WHY MY PICTURE BOOK WON'T SELL

A few years ago I wrote this darling little picture book called Happy 100! I thought it was just adorable. 

Then my critique group read it... 

Yeow! 

And my agent...

Ugh. 

And a couple of conference editors... 

Uh-oh. 

I quickly learned that my adorable picture book wasn't so adorable. And it wouldn't sell. 

Why?

First, here’s the 500-word manuscript:

HAPPY 100!

by Dotti Enderle

 

            Today is Grand-Gran’s one-hundredth birthday. One hundred! Even the TV weatherman knows that’s a big deal!

            Everyone is giving her gifts of one hundred.

            “What should I give her?” I ask my dog, Ringo.

            “Erf!” Ringo says.

            I think that means one hundred doggie treats. “Don’t be silly,” I tell him.

            Mom is giving Grand-Gran one hundred dollars in a birthday card. But she’s cheating. It’s just one bill with one hundred printed on it. Of course if it was one hundred individual dollars she wouldn’t be able to seal the envelope!

            But what can I give her? One hundred buttons? One hundred peppermints? A book with one hundred pages? One hundred is a lot!

            How about one hundred new sets of teeth? Yeah! One set for smiling. One for munching. One that glows in the dark in case the lights go out.

            Oooh…that sounds awfully expensive.

            “What can I give her?” I ask Ringo again.

            Ringo drums his tail on the floor. “Erf!”

            I think that means one hundred fleas. “Don’t be silly, Ringo. If Grand-Gran had one hundred fleas, we’d have to bathe her outside in smelly dog soap.”

            Oops! I shouldn’t have said dog soap. “Come out from under the bed, Ringo. We have to think of a gift for Grand-Gran.”

            I know. Since Grand-Gran loves to laugh,  I’ll make one hundred silly faces.

            Like this…

            And this…

            And this…

            And this…

            Wait. That last one looked too much like the first one. I could never think up one hundred different silly faces.

            But what can I give her? One hundred bottle caps? Trading cards? Pieces of spaghetti? And where would I get any of those things so quickly?

            Hey, how about one hundred shiny stickers for her scooter? Then she’d be the flashiest granny on bingo night.

            (Art note: she digs through a drawer or box)

            Here’s a raspberry sticker. And a purple-slurple. And here’s a blue one that’s the same color as Grand-Gran’s hair.

            Wait a second. I don’t have one hundred stickers. I don’t even have ten! I’ll have to think of something else.

            Ringo and I go outside so the fresh air can restart my brain. There’s a large pile of raked leaves, waiting for me. “KER-PLOP!” I shout, diving in. The leaves are soft and crisp and…

            That’s it! I’ll give Grand-Gran one hundred leaves to play in.

            I count them out in stacks of ten.

            Uh-oh. Suddenly, one hundred doesn’t seem like a lot. It’s not nearly enough leaves for jumping around.

            “Help me out, Ringo. What can I give her?”

            Ringo says, “Erf!”

            I think that means, “I give up!”

            “One hundred,” I say, looking around.

            One hundred acorns? One hundred feathers? One hundred mud pies? No. Grand-Gran would probably have more fun making her own mud pies.

            I think hard. It has to be more than just one hundred of something. It has to be super special. Super-duper special.

            Ringo curls next to me and licks my hand.

            That’s it!

            After Grand-Gran blows out the one hundred candles on her cake, I’ll give her my present.

            “63…64…65…”

            (Art note: Character is on one side giving Grand-Gran kisses on the cheek, while Ringo is on the other side, licking her face)

Okay, so here are the reasons I assumed it would sell.

1. Voice. I really thought I’d nailed the thoughts and speech of a little girl. So playful. So innocent.

2. Concept. Most every kindergarten class celebrates 100 Days of School. So I naturally assumed most every kindergarten teacher would want it for their classroom.

3. Ringo. Kids love dogs, right? And the MC’s relationship with Ringo is sweet and cute. A real selling point…uh...right?

Now here are the hard facts. The reason this book will never sell.

1. First person point of view. Yes, there are some first person picture books out there, but not many. Unless you’ve nailed a surefire kid-pleaser, be prepared. Agents and editors don’t like first person PBs. People in the biz will agree that PBs should be third person.

2. Concept. There’s nothing wrong with writing a book with 100 as the subject matter. That's great. But it was pointed out to me that the percentage of kids with great-grandmothers turning 100-years-old is miniscule. Small children can’t relate.

3. Nameless. What’s the MC’s name? Yeah, I don’t know either. It’s my understanding that little ones do want to know. It’s part of connecting to the story.

4. Ringo. I genuinely thought he was an asset, but a few people felt he was a gimmick. It was never my intention, but I can see their point.

5. Of all the reasons for rejection, this is the BIGGIE. The story's ending. Let’s all say it in unison, “Predictable!” Most everyone who critiqued or considered this manuscript pointed that out. I have wondered if a 3-year-old would guess it, but 3-year-olds aren't buying books, editors are. And editors have tons more experience in bookselling than I do. Believe me, I've banged my head against the wall repeatedly, trying to shake out a new ending. It’s just not there.

