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Barbara Kanninen is a children's writer and Ph.D. environmental economist. She has written 20 easy readers and other curriculum materials for educational companies such as Macmillan-McGraw-Hill, Core Knowlege Foundation, Kane Press and Kaeden Books. She enjoys baseball, choral singing, apple picking, movies without car chases and doing crazy things with her family, like riding peddle cars around beach towns. She has had a number of stories and poems published in children's magazines such as Highlights, Ladybug and Fun for Kidz. Her first picture book for children, A Story With Pictures, received a starred review from Publishers Weekly and was named a "Picture Book We Admire" by the Children's Literature Network. Barbara lives in Arlington, Virginia with her husband and two boys.

Barbara's books include. . .
A Story With Pictures When an author loses her manuscript, the illustrator decides to take charge, painting characters that would never appear in the author's book-including the author herself! Through this energetic tale, students will laugh and learn as a duck offers tips about character, setting, conflict, and other basic elements of a story. A great way to introduce and review the writing process with children. Click here to read the entire book online. Have I mentioned how much I LOVE Lookybook? You can also take a look at the book at the bottom of this post.

Download the wonderful teacher's guide to accompany "A Story with Pictures" from Barbara's website.

Also, by Barbara. . .

Jake's Lemonade Stand (Kaeden Books)

Jake's Toad House (Kaeden Books)

Mr. Miller's Old Car (Seedling)

Circle Rolls Illustrated by Maria Carluccio, Henry Holt and Co., 2010, forthcoming.

FOR 15 YEARS, YOU STUDIED CLASSICAL SINGING. WHY DID YOU GIVE UP SINGING FOR WRITING FOR CHILDREN?
Creativity takes a ton of energy. It also waxes and wanes – hourly, daily, monthly, even yearly. Ten years ago, my singing was in a rut. It wasn’t making me happy anymore. But writing was new to me and felt wonderfully fresh and energizing. Once I stopped to consider my own feelings, the decision wasn’t hard to make!

TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT YOUR PATH TO PUBLICATION.
I started off like so many new children’s writers, sending average stories to major publishers. After about a year of getting all form rejections, I realized I needed to back up, study the craft of writing and be less ambitious about the publishers I was pursuing. I took the basic course with the ICL and focused on magazines for two solid years, working my way up from selling stories to very-low-paying publications (Story Friends and Wee Ones, for example) to the major magazines (Highlights and Ladybug).

When I decided I was ready for the book market again, I took two courses with Anastasia Suen. I joined a critique group and ended up collecting about two years’ worth of nice personal rejections (along with a number of forms). Finally, about five years into my career, I got an e-mail from Christy Ottaviano at Henry Holt saying that she loved my manuscript, CIRCLE ROLLS. That was my first picture book sale (though the book is still forthcoming)!

I'VE HEARD SO MANY GREAT THINGS ABOUT ANASTASIA SUEN'S COURSES. WOULD YOU RECOMMEND ANASTASIA'S WRITING CLASSES, AND HOW IMPORTANT DO YOU THINK WRITING CLASSES ARE FOR WRITERS?
Anastasia’s approach is unique and so valuable. In her month-long picture book courses, participants read and study 100 picture books. The perspective it gave me – seeing how extraordinary a picture book has to be to get published – was eye-opening. It gave me a standard to shoot for. Now, I can look at my own manuscripts and judge them with a learned eye: is this really THAT good, I’ll ask myself. Often, I’ll know the answer is no, and I’ll keep working until I know it’s really that good. But you have to read what’s out there to acquire that judgment. I definitely recommend Anastasia’s courses to picture book writers at any stage of their careers. For unpublished writers, I recommend starting with the ICL.

WHERE DID YOU GET THE IDEA FOR A STORY WITH PICTURES?
I’m not sure I ever really get ideas. I just get little nuggets of inspiration that get me writing something -- anything. In this case, I was just wondering what would happen if a character found him or herself in a book with no pictures. Several drafts later, that character became an author and two years later, that author got a friend: the duck.

