All grown-ups were once children... but only few of them remember. Quotes and illustrations from children's books.

Many Quotes From Children’s Books Every Adult Should Know

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I wrote this story for you, but when I began it I had not realized that girls grow quicker than books. As a result you are already too old for fairy tales, and by the time it is printed and bound you will be older still. But some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again. You can then take it down from some upper shelf, dust it, and tell me what you think of it. I shall probably be too deaf to hear, and too old to understand a word you say, but I shall still be your affectionate Godfather, C. S. Lewis.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

She did not shut it properly because she knew that it is very silly to shut oneself into a wardrobe, even if it is not a magic one.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

    

In about ten minutes she reached it and found it was a lamp-post. As she stood looking at it, wondering why there was a lamp-post in the middle of a wood and wondering what to do next, she heard a pitter patter of feet coming toward her. And as soon after that a very strange person stepped out from among the trees into the light of the lamp-post.

He was only a little taller than Lucy herself and he carried over his hand an umbrella, white with snow. From the waist upward he was like a man, but his legs were shaped like a goat's (the hair on them was glossy black) and instead of feet had goat's hoofs. He also had a tail, but Lucy did not notice this at first because it was neatly caught up over the arm that held the umbrella so as to keep it from trailing in the snow. He had red woollen muffler round his neck and his skin was rather reddish too. He had a strange, but pleasant little face, with a short pointed beard and curly hair, and out of the hair there stuck two horns, one on each side of his forehead.
…

"Goodness gracious me!" exclaimed the Faun. (Chapter 1)

Lucy, one of the protagonists of the tale, climbs into a wardrobe only to find that it leads into an amazing forest. The Faun is the first (and definitely not the last) strange character she encounters in the forest.

In real life, it's unlikely that we'll open a wardrobe only to find a magical forest and a half-man, half-goat waiting for us. But this is children's literature, and that means anything's possible. The fantastic appearance of the Faun in this passage is a perfect example of the way in which extraordinary things happen all the time in kids' lit.

The wardrobe itself is a great metaphor for the way in which children's literature moves between the real and the magical. On one side of the wardrobe, Lucy's in the real world: the world of regular people and houses and streets. But once she's in the wardrobe, she's in a whole new world: one in which the rules of reality are constantly being bent.

It is only a pity that Mr Dahl didn't get to finish this book until the last passage of his life and was able to read it to his younger children, and as he mentioned, they grow up quicker than it takes to finish a book! Sometimes this is true. He would be so pleased to know how well his book was received and how many millions of children and parents love reading this timeless tale over and over.

Roald Dahl

One of the all time greatest children's writers.

“He turned and reached behind him for the chocolate bar, then he turned back again and handed it to Charlie. Charlie grabbed it and quickly tore off the wrapper and took an enormous bite. Then he took another…and another…and oh, the joy of being able to cram large pieces of something sweet and solid into one's mouth! The sheer blissful joy of being able to fill one's mouth with rich solid food!

'You look like you wanted that one, sonny,' the shopkeeper said pleasantly. 

Charlie nodded, his mouth bulging with chocolate.” 

― Roald Dahl, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Let us look at many more picture quotes to get you inspired and magically set back on your way.

More inspiring quotes

No two persons ever read the same book.

–Edmund Wilson
    





































A book is a dream that you hold in your hand.

–Neil Gaiman

Whenever you read a good book, somewhere in the world a door opens to allow in more light.

–Vera Nazarian

If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

There comes a time when you have to choose between turning the page and closing the book. –Josh Jameson 






There comes a time when you have to choose between turning the page and closing the book.

–Josh Jameson

I would never read a book if it were possible for me to talk half an hour with the man who wrote it.

–Woodrow Wilson

Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it. –P.J. O'Rourke

Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.

–P.J. O’Rourke












Anyone who says they have only one life to live must not know how to read a book.

