Welcome to Day 7 of 40 craft lessons from 40 picture books. One of the most popular pieces of writing advice is “raise the stakes.” And one of the most misunderstood ones! For me, that advice went in one ear and out the other. Stakes are for adult thrillers, right? I […]
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Welcome to Day 5 of 40 craft lessons from 40 picture books. Many terms in storytelling are confusing. Luckily, “character arc” is one of the clearer ones. Throughout a story, either the main character changes (dynamic arc) or the main character changes the world (flat arc). In both cases, the
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Welcome to Day 4 of 40 craft lessons from 40 picture books. For a long time, animal characters have dominated children’s books. In recent years, human main characters have become more common. So, when is it still better to use animal characters? It’s tempting to choose animals simply because
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Welcome to Day 2 of 40 craft lessons from 40 picture books. Do you know what is more complicated than writing a book? Writing the first line! The first line is the gateway to the story’s world. It shouldn’t be banal or overly strange, nor should it be too slow,