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Where Are My Books? Creation Process: Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4

WRITING THE STORY FOR "WHERE ARE MY BOOKS?"

A Guide For Young Readers (Part 2)

by Debbie Ridpath Ohi

Every children's book author/illustrator has their own method for creating a story. 

Debbie started with writing only the text. Here is the first version of the story:

Here is another version:

When Debbie was happy with the story, she created something called a "picture book dummy" to show her editor at Simon & Schuster Children's. A picture book dummy is a rough version of the book. Here is the first page from the picture book dummy for Where Are My Books?:

After Debbie's editor read her story, they talked about how to improve it. Here is a photo of Justin Chanda, Debbie's editor at Simon & Schuster Children's:

Because Justin loves gardening and children's books, Debbie later drew him as a book gardener for fun:

Debbie did some more scribbling:

One of the drawings above ended up being turned into the front cover of Where Are My Books?

Can you spot which drawing?

Continued in Part 3 of A Young Reader's Guide: How Where Are My Books? Was Created.