A few months ago, I began reading WHALE BOYS, THE TRUE ADVENTURES OF MELVILLE AND MANJIRO by J.C. Kato, newly released by Reycraft Books, 2026. The more I read, the more I fell in love with this lyrical novel! So, I wanted to share it with the Rhyme Doctors' House Calls readers as an example of a longer lyrical text for exploration and study. I was struck by the beauty of J.C.'s poetic verse, written in chapters structured by alternating viewpoints of the two protagonists. The experts agreed--as this book just earned a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection Honor! Often, the Rhyme Doctors share blog posts focusing on picture books. WHALE BOYS offered an opportunity to mix it up and take a closer look at a novel written like a beautiful flowing poem. . . .

Eileen: Welcome to our blog, J.C. How did you come to decide on this lyrical format for the novel?
J.C.: Thank you so much for reading Whale Boys, and I’m thrilled you’re enjoying it. Actually, the format chose me. It just wouldn’t let me manage the lines any other way. It happened in the first chapter I wrote from the Japanese perspective on a previous project (The Hour of the Horse: When General Grant Met the Emperor of Japan, Reycraft in October 2026). So for Whale Boys, I again had two huge historical characters with one big thing in common, but to get to the heart of the story, and stay focused on it, I had to really simplify enormous amounts of facts and information on them. The verse helped me accomplish that.

Eileen: How many drafts did it take to craft your verse novel?
J.C.: I have seven or eight years of drafts on my computer. I’d still be editing if I hadn’t just told myself, “enough, already!” After an SCBWI conference in Florida about six years ago, there was a stir of interest from a publisher on my Ulysses-Emperor story, which encouraged me to keep fiddling with it. My agent at the time, Rubin Pheffer, loved it, as well as Whale Boys, but publishers at that time didn’t want to run with the cross-cultural idea. Sometimes, it takes a while for the right publisher to appear. Reycraft wasn’t around back when Rubin was pitching both stories, but later on an editor immediately loved both manuscripts, and in one short face-time call, I’d sold both of them. And here we are.

Eileen:  Amazing! That is so important for creatives to understand that sometimes it's all about timing for pitching your project -- and to keep the faith! Can you tell us more about your thinking behind this layout?
J.C.: I believe it was a critique group pal way back, who blew me away with her courageous YA manuscript about a teen struggling with self-harm. At the time, I wasn’t really familiar with the verse format, and wouldn’t have considered it for my stories. Later, when researching for my W.W.II Girl Scout story, Finding Moon Rabbit which I co-authored with my daughter, I fell in love with Dust of Eden by Mariko Nagai. It also dealt with a tough subject through verse. So, when I innocently thought it would be cool to do a novel for kids about two countries that I love, I had no idea how hard it was going to be. Writing in verse, makes tough subjects approachable. And with Whale Boys it was especially fun! 

By this time, the layout was deliberate, and I wanted it to be fun reading for my target age group, 9-13. I wanted readers to enjoy a little up and down, like waves, using their eyes and imagination. It wasn’t just to slow them down, but to have a kid look at the whole page and ask, “what the heck is that?” and maybe read the page instead of skipping it.
​
White space on the page, I believe, offers space in the brain—like what poetry and Picture Books do. White space leaves room for emotions to evolve and for the reader to draw their own conclusions. More importantly, I wanted kids to know that Melville and Manjiro were once kids with things happening to them that they had no control over—and how they persisted in trying to get back home to their families while serving in one of the most dangerous professions of the 19th Century, whaling.
​
(Eileen: Below, I've included a few excerpts from the book to show the lyrical layout of J.C.'s text.)

J.C.: I’d like, for as long as I can, to travel to the places my characters have been and imagine that their feet may have walked past the same building, tree, stream, or river I was exploring. You don’t have to do that to write a good story, it’s just I learn best through sensory connections.

