In the Forecast: A Deluge of e-Picture Books?

Posted by Carol Baicker-McKee



Comparison of book version and ipad version of spreads from The Three Little Pigs illustrated by L. Leslie Brooke

Like Kitty in this post, I've been thinking about the flood of technology changes for readers. In particular, I've been amazed at the shift to ebooks: by the middle of 2010, Amazon reported that e-book sales for its Kindle device had surpassed those of hardcovers, and by early 2011, they had surpassed sales of paperbacks. That's a phenomenal shift in the way many people read books.

But like many other children's book people, I've been assuming that picture books are different, that they will persist almost exclusively as physical objects rather than evolve into electronic files to be consumed on a reader. (See, for example, this post by the fabulous author Eric Kimmel.)

For one thing, who wants to hand a young child an expensive electronic device to get dropped, banged, smudged with sticky fingers, and perhaps even drooled and chewed on? For another, reading with a young child is a cozy, physical experience - curling up with a screen just doesn't seem the same from an emotional viewpoint. Finally, there are all the difficulties of picture books that most e-readers aren't well designed to handle, beginning with color, and continuing through full spread illustrations, and the wide variety of sizes and shapes of books that don't translate precisely to the fixed screens of devices.

But I'm starting to realize I was wrong. Picture books are going "e" and I wonder how profound and rapid the shift will be.



Image on Color Nook from Go Dog, Go by P.D. Eastman

 One reason is the introduction of more e-readers that can handle color. The recent debut of the color Nook (the Barnes and Noble reader) and the growing popularity of tablets like the ipad means that more e-readers can provide a visually pleasing reading experience.

Screen shot of the cover of Green Eggs and Ham ipad app

Another is that the proliferation of ipads and other tablets is leading to the development of more and more picture book apps - a medium that's part book, part game, part animation. (See for example this recent NPR article on children's book apps for the ipad.) More "shiny" choices for kids = more people buying this format rather than traditional books.

I think too that I underestimated the comfort of young parents with sharing their electronics with their kids. In the grocery story now, I nearly always see a mom distracting a fussy toddler not with a cookie but with a game or book app on her expensive smart phone. (I'll also wager that there are teams of engineers right now developing readers aimed at hard-using tots.) And as this other NPR article reflects, today's parents don't feel as awkward as I do about snuggling at bedtime with a device and an interactive app that does all the work rather than a paper and board book that I have to read out loud myself.

So what do you think? Are ebooks going to replace traditional picture books? Do you use them? Love them or hate them?

NanoWriMo, Butt-in-Chair and More: Tools to Get You to Just Finish Your Novel

We're kicking off this blog with a month of posts about novels. I have to confess I had my doubts about being the debut poster on this topic, because although I love novels and although I've even had three several-hundred page nonfiction books published (as well as assorted picture books), I've never actually managed to finish any of the half dozen novels I've started.

For anyone out there who's like me, I'm here to tell you about some of the tools/tricks I'm using right now to help me finish at least one of them. Though maybe you should take them with a grain of salt until I actually get a first draft completed...

• NaNoWriMo November, in case you've been avoiding all writing-related sites recently, is National Novel Writing Month. NaNoWriMo is an unbelievably cool idea/organization: you write a 50,000 word novel. In a month. Yes, 30 days. From scratch. For those of you who also hated math in school, this works out to 1,667 words a day, which may not sound bad, but is in fact a lot of words if you are really good at distracting yourself with trips to the refrigerator, trips to the bathroom, trips to the coffeemaker, more trips to the bathroom, and oh, heck, even trips to the laundry room. Fortunately, if you go to the nanowrimo site and sign up, you get tons of emails inspiring, encouraging, nagging, scolding you, etc. until you get your daily quota done (and post it on their counter thing). 
• Not much of a joiner, you say? November's a terrible month for you? Want to keep working on something you already started? No worries. You can: a) do nanowrimo unofficially (like I'm doing with my son - we nag each other with no need for gobs of emails); or b) you can do a mini version (set your own target word count or write a picture book or something); or c) you can join one of the Plan B groups, like the janowrimo people, who go through a similar process in different months, not even just January; or d) cheat, and pretend you just started, which will make those first few days very easy, but the last ones super tough. 
• BIC HOK TAM This is a mnemonic I first heard about at a writing conference years ago - and it remains the most effective tool I know for successful writing. It stands for: Butt-In-Chair; Hands-On-Keyboard; Typing-Away-Madly. And in the end, it's the only thing that works. To remind myself to settle in and work, I decorated my writing chair (shown above) with buttons, making it a button chair. Get it? Hilarious I know. (I was nice and spared you a view of my butt in the button chair.) Here's a close up:

• It is about the easiest craft ever. Find some spare buttons or cut them off the shirt of your worst enemy (preferably when he isn't wearing it). Grab a hot glue gun. Apply dots of glue to the chair and stick the buttons on (dot, stick; dot, stick - the hot glue sets up quickly). Don't worry about being all arty about it - just get it done. That will put you in the right frame of mind.
•  Yoga I'm not much of a New Age-y person, but I've got to say yoga is great for stressed out writers. It teaches you to focus, helps you work out the kinks from sitting in your button chair too long, and reduces the stress you feel from trying to beat the nanowrimo deadline. If you're prone to carpal tunnel or other desk jockey ailments, I strongly recommend the great exercises to prevent repetitive stress injury you can find at My Daily Yoga.
• A Tree House

Okay, not strictly necessary. But a place where you can get away from your every day responsibilities and people looking over your shoulder is a big help. A couple years ago, I took over my kids' old treehouse playhouse, painted it, added curtains and some nice furnishings from my neighbors' trash (yep - even the Oriental rug, which is in better shape than some of the rugs in my house, came from the trash), and got the electrician to run wiring to it when he was here fixing some other stuff, and now I have the perfect writing get away, when the weather cooperates. Which it magically is this week!

Of course, when all else fails, there's always the inspiration/reward of chocolate. Preferably Linder's Dark Chocolate with a Touch of Sea Salt...

How about you? Anyone else have great ideas for a kick in the button chair?

Welcome! (from Carol Baicker-McKee)

Hello!

Pull up a chair and join us, a motley crew of writers living along Route 19 South in Pittsburgh. We're still just feeling our way around, but we're planning to  post 3 times a week on topics related to the writing life, the publishing world, book people, and of course enjoying the written word (and the illustrated one!). Also, we will talk about food, since we all like to eat while we write and read.

We're planning to pick a theme to blog about each month, but although we'll have that common thread, each post will be the work of just one of us - subject to that individual's quirks, specific knowledge and opinions, which the rest of us may or may not share.

November's theme: NOVELS.

We hope you'll join us to offer your insights and share knowledge, ask questions, tell us when we're being morons (okay, maybe not that), and generally have fun discussing this crazy life we share!

A little more about us:

• Most of us write for the children's market - for every age group from infants to young adults, for every genre from nonfiction to fantasy. A couple of us also (or instead) write for the adult market, with a particular interest in mysteries. One of us is a poet (or meter maid, as we like to call her), and one is an illustrator who will yammer on and on and on about picture books. Um, that's me. You can tell me to shut up when it just gets to be too much.
• Most of us are published writers, but regardless of level of publishing success, we all still feel like we are learning more every day. And we all have knowledge that we hope will prove useful to other writers at every stage from "thinking about it" to "book tour."
• We are all avid readers. Maybe "rabid" is a better descriptor. We have strong likes and dislikes (and disagree at times, of course), so look for our reviews of exciting new discoveries or old favorites. We all haunt the excellent (and financially beleagured) local libraries and the dwindling number of bookstores...(another one - Joseph-Beth - just closed in Pittsburgh. Waah!)
• We're active in the world of writers: we belong to a range of writers' organizations and we all attend conferences and author talks. And we like to visit the blogs of other writers, reviewers, and editors. We'll talk about controversies in publishing and bookselling, about big topics related to books like censorship and dealing with sensitive issues, as well as the ordinary questions and concerns of people who write or love books, from avoiding carpal tunnel syndrome to deciding whether conferences are worth the money to how to keep your family out of your hair while you work. And we'll include interviews of other writers, editors, agents, librarians and more.
• Everyone of us is a decent cook. (I think.) Look from time to time for our favorite recipes - ideas for easy meals when you're crazy busy writing, recipes that go well with books we're reading, foods that unstick or inspire us or just sustain us in times of crisis.
• A few of us are crafty. Judy, who writes gobs of craft books for kids, will post tutorials of fun things to do with your kids. And a few others of us will include tips or directions on book-related projects, from making a "butt-in-chair" (next post!) to knitting wrist warmers to keep your arms from freezing off while you sit at your keyboard on cold winter mornings.
• Other things you'd like us to write about? Let us know.

Looking forward to getting to know all of you!