WHAT WAS YOUR REACTION WHEN YOU SAW THE ILLUSTRATIONS BY LYNNE ROWE REED?
The first thing I saw was the cover on-line. I thought, wow! That’s… not what I expected but I love it!

YOU USED A LOT OF HUMOR IN YOUR BOOK. HOW IMPORTANT DO YOU THINK IT IS TO INCORPORATE HUMOR IN WRITING FOR CHILDREN?
Very, very, VERY important! Frankly, I don’t think I ever would have gotten published if I hadn’t developed the skill of writing humor. And, trust me, it was a skill that I studied and learned, not one that came naturally to me! I will always say that I have Marileta Robinson at Highlights to thank for pushing me to revise a manuscript twice (over the course of two years) to make it funny and (the second time) even a bit funnier. I sweat blood to learn to be funny. It was my first chance at a major publication credit and a lesson I’ll never forget. And, yes, I did sell her the story!

Now that I do school visits and read my book, A STORY WITH PICTURES, to classes, I can definitely say that I’m glad I learned that lesson. It is a true joy to hear the children laugh all the way through the book!

HOW DID YOUR EXPERIENCE AS AN ECONOMIST INFLUENCE JAKE'S LEMONADE STAND?
JAKE’S LEMONADE STAND has been my only successful attempt to combine my economics background with children’s writing. The challenge for me was to find a way to take a serious topic (for me) and make it fun. So it wasn’t so much a question of using my experience as an economist as it was using my experience as a children’s writer. Every story needs a great cast of characters and that’s what I focused on in this story.

TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT YOUR AUTHOR VISITS FOR A STORY WITH PICTURES. IT REALLY SOUNDS LIKE A FUN TIME!
As I said above, I never get tired of hearing children laugh when I read A STORY WITH PICTURES! With younger classes, I bring a backpack full of funny props from the story: a tutu, a duck, a giant-sized pen. I have the children guess whether each prop is part of character, setting, problem or solution. What’s really interesting – and something I didn’t realize when I started out – is that all those props start off under character, setting or problem, but by the end of the book, they’re all part of the solution!

Sometimes I read my newer manuscripts to the older classes. That’s been a great experience for me – seeing what captures their attention.

WHAT DO YOU LIKE BEST ABOUT AUTHOR VISITS?
The smiling faces, the laughter and the thank-you notes!

YOU ALSO OFFER TALKS FOR ADULTS. CAN YOU TELL US SOME OF THE THINGS YOU DISCUSS?
As an author, educator and parent, I think I have a unique take on the whole subject of children, books and reading. I’m a little bit “teaching your child to read” and a little bit “teaching your child to read intelligently” and a lot “getting your child to love books… in the long run!” After all, the goal isn’t just to have a child sounding out words when they’re five or six. The real goal is to raise a life-long reader. Readers are getting scarce in our society and my goal is to help turn that tide!

CONGRATS ON YOUR NEWEST BOOK. TELL US ABOUT CIRCLE ROLLS.
CIRCLE ROLLS (Henry Holt, forthcoming) is a rhyming story about shapes: “circle rolls, oval rocks, square sits like a box.” But Circle keeps rolling and rolling and creating all sorts of havoc in a toddler-like way. It’s a fun story and I can’t wait to see the illustrations. I think the current publication date is set for 2010.

Visit Barbara's website to find out more about her books, booksignings, conference presentations, school visits, and more.

Read another interview with Barbara by Anastasia Suen.

Author: John Denver (John Conner)
Illustrator: Christopher Canyon
Published: 2007 Dawn Publications (on JOMB)
ISBN: 1584690968 Chapters.ca Amazon.com

We know, we know! Celebrity-linked children’s books certainly don’t need a mention from little old us, but with a song this belt-outable and illustrations so happy and full of popping off the page family fun, how could we resist?

Other books mentioned:

• Is There Room on the Feather Bed?

Other favourite sing-along books on JOMB:

• Sing, Sophie
• Badness for Beginners
• Follow the Drinking Gourd
• Monster Goose
• Bantam of the Opera
• The Preston Pig Series
• Sitting On the Farm
• Mei Ming and the Dragon’s Daughter**
  
• The Tortilla Cat**

** supply your own tune.