, or that whole sentence out.’ And why are we slicing words out at this late stage? Because the pictures make the story so clear that we don’t need the words any more.
Picture books really only need words to explain the story that the reader can’t see in the pictures, like what people are saying and sometimes what they are thinking, and perhaps what order things happen. Though it’s also good to have words which sound lovely or funny or exciting read out loud.
But this week, we’ve been able to take out lots of words, and that’s all due to Claire’s wonderful pictures and Helena the designer’s clever layout, which lets the story dance along without a lot of help from me.
So what’s the writer for, if the pictures are the important bit? Well, the writer comes up with the story. And sometimes taking out exactly the right words requires just as much thought and effort as writing those words in the first place.
So I’m really looking forward to seeing the final version of The Magic Word in the autumn, with (fewer) words and (coloured in) pictures together.
Here’s a wee taster:
Retelling an old story which everyone already knows is a bit scary; retelling an old story almost no-one knows is even more of a responsibility.
My first retelling of a well-known fairy tale – Little Red Riding Hood – has just been published. When I was writing it, I had to decide which bits of the many versions of Little Red I would weave together. I did a lot of research, then chose the elements which were most vivid and which worked best in my voice. So I hope I’ve retold a story which you will recognise, but which will also surprise you. A journalist recently asked me how I had changed the story, what spin or twist I had put in, but that wasn’t what I was aiming to do with this retelling. Every major plot element comes from one of the older tales, though I have told the story in my own words, and I’ve tried to make a few of the things which never made sense to me (why doesn’t she realise it’s a wolf in the bed, not her granny, for goodness sake? Can’t she tell the difference?) seem more plausible (she sees more of the wolf each time she lets extra light into the room: opening the curtains, lighting the fire etc.)
But it’s a huge responsibility retelling a story like Little Red Riding Hood. Children already know it, and if you write something which differs from the version they know, they might think it’s wrong! (Which can prompt interesting discussions with kids about how traditional stories are passed on and changed.) Also, this book, with Celia Chauffrey’s gorgeous pictures, might over the years become some children’s very first experience of Red Riding Hood, so when they read other versions they might think my version is the right one and other versions are wrong… That’s a big and scary responsibility!
But I’m very glad that this story of a tricksy, talking, toothy, people-eating wolf is a story most children already know. Because if they didn’t, they’d probably find it far too scary and gory to enjoy it!
I’m now also retelling some stories which aren’t so well known: six animal tales from around the world (two already published, about a tortoise and a tiger, another four in the next couple of years, including a bear and a fox); a collection of Scottish folktales (coming out next summer, which contains stories I’ve never seen in other illustrated collections); and a collection of heroine stories from around the world (most of which are very obscure.) And that’s a completely different kind of responsibility.
Because I do change stories when I tell them out loud. I deliberately change them so they make sense in my head, so they work in my voice, so they are dramatic in the way that I like a story to grab and hold the attention of an audience. Therefore the story I tell is never exactly as it was when it was written down, a hundred, a thousand or four thousand years ago. And that story, the one I tell out loud, the one I’ve changed to become my story, is the one I write down. I’m always quite honest about that, but now these versions are being printed and published, available on paper for anyone to read, forever… that is a serious responsibility.
With Little Red Riding Hood, if I make a minor change, I know that kids will see another half dozen versions over the course of their reading lives, they will compare those different versions, realise there are many ways to tell a story and decide which is their favourite. But when they read my retellings of the untrustworthy Korean tiger or the Witch of Lochlann or Inanna tricking the god of wisdom, they might never see that story anywhere else. My version will be the only version they know. And that’s a really heavy responsibility.
But I’m not worrying too much about it. These are great stories, I’m writing them as well as I know how, I’m really excited about sharing them and I want you to enjoy reading them. Then if you want to study them more deeply by reading the ancient originals, I’m quite happy to point you in the right direction!
Here is the gorgeous front cover of LRRH, and I’ll update on you on the other retellings nearer the time!
I’m often asked at author events whether my own children give me ideas or help me write my books.
And the answer is no, they don’t give me ideas (if they have good ideas, I hope they’ll write those ideas themselves!) but I often have ideas when I’m with them. In fact two of my picture books and all my novels were inspired in some way by my two girls.
They are hugely helpful in lots of other ways too. They read kids’ books, then recommend the ones they really like to me. (And they put some kids’ books down after just a few pages too, and seeing what books don’t grab them is just as useful to a writer…)
They are very useful at suggesting character names: they get credit for Roxburgh the selkie in Storm Singing, for example, and I brainstormed a few of the dragons in Maze Running with them too.
They let me read them early drafts of all my books, and reading out loud to them is a great way of gauging whether the book is working. Sometimes I scribble in the margin “this bit is boring” because I can see them losing interest. Then I ruthlessly edit that bit before it gets anywhere near paying readers!
As they are getting older, they have even started proof-reading my manuscripts on paper. My 9 year old read Maze Running with a red pen, and made some very helpful comments and criticisms.
But the main thing they do is show enthusiasm for stories. They get angry with me when I’m cruel to characters or put them in difficult situations. And if they get all excited about a story, then I know I’m on the right track.
