Done!

Annotated 155 books in March - an average of 5 per day. (I had to bunch up a little to finish before Holy Week!) Her is the best of the best.

 

On loss

Daly, Cathleen . Emily's blue period

Epsom, Jo. Rabbityness.

Honecker, Stephen. Sally goes to heaven.

 Jeffers, Oliver. The Heart and the Bottle.

Long, Loren. Little tree

Moundlic, Charlotte. The scar.

Paschka, Chris. The purple balloon.

Shepherd, Jessica. Grandma

 Skofield, James. Bear and Bird.

Vigna, Judith. Saying goodbye to daddy.

Walsh, Barbara. Sammy in the sky.

 

Other great finds

Bean, Jonathan. This is my home, this is my school .

Header, Thyra. The bear report.

 

LaRochelle, David. Moo!

Levy, Janice. Papa gave me a stick

Pollaco, Patricia. Junkyard wonders and Aunt Crisp and the great Creek Dam Affair.

Rash, Andy. Archie the daredevil penguin.

Shaw, Nancy. Sheep go to sleep

Stewart, Melissa. Feathers not just for flying.

Teague, Mark. Pigsty.

Torrey, Richard. The almost terrible play date.

 

 

increase output

Besides my marvelous critique groups, the best encouragement for writing picture books is The 12x12 Picture Book Challenge. http://12x12challenge.com/



Cooperative critiques, encouraging articles, tons of agent and editors inside information. I am sure I did not get 1/2 of what was offered last year, but I did write 17 picture books - probably 10 more than I would have! I signed up again, at the Shel Silverstein level.

If you are interested open enrollment is NOW. http://12x12challenge.com/membership/?hop=write4kidz.


 

Of making many books there is no end.*

Each week stacks of shiny covers are unloaded and stand proudly on top of the shelves. Like a gourmet chef in a world of food, I am surrounded at the library everyday with the picture books that have made it past the slush pile, off the press and onto the shelf. I certainly view them with a writer eye as well as a purveyor-of-story-times view!

I consume critically, pictures first. Then I read the opening line. In the picture books world that one line is a substantial percentage of the story and has to be perfect. If it not good, the “reader” will not have the patience to go on.
Virtually all pictures books are the same number of pages so the amount of text, the interplay of text and pictures is key. Are the pictures an integral part or only decoration? More than two paragraphs on a page and it is suspect.
If it gets past those stages, I go to the ending. Only grandmas like “sweet” stories. Kids want to laugh and they want to be surprised. The bigger the twist, the better.

Most time the books get a “satisfactory.” As a tax based institution we buy only well reviewed books form the biggest publishers. Once in awhile I find one – usually on a particular niche theme like explaining mommy’s tattoo – that I cringe to share. How did this get published and my great story of a frog lies deep in slush!
And there is about one book a month over which I totally swoon – as a librarian, a writer, a nana, a human. At those moments I despair of getting Victor Javalina into print. Why, why, why didn’t I think of that storyline or play on words?

Well at least I know the competition is good and publishing, for all the bad economic news, is still turning out wonderful beautiful picture books.

* from Ecclesiastes 12:12