Picture Books and Lazy Parents

Hedgetrimmer · Feb 17, 2007

Hey, guys. This is a bit of the pessimist coming out in me. I was thinking the other day about the reported trend of PB currently being a slow market. Perhaps the main reason I continue to read is one of a cost factor, both for the publisher to produce and the parents to buy. But I was wondering just how much of this has to do with parents either being too busy, too self-absorbed or just too plain lazy to want to sit down and read a book to their children. I notice that publishers are asking for shorter PB, around 500 words, but this has nothing to do with the manufacturing cost of the book. The same number of pages will be used, only more words on the page. I just can't help but wonder if publishers are scaling back on the length of the books as well as the number being published simply because today's parents (no offense to any of you very nurturing parents, I'm sure) just aren't willing to put in the work that a PB requires. It's so much easier to turn on the TV, pop in a video, give the child a game, or some other means of allowing the children to amuse themselves.

Of course, I could be way off base here. It wouldn't be the first time.

Soccer Mom · Feb 17, 2007

But you also don't need 3 million PBs to read to your child every night. Mine (only one still young enough for PB) wants the same story every night for a week. He will even have me read the same book three times in a row. We once read Goodnight Moon for a solid year (with other books too). Hence the fact that I can quote for memory....In the great green room, there was a telephone,...

There is also more of an emphasis on the image rather than the word in many PB books I see today. I'm afraid that's just a fact of modern life.

Susan Gable · Feb 17, 2007

Soccer Mom said:
But you also don't need 3 million PBs to read to your child every night. Mine (only one still young enough for PB) wants the same story every night for a week. He will even have me read the same book three times in a row. We once read Goodnight Moon for a solid year (with other books too). Hence the fact that I can quote for memory....In the great green room, there was a telephone,...

.

And a red balloon, and a picture of the cow jumping over the moon. <G>

Yeah, we read that one more than once, too. LOL.

It's also one of the few books from my son's childhood that didn't get destroyed and hence, is on the shelf here in my office.

It's also a book we made sure to buy to give new parents. Maybe more of us need to be doing that -- handing out excellent books to new parents along with letting them know how important reading to their kid is.

Susan G.

Hedgetrimmer · Feb 17, 2007

At the library I frequent most often, the branch manager sometimes leaves in the afternoon to pick up her two kids from school (maybe 5 and 6 years old) and bring them back to work until she gets off that night. Not once, never ever, have I seen her kids with a book while they're in the library. They are always sitting at the computers playing some silly game. Of course, one could argue that being a librarian, she probably exposes her kids to books all the time at home and, therefore, allows them a little playtime on the computer games while at the library. Still, this coupled with the fact that those games are always in use while I only see a handful of kids browsing the bookshelves, makes me a little concerned.

wyntermoon · Feb 17, 2007

We have a couple of computers available within our childrens' section but the majority of kids I've seen there are trolling the aisles or flopped out on oversized cushions reading PBs. My kids will hit the PB section (or older), then may save them for later to look at the different educational games they have at the library computers. Perhaps this is the same case for your librarian's children.

PattiTheWicked · Feb 17, 2007

Our library has computers in the kids section, and my children are more than welcome to play on them while I browse for my own books. We go to the library once a week, plus each of them goes to school library once a week. I don't mind my rugrats playing on the computer once they've selected their books -- that gives me about fifteen minutes where I can go get my own selections without having to tell two small people to stop jumping around and poking each other. And although the games may appear "silly", if your library is anything like mine, the computer games are probably educational and fun.

You probably don't need to be concerned at all about the librarian's kids; as you said, they most likely read a LOT at home. I'd be more concerned about the fact that there are some kids who've never even set foot in a library, let alone played computer games in one.

stormie · Feb 17, 2007

Don't know if this fits in this thread, but here's my story:

From the time my sons were a few months old, relatives and we, their parents, bought tons of picture books for my kids. So, lets see--over a hundred PBs in the house by the time they were in first grade. I read to them at breakfast, I read to them at night. But guess what they told their teachers when asked to bring a PB to school? "We don't have any books to bring," they said. I didn't know this, and couldn't figure out why the teachers highly recommended me taking them to the library, or sent them home with a PB to borrow. It was years later that I heard what happened. And realized my boys considered our home library to be sacrosanct. Those books stayed at home. Period. I can laugh now, but back then, I'm sure I was considered a lazy parent who didn't read to her kids (though they were very good readers!).

So, you never know.

Sempine · Feb 17, 2007

My oldest always seemed to enjoy the one that had "I want another, mother" in it. She had a mean streak. Perhaps that's why she turned into an author, herself.