My feet have tromped all over New Bedford and Fairhaven, Massachusetts, where Herman Melville and John Manjiro lived or stayed, and had breathed in its briny air. (Sat in the pew Herman sat in at the Seamen’s Chapel, and stood in Manjiro’s bedroom in Captain Whitfield’s house). There’s a great whaling museum in New Bedford, complete with a whaling ship to bump your head on when climbing down into the whalemen’s sleeping quarters. Across the bridge to Fairhaven where Manjiro lived and went to school is the Whitfield-Manjiro Friendship Museum. Fairhaven is a sister city with Tosashimizu in Japan. My biggest high hopes were realized last year when I flew to Japan and stayed in the city of Tosashimizu where Manjiro lived before the Black Current swept him away.

My Ulysses story was more reading, reading, reading. But I’m from the hills of Ohio and easily imagined him as a young boy driving his horses through unfamiliar terrain. Thankfully, there were lots of materials available to study on Meiji—and I’d only dreamed of going to Tokyo. But after Tosashimizu, I took a train to Tokyo to visit Ueno Park and sit on the steps of Grant’s Memorial there.
​
For my first novel, Finding Moon Rabbit, my husband and I visited all ten major internment camps where Japanese Americans were incarcerated during WWII. That’s ten locations placed in deserts, swamps, and in-the-middle-of-nowhere spots in California, Idaho, Colorado, Arizona, Arkansas, and three visits to Heart Mount Wyoming where the story takes place. I learned to lasso there!

​Eileen:  Can you share any information about upcoming events?
J.C.: I’m honored to have been invited by Reycraft to participate in the ALA in Chicago this June. I’ll have two book signings for Whale Boys on Saturday and Sunday. Later this month I’m participating with other authors in Reycraft’s rollout of their fall books with The Hour of the Horse. My website jckato.com, will have pictures and updates. Go to “Send JC a Message” and watch/listen to the video on Whale Boys. It’s sure to get you moving! I share my book news on Facebook, //jckato.com, Instagram/Threads, instagram.com/findingmoonrabbit, and LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jc-kato-0b216452/recent-activity/all/.

Cross your fingers for me. I have one more verse novel sitting in my computer on two more famous characters from the U.S. and Japan!

​Eileen: Thank YOU, JC! And again--congratulations on the Junior Library Guild Gold honor! I hope many of our House Calls readers will ask their local library to order a copy of WHALE BOYS or pick up a copy themselves to read and enjoy your beautiful lyrical adventure novel!  Happy summer reading!

Do you like to write in rhyme? Are you also a foodie? If you answered "Yes" to both, why not try writing a rhyming or lyrical picture book with a food theme? In today's Mentor Text Referrals, I look at three recent books with food themes -- two in metered rhyme and one lyrical text.

Plenty of Pancakes reunites the team of Carrie Finison (author) and Brianne Farley (illustrator) and is published bby G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2026. It is a companion book to Dozens of Doughnuts, published in 2020 and featured in the House Calls post "Two Picture Books that Almost Rhymed."

This book builds upon elements and techniques that Carrie Finison employed in her earlier book:

• a cooking theme and returning cast of characters
• a bouncy rhythm (primarily anapest -- da-da-DUM -- with some variation at the head of the lines), as well as a refrain
• building tension based on not having enough food and a satisfying ending

​In this spread, Finison introduces a refrain that includes a predictive rhyme that doesn't materialize:

Readers will expect "pan" to rhyme with "LouAnn," the main character from Dozens of Doughnuts who is re-introduced in the opening of this book. The non-rhyme here adds an element of mystery to Plenty of Pancakes.

​The spread below, which happens just before the climax of the book, contains lots of great poetic and story devices:

• an example of the "Rule of Three" with three mini-scenes of friends helping
• alliteration -- the P sounds in pitch/pour and the CH sounds in Chip/Chomp
• repetition in the Woodrow stanza ("He looks low. He looks high.")
• interesting rhyme pairs (batter/platter and twenty/plenty)

Next up?