–Author Unknown







More Quotes about books and reading

I think of life as a good book. The further you get into it, the more it begins to make sense. –Harold Kushner 

I think of life as a good book. The further you get into it, the more it begins to make sense.

–Harold Kushner

If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.

–Haruki Murakami

There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all. – Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis 

There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all.

–Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading one of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.

–Maya Angelou

The book you don’t read won’t help. –Jim Rohn #book #quote

The book you don’t read won’t help.

–Jim Rohn

Great books help you understand, and they help you feel understood.

–John Green





A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author. –G.K. Chesterton 

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.

–Gilbert K. Chesterton

There is a great deal of difference between an eager man who wants to read a book and the tired man who wants a book to read.

–Gilbert K. Chesterton

A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it or offer your own version in return.

–Salman Rushdie

In a good book the best is between the lines. –Swedish Proverb #quote #book

In a good book the best is between the lines.

–Swedish Proverb

Are we not like two volumes of one book?

–Marceline Desbordes-Valmore

Keep reading books, but remember that a book is only a book, and you should learn to think for yourself.

–Maxim Gorky

It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it. –Oscar Wilde

It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it.

–Oscar Wilde






There are perhaps no days of our childhood we lived so fully as those we spent with a favorite book.

–Marcel Proust

The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.

–Oscar Wilde

Beware of the person of one book. –Thomas Aquinas

Beware of the person of one book.

–Thomas Aquinas

A book is the only place in which you can examine a fragile thought without breaking it.

–Edward P. Morgan

If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.

–Oscar Wilde





The only important thing in a book is the meaning that it has for you. 
–W. Somerset Maugham 

The only important thing in a book is the meaning that it has for you.

–W. Somerset Maugham

Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them at all.

–Henry David Thoreau

Reading a book is like re-writing it for yourself. – Angela Carter #book #quote

Reading a book is like re-writing it for yourself.

–Angela Carter





There’s nothing wrong with reading a book you love over and over.

–Gail Carson Levine






It is a good rule after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between.

–C.S. Lewis

Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself. –George Bernard Shaw 

Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.

–George Bernard Shaw

Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren’t very new after all.

–Abraham Lincoln

I can’t imagine a man really enjoying a book and reading it only once.

–C.S. Lewis




Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore? –Henry Ward Beecher #quote

Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore?

–Henry Ward Beecher

A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading.

–William Styron

One always has a better book in one’s mind than one can manage to get onto paper.

–Michael Cunningham

I divide all readers into two classes; those who read to remember and those who read to forget. –William Lyon Phelps

I divide all readers into two classes; those who read to remember and those who read to forget.

–William Lyon Phelps

In old days books were written by men of letters and read by the public. Nowadays books are written by the public and read by nobody.

–Oscar Wilde







There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

–Joseph Brodsky

What you don’t know would make a great book. –Sydney Smith #book #quote

What you don’t know would make a great book.

–Sydney Smith

You know you’ve read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend.

–Paul Sweeney

I cannot sleep unless I am surrounded by books. –Jorge Luis Borges

I cannot sleep unless I am surrounded by books.

–Jorge Luis Borges

Some books leave us free and some books make us free.

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

Men do not understand books until they have a certain amount of life, or at any rate no man understands a deep book, until he has seen and lived at least part of its contents.

–Ezra Pound

That is a good book which is opened with expectation and closed with profit. –Amos Bronson Alcott #book #quote

That is a good book which is opened with expectation and closed with profit.

–Amos Bronson Alcott

Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.

–Frederick Douglas

Books are like mirrors: if a fool looks in, you cannot expect a genius to look out.

–J.K. Rowling

A book is a device to ignite the imagination. –Alan Bennett #book #quote

A book is a device to ignite the imagination.

–Alan Bennett




It’s not just the books under fire now that worry me. It is the books that will never be written. The books that will never be read.

–Judy Blume

If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, you must be the one to write it.

–Toni Morrison

A good book has no ending. –R.D. Cumming 

A good book has no ending.