There's more to it than liking the story--they like the feeling it gives them to have it read, like having it read by a special person, and like knowing that they will get to hear it again. Otherwise, they wouldn'g go to sleep!

Mac

janetbellinger · Feb 17, 2007

I don't thnk today's parents are any lazier than ones in previous generations. Maybe more writers are writing picture books because they think they are easier to write than regular books. (I know I did.) So there are more picture books being produced. They are actually harder to write rather than easier. One sentence has to sum up a hundred pages. I think people maybe expect their kids to read more print at an earlier age and perhaps that's why they aren't reading as many picture books to their kids. They are trying to hurry them along. I don't believe they are all propping the kids in front of the TV.

Jamesaritchie · Feb 17, 2007

janetbellinger said:
I don't thnk today's parents are any lazier than ones in previous generations. Maybe more writers are writing picture books because they think they are easier to write than regular books. (I know I did.) So there are more picture books being produced. They are actually harder to write rather than easier. One sentence has to sum up a hundred pages. I think people maybe expect their kids to read more print at an earlier age and perhaps that's why they aren't reading as many picture books to their kids. They are trying to hurry them along. I don't believe they are all propping the kids in front of the TV.

I suspect you've hit it. An awful lot of writers out there think children's books of all types PB, MG, Chapter, novel, you name it, are easier to write, and there's a mountain of them out there.

And, really, I'm not sure the PB market has every been super fast. It's just not a market built for speed.

Hedgetrimmer · Feb 19, 2007

Has anybody read the PB "Once Upon a Time...The End?" The author pokes fun at adults hurrying to finish stories by skipping sections.

I once dated a woman who had a toddler, and it used to crack me up whenever she pulled this stunt, sometimes skipping 2 and 3 pages at a time. The little girl, quite precocious, would give her mom a suspicious look and say, "Hey, that's not what happened."

TnTexas · Feb 19, 2007

Hedgetrimmer said:
Has anybody read the PB "Once Upon a Time...The End?" The author pokes fun at adults hurrying to finish stories by skipping sections.

I once dated a woman who had a toddler, and it used to crack me up whenever she pulled this stunt, sometimes skipping 2 and 3 pages at a time. The little girl, quite precocious, would give her mom a suspicious look and say, "Hey, that's not what happened."

Funny? Yes, but a sanity saver at times - especially when you're reading the book for the 10th time in a row and you weren't particularly fond of it to start with.

Hedgetrimmer · Feb 19, 2007

TnTexas said:
Funny? Yes, but a sanity saver at times - especially when you're reading the book for the 10th time in a row and you weren't particularly fond of it to start with.

I totally agree. One of the things I'm really focusing on with my PBs is creating stories that the parent would love as much as the child, although not necessarily for the same reasons. It's a delicate balance, but one that should be met. After all, the child is the last pair of eyes to see the book. First there's the editor/agent (adult), then higher editors (adults), then marketing folks (adults), librarians, booksellers, book reviewers, teachers, parents, la-de-da, la-de-da. The child is the last person who must either approve or disapprove its existence.

In the PB I just completed, I tried to structure it in a funny, kid-friendly way but also include elements that while humurous on the surface, may also have secondary meaning to an adult.

I think with the fierce competition these days, the PB has to work on several different layers, not just as a story on the page.

jennifer75 · Feb 19, 2007

I work full time and get home from work at 7:45 each night. The last thing I want to do is sit and read aloud a long story to my son.

I'll take a short story, 10 pages or so, I read it, then he reads it, then it's off to bed. 15 minutes at the most.

I'd love to come home at 5:00 in the evening, do my "chores" relax a bit, and then start up Charlottes Web with him, but it doesn't happen that way.

I'm sure a LOT of parents prefer the shorter stories for this same reason. It's a sad reality but it is just that, my reality.

Jenan Mac · Feb 19, 2007

I'm trying to think of whether there's a common thread to the picture books my kids liked (I have four, ranging from 25 to 9). The biggest thing, I think, was the lyricism of the language. Goodnight Moon, and Ferdinand, and Guess How Much I Love You are all classics, I think, for a reason. And we had about a bazillion other books by Margaret Wise Brown, who had the most amazing not-quite-poetry rhythms. I can still probably recite most of The Color Kittens.