When I was writing the animal tales for Barefoot many months ago, my younger daughter enjoyed my version of the tortoise story so much that she retold it on the living room carpet, as I was reading it out, with playmobil figures. So here is the wonderful tree, inside the circle of hungry animals (not all the animals are from Africa, to be fair, she did adapt it a bit!) The Tortoise’s Gift brought to life.
And when I’ve just burnt tea because I was scribbling down a ‘what if’ and I know I’ll be up past midnight trying to meet a deadline, then seeing my words inspire this sort of play makes it all worthwhile.
So yes, my kids do help. But not always in the way you’d think!
Do you think children’s writers just sit at a desk and write? It’s much more fun and much dafter than that!
If you read my blog regularly, you’ll already know that children’s authors have to do some fairly strange things. But recently, my life has been getting even weirder. You can now find me on YouTube, flicking peas off the top of melting ice-cream, right across my own kitchen.
I spent a whole day with Chani and Benedicte from my publishers Floris, filming peas floating in glasses of orange juice and peas sitting on top of ice-cream… Why? Because they thought it would be fun for people to see me act out the story of Orange Juice Peas, my new picture book.
I’m used to reading the story out loud, but I’m usually in a classroom, library or theatre, so I don’t often have a fridge, a freezer and a bag of peas handy. But we thought that if we filmed it in my kitchen, we could do the whole thing for real. So we did. And it was very odd, and huge fun, and I suggest you have a look and let me know what you think!
But that may not be the oddest thing I’ve done while researching, writing or promoting my books. I’ve also:
– allowed a fairy to guide me through a maze;
– let the BBC get me lost in the very same maze;
– told a Viking legend in a cave;
– walked sunwise round a small hill in the Eildons looking for a magic door, on the same day that I’d been threatened by the Faery Queen on Twitter;
– shouted “Bottom!” loudly in the poshest, quietest bit of the Edinburgh Central Library;
– read from Wolf Notes in the gardens of a castle, rather than indoors, because the staff were a little nervous that the relevant chapters were about breaking in and stealing from their castle;
– phoned up a university to find a vet who could tell me how to heal an injured dragon;
– contacted a tropical fish society to ask about mermaids’ tails;
– tried out some exotic herbs and spices to find out what a witch would use to flavour the children she was going to eat;
– clambered along a clifftop in a howling gale;
– timed a frond of bracken travelling down seven waterfalls, in the Pentlands, on Christmas Eve;
– waggled my bottom at children on a regular basis, which may be why many infants now call me The Big Bottom Lady (because of the book title, obviously, not the size of my bottom!)
– learnt how to read (some) cuneiform writing, and invented my own Sumerian monsters;
– run down the same hill as Tam O’Shanter, like I was being chased by witches, when in fact I was being watched by puzzled American tourists.
Those are some of the daft and dangerous things I’ve done so far as a writer. I wonder what I’ll do now, to research my next book?
I’m sitting on the fence today, not sure if I’m a picture book author or a novelist. I launched my new picture book, Orange Juice Peas, at the end of April and I’m already starting to think about the launch of Maze Running in June. So I’m going to spend the month of May being a wee bit confused about who I am. Do I write books about peas, bananas, babysitters and giggling, or do I write books about monsters, magic, danger and quests?
The answer of course is that I do both, often on the same day, and that I only occasionally get confused. But why do I do both? And is there any difference, for a writer, between them?
The main difference for me is that I spend so much time with the characters in a novel, often months, sometimes years, that I know them as well as my family and friends, and care about them almost as much too. I don’t spend nearly as long with the characters in a picture book, so however fond I am of them I don’t know them as well. In fact, I don’t really know them at all until I see their pictures. That feels like the moment I first meet them, which can be a year or so after I write the book!
Also, I don’t have to describe the characters in a picture book, or everything that they do, because the reader can see them on the page (I may have described the characters and the action in illustrator’s notes when I came up with the idea, but those notes aren’t part of the finished book.) In a novel I have to give the reader a lot more detail, because the reader has to make the pictures of the characters and the action in their mind (the very best kind of pictures, I think!)
And the words in a picture book are still a work in progress until they are married with the pictures, because the illustrations are just as much a part of the story as the text. The cover of a novel, however, is designed to draw you into the story, it’s not part of the story.
And why do I write both? Because I always want to find the best way to tell a story. When a “what if” pops into my head, I want to explore it in the best way for that question. If the question is about whose bottom this is, or who is going to eat what ice-cream, then it’s probably a picture book; if the question is about why someone has just kidnapped your brother and sisters to use in a magic spell, or why there’s a thieving jellyfish trying to strangle a camp full of scouts, it’s probably an adventure novel! Also if there is only one problem to solve it’s probably a picture book, if there are lots of problems it’s probably going to take a bit longer!
So it’s usually clear to me whether a story idea is a novel idea where I will build the pictures for the reader to see, or whether it’s a picture book idea where I build the structure for an artist to create the pictures.
So, picture books and novels look very different on the shelf, and they are quite different for the writer too. And right now I have a picture book idea AND a novel idea in my head. Which should I go and scribble down first?
picture books vs novels!
Here are all my picture books and all my novels so far. They do look quite different! Which pile looks more fun to write?
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