–R.D. Cumming

Every sentence and every book is a miracle and a miracle takes time. Never give up, carry on writing, carry on reading!
If you loved all of these quotes please like our pages at the top of this blog and you can also find us here KidLiterature

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This blog was brought to you by Karen Emma Hall for Kid Literature 

The day I interrupted writing one book for another.

The law of inertia tells us that a body in motion stays in motion. And the same goes for projects, creative ideas, daily tasks, half-written emails, and that thing you stopped working on to read this article. When you interrupt a task, it can be difficult to pick it up again.

And we are interrupted nearly every three minutes, apparently, according to some professor or another. But most of our interruptions are self-imposed.
When you're working on something without a clear deadline, seeing it through to its end can be a huge challenge.

Think of all those books you couldn't wait to read, but never actually finished; the projects you giddily started that petered to stagnation; the ideas that never moved into actual conception. Not everything is meant to be finished, but many of us have a boatload of projects, books, emails, and to-dos that have been relegated to a kind of purgatory of incompletion.

Nearly a quarter of adults around the world are chronic procrastinators.
But I am the worlds worst. I have so many projects on the go, that at one point I had to scrap all the ones except the ones I would realistically get finished within 6 months.
I have many book ideas, story prompts, bits of notes about titles and plots.
Two of them were almost ready for an edit until last week.
Last week, I started reading Leigh Shearin's blog and it stopped me writing in my tracks.
Leigh's blog is a blog you can feel, as you will notice when you start to read her blogs. So much so, that I was so inspired it gave me another story idea!
An idea that wouldn't quit.






Now ordinarily I would have just had to write the idea down and leave it until whenever, but I woke up the next morning still thinking of this particular part in the blog and my ideas went on and on and once I started writing I couldn't stop. This has only ever happened once before and that was with my first book Teeny Pheeny as if it was already there in the air waiting to be caught and written down.
I was racing along! 2,000 words, and the next day another 2,000.
That night I was so pleased I got it edited. Then when in a conversation with Leigh, I decided to tell her about my idea from her blog.

Leigh is a Writer, Baker, Photographer and Farmer.
She resides in a rural land with her husband, who are developing their own small, sustainable farm, Winter'Rest Farm in north Central New York. Through it all, Leigh has written stories and poems, some published, some tucked away. 
"I didn't start life as a writer. I started life with a set of parents who gave me books" - Leigh Shearin 

Now that I'm nearing the middle part of my life, (assuming I'll live to 100), the Writing Gene has ignited. I can't seem to quench my thirst for words.
I'm following my goal to write full-time, to farm full time, to dream full-time, This is just the beginning. I hope you'll come along for the ride.

Read more about Leigh at her author page Leigh-Shearin Author page
and a glimpse into her childhood when you follow her blog here http://leighshearin.weebly.com/blogs/paging-mr-seagullmr-jonathan-livingston-seagull

  Overlooking a long, narrow lake, Westward Ho was my childhood home.  A sprawling mid-century wood-and-glass, pseudo stone-chalet perched atop a low rise in a Pacific NW neighborhood full of similar cedar shingled, contemporary, heavily wooded properties. It was a terrific place to grow up.

    Raised in the Birkenstock-wearing, Save-the-Whales, granola crunching west coast of the early 1970s, I was what would now be considered a "free range child".  As long as my chores were done, I came and went as I pleased, spending large chunks of time at the nearby Hunt Club, where I took riding lessons, groomed during Polo matches and shows, and participated in Pony Club. Our neighborhood too, was loaded with my schoolmates, and we all roamed through each others yards, sharing toys, building forts under the jungle-like rhododendrons, and cruising on bikes. None of the area kids spent much time indoors when the weather was fine, and I was no exception. In those days, our mothers didn't try to be our friends. They laid out graham crackers and juice for snacks, bandaged scrapes, and called us for dinner. Aside from that, they expected us to be outside, playing, and leave them alone.

