Picture Book Resources?

Sunshine13

Sunshine13

Mom by day, writer by night!
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Hello, hello, I'm new to this area of writing but have for a long time now been interested in writing children's books. I'm about to start outlining a YA contemporary fantasy, but have been musing over an idea for a picture book for some time now.

My questions mainly lie with the formatting, etc. And I'm assuming one still would rather find an agent first in this field of writing versus straight to a publisher? Any other info I forgot to ask about would be appreciated, I'm clueless here other than how to write a story. :p
 
Jeffery E Doherty

Jeffery E Doherty

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Write the story and wory about the ms formatting later. That's my advice.
The main things to remember though are PB's are the hardest form of children's writing to sell or write for that matter. (Particularly rhyming ones.)
PB' are nearly always 32 pages including the title, endpages and publishers page. Basically leaves 15-16 double page spreads so the story must have at least that many illustratable scenes.
Don't add illustration notes when you send it off unless it is a concept book where the pictures don't correspond to the text.
You don't need to physically describe things or characters because the illustrator will do that. (unless the fact they have blue hair is part of the action of the story)

Hope this helps.


Jeff
 

Danthia

From what I understand, PBs are one of the few things you can go right to publishers with. The advances usually aren't high enough for agents to take on.
 
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