There are probably a lot more reasons for rejection than what I've listed. Feel free to point them out. We’re all here to learn and grow.

Another huge reason this book won’t sell? I just published it on my blog.  :)

So what’s been your picture book experiences? Successes? Failures? If you have little ones at home, I’d love to know what you’re reading to them and why they want to hear it over and over.

AIM FOR THE MOON

I’ve been a moongazer all my life. Yes, even when I thought it was made of green cheese. That’s what led me to write my 2008 novel, Man in the Moon. That book was so much fun to write, especially my choice of breaking the chapters into phases of the moon. It makes me sad that Delacorte didn’t indicate the paranormal aspects in their rather blasé jacket blurb. When is the moon not magical? 

OK, why am I telling you all this? Because I was doing a bit of cleaning up and found an unopened box filled with copies. And since books are meant to be shared, I’m offering 3 free autographed copies to my faithful followers. Just tell me in the comment section your thoughts, experiences, romances, etc., that somehow involved the moon. I’ll send copies to the 3 I think really shine. And be sure to leave a contact email address so I can notify you.

A Writing Wreath

Let me say first off, I don’t have a creative bone in my body. I can’t sketch or paint or sew...though I can do a fair job of writing. So keep that in mind as I instruct you on creating a craft.

I write most every day. Some days the prose flows like the Hamilton Pool falls (Google it), and some days I have to pry those words out with bottlenose pliers. Either way, I always feel good after a productive day.

But unless I print out what I’ve written, I just see words on a screen, nothing tangible. That’s why I've started this experiment. I call it a Writing Wreath. Right now it looks like this.

Snapped by amateur photographer

Yeah, I know, it’s just a stretched out coat hanger and some bits of ribbon. But at the end of each writing day, I'll attach another snippet, then another and another until eventually they're all scrunched together, nice and fluffy. 

Needs manicure

Then I can trim and edge it and make it look more like an actual wreath.

Like I said, it's an experiment. I have no idea if it'll represent a completed novel or just many months of writing. But when I can’t squeeze another ribbon onto it, I'll have it figured out. Until then, I’ll occasionally report the progress.

Okay, so I do have a little creativity. But you, my faithful followers, probably have a lot. Suggestions?

What I Learned From Writing Adaptations

When my editor at ABDO Publishing asked me to write adaptations from classic novels I said, “Wait..what? What qualifies me to do a chop job on these timeless works?” Naturally I asked myself that. I wasn’t going to let my editor think I couldn’t meet a challenge. Plus being an adapter would look pretty snazzy on my resume.

Since then people have asked me, “Did you have to read all those books?” The answer: “Meh.” The fitting question is, “Did you have to reread those books?” At some point I’d read all of them except The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and I did do a heck of a skimming job on that one.

While adapting, I had the books in front of me, and I used the authors’ own words when possible, which was actually quite a lot.

I kept a couple of other children’s adaptations handy. Not to plagiarize (!!!), but to reference. It was helpful to know what the other adapters chose to leave in and take out, and how they handled a difficult scene. I quickly learned that no two adaptations were the same, so I mostly played it by ear.  

And naturally, I channeled my inner teen and used SparkNotes – a great tool for answering the age old question, “Huh?”

The fun part of writing them was what I uncovered about the authors themselves and their writing styles. Here's what I learned:

The Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde constantly had his characters throwing themselves on furniture. He flung himself onto the sofa. He threw himself down in a chair. After a while it became comical. But Wilde was a playwright with a flair for the dramatic, so I cut him a break.

Frankenstein – Remember the 1931 movie with Colin Clive and Boris Karloff? The lightning rod? The Tesla currents? Yeah, pretty awesome. But in the original novel, Shelley wrote, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. That sentence is beautiful, but what the heck are the instruments of life? And infuse a spark? I don’t think lightning rod, I think jumper cables. Anyway, kids are too inquisitive to just leave it at that so I got permission from my editor to spark him like they did in the movie.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow – This one was easy cause I love that story. Poor Ichabod. What a schmuck. But here’s the thing. Washington Irving was a master storyteller and the king of description. Check this out. A stately squadron of snowy geese were riding in an adjoining pond, convoying whole fleets of ducks; regiments of turkeys were gobbling through the farmyard, and Guinea fowls fretting about it, like ill-tempered housewives, with their peevish, discontented cry. That’s a heck of sentence. Sleepy Hollow is just over 11,000 words. If Irving had dialed down the descriptions, it’d probably be about half that.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – This is in my top five of all-time favorite books. It’s a near perfect novel. Twain has a way of putting you on that raft and making you forget you’re a writer. But here’s the deal. If Huck were a boy in today’s world, he’d be on Ritalin. Truant…fidgety…always running away. Back then: Boys will be boys. Today: Developmental disorder. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for what's best for kids, but can you imagine what a drab story it would’ve been if Huck had complied with the Widow Douglas and hung around the house more? And I was actually surprised at how much of Twain’s text I could use, considering the dialect. (And in case you're wondering, in my adaptation, Jim was never labeled anything other than a slave.)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame – Here’s the main thing I learned from this novel...it’s tough to adapt an English translation of a French text. Seriously. And I skimmed that thing well. However, I still managed to get caught up in it all. And believe me, Paris in 1482 was not the romantic getaway it is today.