So now I have promised to allow Leigh to read a few chapters before I publish it, and I will.
Once you have read some of Leigh's blogs you will not be in the least surprised to find out that her first children's book John Bloom and the Victory Garden is about the step by step commitment it takes to nourish and grow!  How creating and building your own garden are the key ingredients to sustain not only our physical being, but each and every part of our emotional and spiritual being. To learn about ourself and about life. Once you get into this book you are living it with her, and it's an experience not to be missed.

Monday, December 8, 1941, is no ordinary day to wake up to for 10 year old John Bloom.
 When he finds out Japan had bombed Pearl Harbor, we wonders if there is there anything he can do to support?  John Bloom and the Victory garden is the first in the series.

The story is a time capsule of life in a small, U.S. town on the eve of Pearl Harbor and its aftermath during the winter 1942 as seen through the eyes of three fourth-grade boys. Read more here Bloom-Victory-Garden-Leigh-Shearin-ebook

So thank you Leigh Shearin and for allowing me to procrastinate and get so much out of it, like a fully written book almost! (Only Leigh knows what it is about, and I will be mentioning it at a later date.) Thank you also for inspiration and not giving up even when you are on the cusp of giving up. I raise a glass of home made wine to a very inspirational free-range writer and say cheers to good friends and ideas!
And to Leigh and thousands of others I also say; never give up on a dream entirely, do what John Bloom does, one step at a time to nourish and grow.

Summer art with kids! Ice-painting. Cool idea!

Summer art with kids! Ice-painting. Cool idea! 

                                   art tips and fun combined.

It's summertime, and time for more outdoor activities, fresh air, sunshine and happy days. 

The school year is coming to a close, or maybe has already for some of us, and the holidays are looming bright and some lucky people are waiting excitedly as they countdown the days to their vacation or holiday fun.  But while you are counting down the days they will go a lot quicker if you have a gripping book to read, or you are looking after children.
Make that time a pleasurable time for you and the children by creating art outdoors.
It's getting hotter outside, and everyone is ready for some fun in the sun! Summertime can also get a little too hot, so make sure sun hats and sunscreens are worn by everyone. Remind the older kids that you still tan with sunscreen, it only blocks out the harmful ageing rays.
So here we go, let us have fun with ice and water and paint! Woopeee!

Lets get messy! (But let the mess wash up easy for a chilled life too!)

What can be more exciting to cool you down on a hot day than ice painting! 

It is so easy to make, and before you know it, you are ready to have cooling pictures, that are just too cool for school!

Prepare

To prepare it is a lot easier to do so the night before, so you do not have children asking every few seconds 'when is the ice paint going to be ready?'
So the night before all you have to do is to mix half paint to half water and then pour carefully into an ice tray container. Even when the paint is watered down you can get amazing vibrant colours.
If you have a shelf on your freezer that you can keep empty for this activity then all the better, so you may be able to put 2 trays of paints on this shelf depending on how much paint and how many containers you have.
One container will do. Why not try the primary colours. Use £1 / $1 shop acrylic paint, or even better, if you have time make your own with simple cornflour and food colouring! Better for the environment too!

So you may want to have red, and green and yellow and blue, maybe a little pink or purple or orange depending on the child's favourite colour!
Mix half of one colour in a jug with the same amount of water, mix it up so it is combined and then carefully pour into the ice cube tray.
Maybe do a row of each colour, so you have a multicolored ice tray to wow them with at breakfast the next morning!

Once you get the hang of it and you want to be a little more arty, when the first colour is set in the freezer you can add another colour on top of it. So when you come to create with them they give you 2 or 3 different colours, and this helps them learn which colours make different colours once mixed together!
Wow, the kids are having so much fun, they do not even know how much they are learning! Adding glitter is also a fun addition once children are older than 5 years.