Pie-Rats! by Lisa Frenkel Riddiough and David Mottram was published by Viking in 2024. This story is a hat trick of rhyme, food, and PIRATES! I love that the opening spread features the rhyming pair doubloons/spoons. The word choices in this book are fantastic! The meter is quicker here, what the Rhyme Doctors would call a tail-less trochee, which drops the last unstressed syllable (DUM-da-DUM-da-DUM-da-DUM).

As the pie-rats set out in search of yummy pie, the author uses a refrain that changes slightly from scene to scene and invites reader participation:

From the ____________, hear them cry:
PIE, PIE, PIE, PIE!
(the blank spot includes pirate-y word choices like 
​poop deck, ratlines, lookout)

Alas, when the pie-rats reach the pie-filled island, they discover scallywags have eaten all the pie! ARRGH! Whats a pie-rat to do?

Poetic devices to note in this spread are the F alliteration of frosted/fluff and the S alliteration of sprinkle/sniff, as well as the predictive rhyme, using an ellipsis to encourage the page turn. Have you guessed what the pie-rats will find?

​Book #3 is a lyrical picture book:

Bread Is Love, by Pooja Makhijani and Lavanya Naidu and published by Roaring Brook Press this year (2026), contains a story about a mother and children baking bread, as well as a recipe and instructions in three pages of back matter.
​
What makes a story lyrical? Techniques like the use of poetic devices, precise word choices, and shorter sentence structure.

​Rich word choices (gloopy, bubbles, oozes) and onomatopoeia (glug-glug):

Repetition and the variable font size of the word GROW. The metaphor in the staement "Bread is patience." (And in the title, too!)

Alliteration. Look the many words that begin with Bs and Cs!

Are you hungry now to try and write a rhyming picture book about food? Harness your creativity and start one cooking!

​~ Patricia Toht

​My newest lyrical nonfiction picture book, A Pathway for Pollinators, illustrated by Blanca Goméz and published by Norton Young Readers, releases today!  Just in time for planting season!

​​A Pathway for Pollinators is a companion to my 2024 release, A Place for Rain. Both books feature a classroom of nature-loving children set on tackling an environmental challenge. In A Place for Rain, the challenge is how to “lessen all the mess” of dirty storm water flowing into waterways. In A Pathway for Pollinators, it’s how to provide pollinators with the food and shelter they need in urban settings.

​A Pathway for Pollinators is the first book that I set out to write as a companion text. In the past, I approached each new manuscript as a blank slate, not influenced by topics, structures, or approaches I had used in previous books. But with this project, I knew even before A Place for Rain went to print that my editor at Norton, Simon Boughton, was interested in a book on pollinator corridors as a follow-up title.

So, how did I approach this task of creating a “matched pair?”

To begin, I revisited the essential elements of A Place for Rain. At its heart, A Place for Rain is meant to inspire kids to enact environmental change at a local level. It uses a steps-in-a-process structure to show actionable ways to solve a problem. Finally, it relies on onomatopoeia to create an engaging, read-aloud voice. I wrote these three “elements” at the top of my first draft of A Pathway for Pollinators to serve as guideposts as a began the new story.

After that, I created a two-column draft. In the first column, I pasted the text from A Place for Rain, dividing the spreads into rows. In the second column, I wrote the text A Pathway for Pollinators.

​This is what my draft looked like:

Placing the two stories side-by-side helped me zoom in on the structures and techniques I used in A Place for Rain so I could imitate them in A Pathway for Pollinators. In most places, I didn’t attempt to exactly mirror line and stanza lengths. Instead, I aimed for each scene to follow a similar “path” to move the story forward.

Both texts open with onomatopoetic scene-setting:

“Plink. Plip. Plop.” to describe the beginning of a rain shower.

 “Flitter. Flutter. Buzz. Hum.” to describe a meadow thrumming with pollinators.

