Saturday, February 27, 2010

Speaking of ideas......and critics are born, not made

Right after I wrote my first children's book, The Fairy Painting, I wrote a chapter book called The Magic Waiting Room. I really like the story but, not having a boy who read at the time, I just couldn't get it right. My son is now 9 years old and is a great reader but is VERY picky about what he reads (it MUST be funny) so I got to thinking "maybe I can rewrite The Magic Waiting room so Son would like it AND get it out to a publisher" - thus killing two birds with one book. I picked up one of Son's favorite books - Diary of a Wimpy Kid - for inspiration then rewrote the beginning of MY book and gave it him to read. He read it, LAUGHED OUT LOUD, then said "That's pretty funny." But when I asked if he would like to read the rest of the story THIS is what I got:

"What's the title?"

"Who's the guy narrating it? What's his name?"

"Is the Magic Waiting Room a real place? Like, does it exist on earth?"

"Nah, I don't think so."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

1 comment:

unmitigated me said...

If you want help, talk to his teacher. Grade school teachers are huge mavens of kid lit. You should SEE the collection I left behind. Must have been $2K worth of books. Hundreds of 'em. ANd I brought about 50 of them home with me.