Now you can use any paper of course, but thick paper works very good, and this can be sketch paper, craft paper, watercolour paper and gesso paper. You can create your own gesso paper with ordinary thin paper and make it into watercolour paper! Watch tutorial videos which are brand new coming soon, to see how to make your own watercolour magical paper that resists for perfect blending colours with any inks and paint and pencils and gelatos.

Turn out your cube tray outside, on the lawn, garden, path, or front porch area.
You can drop them in a large bowl to keep them together and more organised with little mess.
Canvasses and towels are so cool to use for a background too in the summer. Take your newly made ice cubes and drop them or work them into your paper or towel. Swirl them around and the fun begins once they start to melt.
Allow the ice cubes to melt and trickle down your work surface area, paper or towel and then add other colour ice cubes and let their imagination go!

Written by Karen Emma Hall https://www.facebook.com/AuthorKarenEmmaHall
please check back here for the debut of video art tips for kids and crafters.

Children see magic because they believe it exists - About Karen Emma Hall

                     Children see magic because they believe it exists. 

  Karen Emma Hall

WEB » WWW.KIDLITERATURE.COM  » WWW.FB.COM/AUTHORKARENEMMAHALL » TWITTER.COM/KIDLITERATURE  » KIDLITERATUREAUTHORS@YAHOO.COM

Karen Emma Hall is a children’s author, artist and founder of Kid Literature, an online platform for writers, artists and anyone with a passion for reading and writing.

Karen has a passion for showing how exciting and pleasurable reading books can be, making storytelling an adventure of discovery. Karen’s love for writing developed while reading to children as an auxiliary nurse and nanny. She studied for her N.N.E.B as well as many courses over the years in art, literature and child care.
Her first series of children’s stories are a little bit magic. They leave readers with that magic feeling.
If you love owls and you love cats, then you are going to adore her own fully illustrated books.

Karen believes that being able to read and write is the most basic foundation of knowledge that propels us as children into a world ready to be discovered. With literacy comes a quality of life that can take us to the far ends of the earth without even leaving our own room. You can go anywhere in your imagination, and having a book at your fingertips is an accomplishment in itself; you have the universe in your hands.

Karen has four daughters and three cats who love to feature in her stories. Karen still finds time to be active on social media when she is not creating something new for a book or her blog. She is currently illustrating more sketches and starting on her next lot of children’s amusing stories, as well as venturing out in video art media which will be ideal for creative imaginitive minds. Bringing teeny bits of teeny magic. printed here at http://www.childrenswritersguild.com

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hello-Teeny-Pheeny-Karen-Emma

Print Hello-Tenny-Pheeny-Karen-Emma

               http://www.amazon.com/Hello-Teeny-Pheeny-Karen-Emma-

Karen's first book is about a little owl and it is called 'Hello Teeny Pheeny', a charming story that takes place in a magical village of owls and in the book we see Karen’s owl illustrations – cozy, enchanting, full of character.
So what is it that makes this book compelling, special or unique?

Well Teeny Pheeny was born one day quite by accident, after my visiting a beautiful rescue owl called Phoenix. My children gave my storybook owl the name Teeny Pheeny, naming him after this amazing creature we helped rescue. It is a name (and an owl) that children will love and want to know more about. The day Teeny Pheeny was born I knew he was going to be rather special.
I developed a love for reading and writing very early on in childhood. I received so much enjoyment out of my treasured picture books, and I just loved visiting whatever magical land they took me to. I would become completely absorbed. I fell in love with books and, you could say, fell right into them, much like Alice did when she fell down the rabbit hole. It was always a magical place. It still is.

Creativity and reading have always been my main passion, even today. It is a therapy like no other. After leaving university with a BA in Art, I worked with children for many years, from being a qualified N.N.E.B nursery nurse to a teachers assistant. I have always enjoyed reading aloud to children of all ages. I find enjoyment and satisfaction in helping children and people with disabilities with reading and writing



From the perspective of my own writing, there’s another Teeny Pheeny book almost complete with brand new illustrations, in fact the first series is penned and edited. Then there is as a book for middle grade readers, called Cory in Cold Cliff Castle. It’s a wild adventure with gruesome characters that will hopefully attract boys to reading. Very fun, Scooby Doo meets Hammer Horror. Also a cat ryhming book and other cat things! But there is still decisions to be made about which one to put out first and what art is going in these book. Check the progress on Twitter and the website and I will be excited to share this from my new author page late this year. 
Follow Karen and Kid Literature on their journey. 