From there, the second spread provides more setting details and hints at the problem. The third spread reveals the problem. The remaining spreads follow a similar one-to-one plot pattern.
​
In a few key places, I did mirror the exact wording of A Place for Rain. In both books, when the kids asks their teacher if it’s possible to do something to address the environmental challenge, the teacher answers with a simple, but confident “YES!”

​Both books also end with the same final words, “and EVERYONE.” In A Place for Rain, the last line is “a place for rain and everyone.” In A Pathway for Pollinators, it’s “to welcome pollinators and everyone.” I did this to emphasize that caring for nature benefits the entire community.

The fact that Blanca Goméz illustrated both books was a lucky occurrence that happened after A Pathway for Pollinators was purchased and edited. Blanca’s use of distinct geometric patterns and primary colors definitely helps the two books hold together as a matched pair. (I love the bright yellow school bus and six eager children featured in both books!)

Do you have an idea for two (or more!) books that would work as companion texts? If so, my biggest advice is to make sure that your first book can stand on its own. Polish it until it’s as perfect as possible to catch an editor’s eye. From there, try the two-column approach I outline here.  And don’t’ forget to study other companion book mentor texts, such as Rhyme Doctor Patricia Toht’s Pick A books: Pick A Pumpkin, Pick a Pine Tree, and Pick the Perfect Egg.
​
The ultimate goal? Creating companion picture books that “hum and thrum” as a set!

I'm continuing my series with a deeper dive into various poetry forms. So far we've looked at List poems and Haiku if you'd like to review those posts. Today's topic: Concrete poetry, also known as shape poetry, is “a form of playing with words, ideas, letters, and art. It is, in a sense, a picture poem, one that gives not only words but delight to the eye.” (Myra Cohn Livingston, Poem-Making) The poem’s words are placed or fit into the construct of a recognizable shape to reflect the poem’s subject. That’s the challenge – can you select the right wording to not only capture the subject matter effectively with lyrical language, but also form it into a pleasing shape to reflect your topic! Achieving this can be more difficult than it sounds. Let’s explore some concrete poem examples from a few children’s picture books.

Joan Bransfield Graham’s picture book, AWESOME EARTH: CONCRETE POEMS CELEBRATE CAVES, CANYONS, AND OTHER FASCINATING LANDFORMS (Illustrated by Tania Garcia, 2025) uses concrete poetry to dig into shapes and forms found on Earth. Volcanoes, canyons, and archipelagos are just a few examples of the shape poem topics found in this delightful picture book. Check out this selection about Continents--it showcases how a poem can be laid out creatively to reflect the topic. Not only does the poem split apart to visually depict the key fact that gigantic landmasses broke apart millions of years ago and drifted to create today's seven continents, but some words are laid out uniquely (see word "LIKE") to mimic the lower narrow portion of South America. The two-part poem also shows its puzzle-piece relationship to the continent of Africa. Terrific poem in both word selection and visual display!

In Bob Raczka's poetry collection, WET CEMENT: A MIX OF CONCRETE POEMS (2016), he notes that with each poem in the book, he's done two things. First, for the poem's title, he's created "pictures with letters." (I really like this extra twist in his poetry collection - each title is fascinating! See below.) And in the poem itself, he's arranged "words in the shape of the thing the poem is about or in a way that emphasizes the poem's meaning." Take a closer look at this poem about hangers - those common household items we use to hang up our coats and jackets each day, and we don't give them much thought. . . And notice who is speaking in the poem - the hanger! (Essentially, a mask voice in this poem, too! An object (the hanger) is speaking, NOT you.)

Finally, one more poem from a classic book--Heidi B. Roemer's COME TO MY PARTY AND OTHER SHAPE POEMS (Illustrated by Hideko Takahashi, 2004) With a whirl through the four seasons, you'll find concrete poems that celebrate shapes linked to the different times of year.  A favorite of mine, this lovely winter poem about icicles! 