With the exception of Huck Finn, all these novels have one thing in common. Tragic endings. True, some of those guys had it coming - Dorian with this vain and selfish ways. Victor Frankenstein, the ultimate deadbeat dad. But poor Quasimodo. He was so distraught over Esmeralda’s death that he crawled into her tomb and died next to her lifeless body. Hand me a Kleenex.

No doubt about it, writing those adaptations was a challenge. But I'm glad I did it. And so is my resume.  

Sightseeing Is Like Writing

I went to Washington DC this past weekend. The occasion was my daughter's Swearing in Ceremony with the Department of State. Needless to say, we were proud and excited. But there was something else we did there. A lot of walking! And everything I do I relate to writing in some way.

I was wearing semi-dressy shoes for the ceremony. And we did a bit of walking while I had them on. Pretty shoes are great until you wake up with blisters on your feet. Yeah, like the high you get when writing that first draft. Then you go back and read it. Ugh.

That evening we went to the Lincoln Memorial. I was in comfy shoes, but the blisters were still forming. You know the first thing you see there? Steps. Lots of them. Huff your way up and you're wishing Abe would offer you his seat.

The next day we visited the Capitol. A lot of important gridlock takes place there. Writer’s block, anyone?

The Library of Congress is cool. What writer doesn’t want to be surrounded by books? (Am I the only one who thinks the reading room looks like Hogwarts?) But I absolutely loved the Bob Hope exhibit. It focuses more on politics than Bob, but I found it inspirational and nostalgic. And, oh yeah, I got to it by walking up stairs.

One thing that really stood out in DC was all the scaffolding. Repairs from last year’s earthquake. Repair, rewrite, repair, rewrite…same thing.

The last place we visited was the National Cathedral. I can’t help but compare it to writing. It took forever to build. There's a lot of intricacy. And it towers before you, swallowing you up. There’s a lot of praying involved too. I thought I was escaping those ever present evil stairs, but no, you have to go up and down them to get to the restrooms.

So the central theme here? Stairs. Lots of them. Heck, I even had to climb stairs to get to the Chili’s where I ate dinner last night. I did a lot of walking and a lot of stair climbing. The results? Sore calves! It’s an ouchy every time I take a step.

But walking and stair climbing is so much like writing. It’s painful. But in the end, it’s worth the effort.

Book Shout-Out - I HUNT KILLERS by Barry Lyga

I’m sort of stingy when it comes to book shout-outs. A book really has to grab me…keep me turning the pages. But I Hunt Killers totally blew me away.

What's it about?

Jasper (Jazz) Dent had a unique upbringing. Unique in that his father was a famous serial killer. Yeah, that would make you stand out. And worse, Dad wanted Jazz to go into the family business. Like father like son? What Jazz really learned over the years was how to recognize the patterns of a serial killer. And he uses that expertise to help out the local police. But while he wants to do the right then, he still titters on the brink. Will he one day cross over to the dark side? Follow in Dad’s footsteps?

I know it’s only April, but I Hunt Killers is hands down my favorite book so far this year. I can always count on Barry Lyga to produce edgy books with superb writing, but he’s outdone himself with this one. I hope this thriller will bring about a new trend in YA fiction.

A Few Things about the SCBWI Houston Conference

This past Saturday I attended the Houston SCBWI Conference. I always go. And it’s always great.

The first thing I noted when I arrived...my name was spelled correctly on my name tag! That’s a good sign. It rarely happens.

Logo by Diandra Mae

Then the speakers spoke.  I won’t run down the highlights of their speeches. Just know that we basked in their brilliant awesomeness.

One thing I’ve noticed about agents and editors…they keep getting younger and younger. Nope, I’m not getting old, they’re definitely getting younger. But along with youth comes energy. Who doesn’t want that in an agent and editor?

I did something super smart when I registered. I paid for two professional critiques. One from an agent, one from an editor. Both gave amazing feedback. And the agent praised what she’d read and asked for the full manuscript. Yes! I need an agent, and she’s the agent I’d love to represent me.

What I like best about these conferences, is spending the day with good friends and likeminded people. It’s therapy. But you already know that.

When the day wound down, I was in for another surprise. My work was nominated for the Joan Lowery Nixon Award. The winner is mentored by the lovely Kathi Appelt, who graciously took over when Joan passed away in 2003. To say I was honored, major understatement. But today, I made the decision to withdraw my nomination. This is an award that should go to a less published author.

So we topped off the day with a Mexican buffet, after which I came home and crashed.

By the way, if you’re one of the coordinators who slaved so I could have a great day…thanks for everything! Including spelling my name right. 

I'd love to know your thoughts on conferences. The comment section is waiting.