I believe in magic and I do my best to trap it in a book. As Roald Dahl once said “Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it".

To see what art and writing Karen is currently doing, visit her at this blog every Monday and her page here  https://www.facebook.com/AuthorKarenEmmaHall most days 

So what age do I write for? Middle Grade or Young adult

So what age do I write for? Middle grade, or Young Adult. 

So what are the differences between middle-grade (MG) novel and a young adult (YA) novel? and does your book fall between these 2?

 If you think of MG as literature for readers ages 8–12 years, and young adult (YA) as literature for readers ages 13–18 years,  then that is a good starting point. So when writing for the younger audience you do need to know what sets them apart from each other and what category you are writing for.

If you remember MG characters are mainly focused internally; meaning it will be focused on self-growth, learning who they are. Young adult characters are focused more externally, noticing the world around them and how they fit in, how they affect things. Often, that's a huge part of a YA character's growth throughout his or her story; moving from a naturally self absorbed stage in life, where the world revolves around them, to thinking outside their heads, and what is going on in the outside world, and how others feel. So becoming more aware of the feelings and situations of others. Remember children like to read about characters who are older than themselves.

 Middle grade books do not mean for middle school age children. Middle school age children tend to be divided about reading MG and YA books.

So if you are writing for middle grade, you are writing for your readers who are aged  between 8–12 years old, and usually the length is generally 30,000–50,000 words  No profanity, graphic violence or  sexuality. You will be focusing on the immediate world as seen by a child of 10 for example, who is still self orientated. 

YA

 Young Adult books are very popular at the moment and are marketed to adolescents and young adults. A young adult book is defined as literature traditionally written for ages ranging from 13-18 years.  It has been said to also be up to 25 years, but if you enjoy a book at any age, these are just guidelines. Teen fiction can be classed as books from the ages 10 to 15 years. So with all of these confusing guidlines and inbetween MG and YA readers, how do we know who our novel or book is for? 

 YA literature can span the spectrum of fiction genres. YA stories that focus on the specific challenges of youth are sometimes referred to as problem novels or coming-of-age novels

Generally a YA novel word count is between 50,000–75,000 words. More in some cases, like a fantasy. And just because profanity, graphic violence, romance and sexuality are more likely to appear in YA storylines, it  does not mean it has to be full of these topics all the way through. Focus on the story, how the characters fit into the story and beyond their world, and how they analyze the meaning of their existence and what is happening around them. Age of protagonist: Ages 13-18 as a guide. Some YA readers may fall for a younger YA book range. A younger YA book is one that appeals to the older end of the the MG  crowd as well as the younger YA and has cleaner content and as mentioned before can be called teen fiction.

 That is not saying a younger reader would not steer towards the more mature YA books, and sometimes you have the older reader reading the younger YA books too. But for the wider audience, you'll generally want your protagonist to be on the older side.

 if you aren't so sure whether your current project is YA or MG, I think you need to ask yourself  - what age am I writing for? what's the romance like? where's the focus? what's the genre? If it has deep loving, deep feelings, or sensitivive topics like drugs or abuse, then it will not be MG. Keep asking yourself questions throughout your book and you will also learn more about your story and characters.

