Sponsored by Lerner Books.
A lovebird who doesn’t like kisses?! Rissy’s friends and family wonder if she’s sick, confused, or rude. But kisses make Rissy uncomfortable. Can one little lovebird show everyone that there’s no one right way to show you care? Rissy No Kissies carries the message that “your body and your heart are yours, and you choose how to share.” A note at the end provides further information for kids, parents, and educators about body autonomy, consent, and different ways to show affection.
Hi, Kid Lit Friends!
I have a special treat for you today! The creators of the new picture book, Itty-Bitty Kitty-Corn (on sale on March 23, 2021, Abrams), join me on the newsletter to discuss their new collaboration. Isn’t this cover the cutest? I hope you enjoy their fascinating conversation about how this book came to be!
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UYEN: Did you ever have those moments of pure kismet that came in just the most unexpected of places? Shannon and I get lots of moment of inspiration when we hang out together, but none like the time we came up with this little bombshell.
SHANNON: We were on tour for BEST FRIENDS, sitting in a coffee shop working between school visits. Uyen was sketching a picture book and I was revising a novel. Uyen said, “I bet together we could come up with a really great picture book,” and I, the skeptic, said, “Easier said than done.”
UYEN: Hah! I really did think to myself, “Here’s Shannon, a world class writer, and here’s me, the creator of over 100 illustrated books. Between the two of us, we could definitely come up with something.” It felt like math, right? The numbers seem to add up. Like peanut butter and jelly.
SHANNON: We started chatting about things our kids love right now—cats and unicorns—and came up with the concept of an adorable, fluffy kitten who makes herself a unicorn horn. We both laughed, haha, that’s cute but of course we’re both too busy right now to start yet another book. So we went back to working on our separate projects.
UYEN: But I don’t think either of us could knock the idea out of our heads. So unbeknownst to Shannon, I started skteching my idea of the fluffy little kitten who wants to be a unicorn.
SHANNON: And I’m sitting across from her, supposedly working on my novel, but instead I can’t stop thinking about it, so I open a new page and write a few paragraphs about a kitty who desperately wants her friends to see her as a unicorn. A half hour later, Uyen suddenly turns her ipad to me. And she’s sketched our kitty-corn! The more adorable, sweetest little kitty-corn you can imagine. I laughed and turned my laptop around, showing her that I’d started writing the story. After that, it was just like playtime. Everything we did, we did side-by-side.
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UYEN: It might be criminal to say this, but it was just so much fun. Every idea I would come up with, Shannon would come up with a zinger for it. Every time Shannon would start a sentence, it felt like I’d finish it. It was as if the idea of this little kitty existed all on its own, and we were just discovering it together at the same time.
SHANNON: Yes it was just like that! And I think it was because we know each other so well and love each other so much. We didn’t hit everything right the first time—the characters went through several versions, the text took a few dozen rewrites. But it was always playful. There was zero pressure because it was just two BFFs making something fun together with no expectations and zero commitments. I don’t think either of us were thinking about writing something for publication.
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UYEN: No, we were really just sort of throwing the ball back and forth, seeing where we could go. It’s fascinating for me, too, to be able to watch such an amazing writer polish her stuff up. Everytime I would think the wording was great, Shannon would look it over, say something enigmatic like, “No, the arc isn’t right — this moment has to be FELT!” and I would watch in baffled admiration as she’d bring it back ten times better. And each time the story felt not quite right and even Shannon couldn’t work her magic, I could come in and say, “Wait! No words here!” and find a solution through the art. We just kept batting that ball back and forth.
SHANNON: And soon we had a full picture book, sketched and all the text laid out. I read it to my kids and, no kidding, they flipped out. So I started to read it to other people, because it was just so much fun. And the adults had as big of a reaction as kids did. Laughing and even tearing up. My sister said, “My face hurts from smiling so much.”
UYEN: At some point, Shannon started saying, “Let’s send this off!” I think I was more hesitant, partially because I really just loved having it exist between the two of us for a while, and also because sending it off would mean introducing it the real world and seeing if we truly had created peanut butter and jelly.
SHANNON: While I, the skeptic, had become fully converted by now just because everybody I read it to had such a HUGE reaction. I couldn’t wait to share it more! The real test was our agents, Holly and Jodi…
HOLLY M. MCGHEE(UYEN’S AGENT): When Kitty-Corn arrived in my inbox, I opened the pdf immediately, read it immediately, and told Uyen, “I LOVE IT SO MUCH” with not a drop of hesitation because it was adorably drawn and wonderfully written, but more important to me, it was about something deep and something rare: being seen on the inside.
JODI REAMER (SHANNON’S AGENT): I admit I was a bit skeptical when I opened the manuscript because writing about adorable kittens and unicorns seemed a little too on the nose for the market, but as soon as I read it I just smiled and immediately raved to Shannon that she and Uyen had nailed it! The manuscript was so magical; it had so much heart and depth and was about something much bigger than simply adorable animals.
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UYEN: At the end of the day, what makes this whole story so fabulous, so amazing, is that two friends came together, and with no expectations other than their love of their craft and their desire to please the other, came up with this crazy little concoction that seems to have really caught people’s imaginations. Because the story itself is sort of the story of friendship, of identity, and understanding the value of oneself. We still argue over who’s really Kitty (I am) and who’s really Unicorn (of course it’s Shannon — i mean c’mon, she sparkles wherever she goes).
SHANNON: I am 100% certain I don’t sparkle, but I’m also 100% certain that I love this woman. It really was serendipity, everything falling together just right. How often does that happen? But I guess the moral of the story is: don’t take breaks! Keep working on tour!
Many thanks to Shannon, Uyen, Holly, and Jodi for joining me today!
What are you reading these days? Let me know! Find me on Twitter at @KarinaYanGlaser, on Instagram at @KarinaIsReadingAndWriting, or email me at KarinaBookRiot@gmail.com.
Until next time!
Karina
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