I’ve been asked the question, why write books for children? Is it because it’s easier than writing for adults? Well I wouldn’t have said so, but it’s a good question.
I’ve always like to pretend that there’s a bit of magic in the world. As a teacher I found that children felt the same way. When I read stories that contained magic, children listened. They listened to lots of other things besides, but magic was one of the favourite themes. Of course adults also have magic in their literature in the fantasy or sci-fi genres, so why write for children?
Some years ago something magical happened in my life. My son and his wife had their first baby and I became a Granny and soon I had a second grandchild. After a few years I decided that I wanted to give them a present that they would remember, but not something that was bought. I wanted to show them how much I loved them. It was natural to write for my grandchildren and I had a lot of expereince teaching at primary school level, so I had a good understanding of the right level of language for the age group. The important thing, I felt, was to write as they would speak. I need to stress that the books were for my grandchildren and not about them.
The Green Book and Tiny Tyrannosaurus are chapter books which are suitable for a bedtime reading session. They are suitable for 4-11 year olds.
I wrote the stories about an ordinary family, doing everyday things but then added the magic. Each week I published a chapter on my blog and when I’d done about twelve, I looked to see if they would make a book. At that point I revised and rewrote chapters. Each chapter stands alone as a story, but they do all build up to a longer story.
I’ve had lots of feedback while I was writing and many more people started to follow my writing blog. Now that they are published I’ve only left the first chapter of each book free to read because Amazon doesn’t allow you to publish anywhere cheaper than you have with them.
You can buy the books from Amazon.
Since then my daughter and husband have had two children and so there’ll be two more books over the next two to three years. I’ve already started writing the next book. I hope to post the first draft of the next book by the end of July, so watch this space and do feel free to comment.
Recently my grandson read one of the books to me. It was such a treat. I can’t tell you how that made me feel.
pennyluker 