​Crafting a poem can be quite challenging, and adapting it to a specified shape adds another layer of complexity. We've looked at poems shaped like two continents, a household hanger, and frozen icicles. So creative! I hope you'll check out these picture books featuring concrete poetry by these accomplished poets--and try to write one of your own, too!

Happy creating!
Eileen Meyer, Rhyme Doctor

Whether you prefer the term graphic novel, sequential art, or comics, books written in this style have exploded in popularity this century. The first graphic novel that I read was Raina Telgemeier's SMILE, a memoir about the author navigating school while dealing with the repercussions of a mouth injury. Published in 2010, it led a surge of fans to graphic novels. Since 2010, the sales of books in comic/graphic format have soared to nearly $2 billion in sales, according to Publishing Perspectives.

This popularity has led to an expansion of topics tackled in this style, encompassing both fiction and nonfiction, and targeting ages 4-8 to adult. It was only a matter of time before poetry and the graphic format would join forces in the children's book market.

The two books we'll look at today are collections of poems by author-illustrators who have illustrated them in a comic style: 

BEWARE THE DRAGON AND THE NOZZLEWOCK by Vikram Madan (WordSong, ©2024), is a collection of 25 poems about a variety of zany, imaginary creatures and people.

Some of Madan's poems definitely have a flavor of Dr Seuss, while others remind me of Jack Prelutsky. A parody of Robert Frost's "Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening" takes a fun, spooky turn. "A Hatful of Imps" embraces wordplay, using words beginning with the prefix imp- to convey the naughtiness going on. One poem is a tongue-twister; another is a concrete poem. Loads of fun dialogue and onomatopoeia throughout. Poems may be contained in one spread or stretch over many pages. The words and comic artwork blend seamlessly.

POETRY COMICS by Grant Snider (Chronicle Books, ©2025) has a completely different feel. The 69 poems are simpler and the artwork more orderly. The collection is divided into the four seasons, with poems often set in nature, as cued by the cover illustration:

One of the author's aims is to inspire young writers to pen their own poems, by exploring common experiences of children -- from losing a balloon to riding a roller coaster to picking a pumpkin. Also included are four "How to Write a Poem" poems, as well as a concluding poem about making poetry comics. Like Madan, author Snider includes different poetry forms like haiku, ode, and opposite poem. The neat layout of comic boxes and line drawings complement the simplicity of the poems.

Both of these books have been well-received. Beware the Dragon and the Nozzlewock earned starred reviews from Kirkus and Horn Book, and was a "Best Book of the Year" in the Boston Globe and Kirkus Reviews roundups. Poetry Comics also earned starred reviews from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly.

I'm excited to see that poetry collections are now joining the popular comic format! I believe it will attract a larger audience to poetry by appealing to graphic novel lovers. I encourage you to give these two books a read.

​~Patricia Toht

I first learned about seagrass meadows from this article that popped up in my Google feed. When I read that seagrass “shapes life on Earth, from the food we eat to the air we breathe,” I was intrigued. Then I discovered that there weren’t any picture books on this vital ecosystem, so I decided to write one.

But how to present the plethora of information on the benefits of seagrass meadows, some of it scientifically dense, in an accessible, poetic format? I admit that was quite a process, but I’ll share two strategies that played a big role in shaping the book.

The first strategy I used was to rely on side bars to do the factual “heavy lifting.” This freed me up to focus on kid-friendly, image-evoking details for the main text and present them in a free-flowing lyrical way.

​Here’s a spread from early in the book.  The left page presents the main text, which paints the image of seagrass leaves “waltzing with the current.” The right page contains prose sidebars, which explain specific facts about the location and physical attributes of seagrass.

Let's look more closely at the main text: 

In this example, which focuses on seagrass meadows’ importance as nursery habitats, the final lines are  “All seek a leafy haven in the /meadows of the sea.” 

In this example, which discusses how seagrass meadows act as carbon sinks by pulling carbon from the air, the final lines are “slowing global warming with the/meadows of the sea.”