Your aim is to write a story that is meaninfuly and complulsive to your reader, and you have to know who your reader is. You are learning this as you write. Understanding it more because as you are the story maker, you decide what goes into the story, you get to know it inside out and questions that may not be apparent at the beginning should be made very apparent by the time you finish.
For those of you who feel your story is inbetween a MG and YA, but have to choose one or the other, (there is no inbetween in a publishers requirements) just in your readers. I would make your word count the defining factor in deciding, if you are really stuck in choosing and are hating on the fact you have to pick one or the other for publishing, marketing reasons. Make sure you still write the story in the length it takes to tell it, and focus on the story and the writing. Once finished check publishers guidlines

I know we need guidelines to an extent, but write for yourself, forget about the rules while actually writing, just write, and love your writing and where it takes you. Once you have asked your questions, and know who the age range is you are writing for, then it is time to let your pen do the talking.

what in the world prompted you to write fiction for kids?

Kid Literature are pleased to have Shana Gorian on their blog today talking about - what made us decide to write fiction for kids? and meeting Rosco the rascal.


Shana Gorian is the author of the Rosco The Rascal Series. Her chapter books, for young readers ages 6-9, includeRosco the Rascal Visits the Pumpkin Patch, Rosco the Rascal in the Land of Snow, and her newest release coming in July 2015, Rosco the Rascal Goes to Camp. Please visit her on the web at shanagorian.com.

Author Interview, Part 1: What in the world prompted you to write fiction for kids?


In the first of a new short series of blog posts, I’ll be answering some of the questions I’ve frequently been asked about my writing.

First question: what in the world prompted you to write fiction for kids?

It all began several years ago, when I started writing a picture book about my fun-loving German shepherd. I had invented a character based upon him – Rosco the Rascal – as this enormous, overgrown puppy pulled us around on his leash in the evenings. My kids and I would laugh at his funny behavior as he encountered the usual sights and sounds that make a dog’s life interesting.

A squirrel would run by and he’d use his massive strength to pull on the leash as if the world would end if he didn’t catch that squirrel. We’d have fun narrating the monologue that might be going on inside his head as we walked. “Get that squirrel. Gotta get that squirrel.” Nothing complicated. (He never got that squirrel, fortunately.)



But Rosco the Rascal’s character grew, because this real dog of ours was always getting into trouble and providing a multitude of inspiration. He chewed up the license plate and the mud flaps on my minivan. He chewed up our outdoor barbecue. He got bitten by a squirrel. He ran off with the tennis ball when you tried to play fetch, willing us to chase him instead of just chasing the ball again for us like most dogs would. He ran off to neighbors’ homes when we thought he was safely in the yard. But he was mischievous only because he was a dog being a dog. He had a good heart and a steady temperament. What he lacked was a solid set of manners. (We’ve since worked on that with the real dog, fortunately, through a lot of training.) But that early lack of manners and the outrageous behavior are what Rosco’s character is based upon.

Time went on, and I eventually wrote a short story about him for my children. Rosco had human-like thoughts and actions, but he was just a dog, like any pet. He would find or make trouble, then fix the problems he created; learn something every time, grow up a little more, just like a child. Simple personification of a dog. My story was to be an illustrated book for ages 4-6.

My own children were much younger than they are now, when I started writing it, (4 and 7 at the time) and still reading picture books on a regular basis. The story line was cute and sweet and funny and accessible.

It’s worth mentioning that we were that family that had three library cards, one for me and one for each kid – who visited the library each week, and often maxed out the cards as we filled our tote bag with books. So many cards were necessary in case each child wanted to play the games on the library’s computers or if we had a fine on one card and I didn’t have cash on hand to pay it. Or if we went over the 30-book limit in our wild freedom of choice, we’d never have to leave empty-handed. But I was always the sorry-looking mother crouching over from the weight of the bag as I limped back to the car holding my smallest child’s hand.

Every night we had ‘books time,’ in which we read three or four picture books, taking turns reading out loud. We loved it. But, I digress; back to my writing.

Needless to say, over the years we had literally read hundreds and hundreds of picture books. So I ‘knew my stuff’, as far as picture books went.
Please read more here shana gorian-what-in-the-world-prompted-you-to-write-fiction-for-kids/



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