Katiba · Feb 19, 2007

I read probably thirty to forty different picture books to my two kids (ages 4 and 1) every week - but 95% or more come from the library. Quite frankly, it's only AFTER we've checked out a book and read it over and over again, that I buy it: the Pigeon books, Doreen Cronin's duck books, Olivia, etc. Picture books ARE expensive and I need to know that I'm going to be getting my money's worth. For my older son, we also read from books that are picture books compiled into thick chapter books: Pooh, for example, and Thomas. Those we buy, but I don't think they count as 'picture book sales.'

And I agree about everyone wanting to write a PB. I went to the SCBWI conference in Raleigh this year, and at my table at lunch, I was the only person who wasn't writing a PB.

Hedgetrimmer · Feb 19, 2007

jennifer75 said:
I'm sure a LOT of parents prefer the shorter stories for this same reason. It's a sad reality but it is just that, my reality.

Yeah, that was one of the exact points of my initial post: Just how much does this reality influence the length of today's PB.

The book I just finished is 348 words, the one prior to that being about 950.

ghost · Feb 19, 2007

Actually it's not the parents, it's the publishers and bookstores.
Imogene Cooper from Chickenhouse recently gave a talk at my school.
Publishing companies are not taking picture books or Chap books anymore because there are just too many in the market.

Bookstores are no longer ordering new Chap books either. Waterstones (biggest in England) will not order any more period!

Imogene also went on to state there is a big demand for fantasy middle readers, especially if it's from a boys point of view.

Jamesaritchie · Feb 19, 2007

Books

I suspect many parents are the opposite of lazy. I doubt out kids had more than a dozen picture books between them. By the time they were old enough to understand being read to, picture books bored them to death.

We read them much longer, exciting stories. Even when tiny, long before they learned to read for themselves, they much preferred stories that took some time to read, and that we could all get excited about.

The few picture books they had were simply an aid to teaching them how to read, and it only takes a couple of books to accomplish this.

Soccer Mom · Feb 19, 2007

ghost said:
Actually it's not the parents, it's the publishers and bookstores.
Imogene Cooper from Chickenhouse recently gave a talk at my school.
Publishing companies are not taking picture books or Chap books anymore because there are just too many in the market.

Bookstores are no longer ordering new Chap books either. Waterstones (biggest in England) will not order any more period!

Imogene also went on to state there is a big demand for fantasy middle readers, especially if it's from a boys point of view.

Actually, that did my heart good, since I'm working on a fantasy middle reader with a boy's POV.

I no longer submit PBs. If I have an idea for a short piece, I write it as a magazine story. Those still sell. It's a different way of telling the same story, but...well...there's still a market for them.

JoeEkaitis · Feb 19, 2007

ghost said:
. . .

Imogene also went on to state there is a big demand for fantasy middle readers, especially if it's from a boys point of view.

Well, dang, tell her about my book!

wyntermoon · Feb 20, 2007

Soccer Mom said:
I no longer submit PBs. If I have an idea for a short piece, I write it as a magazine story. Those still sell. It's a different way of telling the same story, but...well...there's still a market for them.

I was wondering the same thing for my PB, it's short enough that it would probably make a great magazine insert and not (hopefully) stay in the slush pile!

Torgo · Feb 20, 2007

ghost said:
Actually it's not the parents, it's the publishers and bookstores.
Imogene Cooper from Chickenhouse recently gave a talk at my school.
Publishing companies are not taking picture books or Chap books anymore because there are just too many in the market.

Bookstores are no longer ordering new Chap books either. Waterstones (biggest in England) will not order any more period!

Honestly, not true. I can sort of see Chicken House saying that as their reputation is mainly as a publisher of quality teenage fiction; their picture books tend more to the mass-market. But there are plenty of picture books continuing to be commissioned in the UK. Same goes for chapter books.

Picture books have been a tough market for a while but publishers keep plugging away, mainly commissioning from their established expert writers and illustrators. Many books are budgeted to make a significant part of their revenue from overseas sales - Europe, Japan etc - so the UK/US trade market is not the whole story.

It's certainly become a riskier business on the high street since more shops are doing their picture book buying centrally; if Head Office doesn't like your book you won't see it in any of their branches. But that doesn't mean publishers aren't fighting over that market.

jennifer75 · Feb 20, 2007

Jamesaritchie said:
I suspect many parents are the opposite of lazy. I doubt out kids had more than a dozen picture books between them. By the time they were old enough to understand being read to, picture books bored them to death.

Reading Charlie Brown "Allstar Baseball" to my son last night, he was watching me, not looking at the pictures.

C.bronco · Feb 20, 2007

I started a collection for my son while he was in utero, and he still enjoys them. I like Click Clack Moo, Cows That Type, and the Dr. Suess books as well. At age 4, he still enjoys picture books.

Picture Books and Lazy Parents

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