​These repeated lines do a lot of work! They they sum up the most important idea on the page, provide a refrain for readers to anticipate, and echo the title.
 
I hope this glimpse into Meadows of the Sea has provided you with some ideas for tackling your own nonfiction picture book in a lyrical style . . .
 
and inspired you to learn more about this wondrous ecosystem!

The Rhyme Doctors are once again teaming up with The Children's Book Insider, this time to present a webinar on writing lyrical picture books called Mastering the Flow. (Our previous best-selling CBI webinar, How to Write Rhyming Picture Books, is also still available!) 

Mastering the Flow is a practical, craft-focused webinar designed to help you create picture book texts that sound beautiful out loud while still delivering a strong, clear story. We'll dig into a plethora of recent lyrical picture book mentor texts to show best-practice techniques. We'll also discuss common pitfalls and how to avoid them. 

Whether you write fiction or nonfiction, rhyme or prose, you’ll come away with tools you can use immediately in your own manuscripts.

We hope you'll join us for this 90 minute webinar! 

Sign up HERE! 

List poems have been around a long time, with examples of list verses found as far back as Homer’s Illiad, which dates to the 8th century BC! Walt Whitman used this form as he detailed the varied workers across our nation in his beautiful poem “I Hear America Singing”
​

​I Hear America Singing
By Walt Whitman
 
I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,
The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.
 
Do you hear the repetition of key words? The use of anaphora? The celebration of American workers and the different voices that all contribute to the nation’s song? It’s a classic example of a list poem.

Are list poems used in children’s literature? YES! Check out Deborah Underwood’s The Quiet Book, illustrated by Renata Liwska. This well-loved picture book celebrates the different kinds of quiet that a child might encounter from morning to night. Liwska’s illustrations play a vital role in showcasing Underwood’s short but perfectly descriptive text which reads like a bedtime lullaby, opening with “There are many kinds of quiet” . . .  and goes on to depict spread by spread, different examples of quiet with the reader feeling the emotion of each unique scene.

“Last one to get picked up from school quiet.”
“Swimming underwater quiet.” 
“Lollipop quiet.”  
Read this classic book to learn more about how a list poem structure can work beautifully to convey a surprising list of emotions.

Take a closer look at It’s Fall! by Renee Kurilla. Diving into the wonder of the season, this book celebrates the many ways that fall is delightful in the structure of a list poem. The opening text sets it up: 
 
Colors bursting, shadows tall.
There’s lots to celebrate—it’s fall!
 
Early-morning sunny skies.
Back to school with new supplies. . . .

(Seek out your own copy to read more and discover the ending.) Kurilla also offers It’s Winter! and It’s Spring! in this seasonal celebration.

Poet Laura Purdie Salas and artist Violeta Dadija open their delicious picture book, A Leaf Can Be . . . with this bit of text:
 
A leaf is a leaf, a bit of a tree.
But just try to guess what else it can be!
 
Pages unfold to show the leaf as a tree topper, rain stopper, shade spiller, mouth filler and many other roles a leaf takes in the natural world. You’ll have to read it, or the companion books, A Rock Can Be, Water Can Be to find out more. All of these books are essentially lovely list poems.
 
You often find list poems in poetry collections, too! See if you can hunt and find one in your favorite collection. More children’s books that are structured as list poems for your reading list:
What to Do with a Stick? By Jane Yolen
All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon
A House is a House for Me by Mary Ann Hoberman
A Sock is a Pocket for Your Toes by Liz Garton Scanlon
Thankful by Eileen Spinelli
A Hug is for Holding Me by Lisa Wheeler
 
What type of list poem will you create?
 
Eileen Meyer, Rhyme Doctor

This year, the Rhyme Doctors celebrate our fifth year of providing comprehensive rhyming picture book check-ups. At the outset, we expected our clients would struggle with poetic foot and metrical structure. But, five years in, we know that the manuscripts we receive are just as likely to experience story issues. 
As part of the revision process, we frequently suggest that our clients make a "dummy" of their story. A dummy is a tool that can help a writer imagine the layout of their text as a 32-page book (the most common layout of a picture book). Why is it important to do this? I will explain why in a moment. But first, I'd like to introduce you to two different versions of dummies that can serve two different purposes.

One thing that I like about the Easy-Peasy, One-Page Dummy is that I can whip one up wherever I have access to one piece of letter-sized paper. Fold twice, long-edge to longe-edge, open up, then fold three times, short-edge to short-edge, and open up. Your fold marks will make 32 little rectangles -- exactly the number of boxes needed to replicate a picture book layout. Number the rectangles 1 to 32 and cross out the first three for the "business pages" of the book (title page, copyright, etc.). Grab your manuscript, a pencil and eraser, and get started!

The key to filling out a dummy is to imagine how your words (and the illustrations they'll inspire) will flow through the book. I usually start on p. 4 or 5. Each arrowed line represents one spread of the book (side-by-side left and right pages). I add words to denote scenes of my story as it progresses. Around p. 13, I stop, go to p. 32, and work backwards from the ending. More often than not, I discover (around p. 21) that I have a very messy middle! I wield my eraser liberally, then re-imagine and adjust until the entire story is contained in the dummy. Below is a dummy from my book Taxi, Go! (Note: I use only as many words as needed to understand where I am in the story.)

With the story laid out on one piece of paper, I find it easier to see how a story is flowing --
or not! -- and whether it is hitting the typical touch points for a 32-page picture book. Now is the time to consider BIG PICTURE QUESTIONS, which can often uncover story issues.

The Mini Book Dummy takes a bit more paper, as well as cutting and assembling. Use four pieces of letter-sized paper (8.5 x 11in). Cut each one in half, resulting in eight pieces (8.5 x 5.5in). Fold each piece in half, short-edge to short-edge. Nestle the folded pieces together to form a mini book. Number the pages and mark off the first three for business purposes. 

Print out your manuscript. You will be cutting up your text and adhering the pieces to the pages, according to their layout in the Easy-Peasy Dummy. Using Scotch "Magic Tape" will make it easy to make later adjustments. (Gluing them in doesn't allow for movement!) 

Seeing your text in this format makes it easier to check for things like pacing, balance of text-to-art, page turns, and word choice. Let's look at some PAGE-TO-PAGE QUESTIONS that can help assess these items.

As authors, we know how great it feels to have a manuscript that's working. But a crucial step after the manuscript stage is seeing exactly how well that story will work within the confines of a 32-page picture book layout. The goal of making a dummy is to "see" your book exactly as an editor and reader will see it. The Rhyme Doctors suggest taking that extra step of making a dummy (or two!) to help your book become the best it can be!

​~ Patricia Toht

Brr! Baby, it's cold outside. Time to cuddle up with a cozy winter-themed picture book. Better yet, time to write one! "But wait," you say. "Hasn't this topic been covered . . . a lot?" True, snow and winter are enduringly popular topics for picture books. For good reason. There's perennial magic in that fluffy white stuff that falls from the sky. The key is to capture that magic in a fresh way. 

In this post, I'll look at three recent winter-themed rhyming and lyrical picture books that are as surprising and delightful as freshly fallen snow.

While the list structure and repeated words provide a pleasing rhythm to Snow Is, what really makes this book shine is how it engages all five senses in a joyful day playing in the snow. 

Through alliteration, assonance, and clever end rhymes, Laura Purdie Salas weaves magic into the science of snow, revealing the wonder of winter weather. 

In addition to the counting structure, Nancy White Carlstrom creates musical unity by repeating a specific sentence structure on each spread. Within that structure, she uses precise verbs and adverbs to make each set of creatures pulse with energy. 

With these books as inspiration, I hope you'll play with text structure in your current picture book project and create some magic of your own!

-Rhyme Doctor Michelle Schaub