Nice surprise from my publisher - got the cover of "Mister McAfferty's Cat" and love it! The inside has one item needing revision but then we'll be good to go, YAY!

Methinks they did an awesome job!

My Favourite Books

I was an early reader, and from the get-go, I was hooked. Back then, I'm 70 now, there weren't all the paraphrased versions of the classics, so (between the ages of 7 and 11) I read most of the classics by Dickens, the Bronte sisters, Captain Marryat, Anna Sewell et.al. and some more contemporary, like Marguerite Henry and even Louis L'Amour.

My favourites back then were Brighty of the Grand Canyon, Jane Eyre, Lorna Doone, The Children of the New Forest and Oliver Twist. 

My Brighty copy was bought secondhand and was a dingy red hardback, that seemed huge to my 7 year old self, but I loved that book and read, and re-read, it over and over. It had awesome illustrations but sadly I don't remember the illustrator. 

I'm not sure what happened to it, whether my mum may still have it stashed away, since she has shelves full of old Ladybird Books, which were also my favourites and encompassed so many subjects.

My nan had bought it for me, and also regularly spent 2/6d on various Ladybird Books that were about things that interested me. Stone Age Man in Britain was one of them, and on annual holidays with my grandparents we toured Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall visiting historic sites - including burial mounds, caves with stalactites and stalagmites, places in the books that I read, and relics of the Industrial Revolution.

On those trips, on our first night out of London, we'd camp in the New Forest, which obviously fuelled my love of Captain Maryatt's book. In Somerset we'd visit Exmoor, the Doone Valley and Oare Church, the settings of R.D. Blackmore's novel.

I can't imagine not being able to have read those books, they fired up my imagination and created a lust for more, and for exploring the settings.

So, when I had my children, one of my first tasks in their toddler/preschool years was reading to them, and then teaching them to read and write before they started school.

At that point, I fell in love with Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar. As did my kids! They loved poking their fingers in the holes. Others on their bookshelf - Goodnight Moon, The Velveteen Rabbit, Thomas The Tank Engine (and I actually spent some time with the Reverend Awdry in Wisbech in the 70s), Richard Scarry Books and the Berenstain Bears books.

I actually used Bears In The Night as one of the books when I was teaching my three to read, because of its simplicity and repetition.

By the time my granddaughters were born (after I'd moved to America) I'd also become a fan of Dr Seuss, especially Green Eggs and Ham although I happily read his others to them, and the children I babysat, because I loved the cadence they introduced children to.

I am still an avid reader, I usually have 2 or 3 books on the go at any one time. My tastes are many and varied, as are the authors that I enjoy. 

Illustrations Are Sorted And Other Updates

 Well, things are moving forward and the illustrations are now in the colouring phase! I'm excited. It'll be so nice to get it all put together and published. There've been so many hiccups along the way, I honestly thought I was fighting a losing battle 6 months ago, and that I'd never find someone to do the pictures how I wanted them. I'm thankful things finally started falling into place.

I began putting some of my poems on youtube, with me reading them. I've also put some to music on Suno, and have been sharing them. It's neat getting feedback from people about what they like (or don't) about my offerings. 

Hoping that the upcoming month will be full of new accomplishments.  I have some online trainings that I want to do to enable me to use certain programmes better. More efficiently.

3 More Of My Books Are Now Available In The Greenville County Library

On Friday, I went by my local library in Mauldin and donated copies of Rose's Rhymes For Children,

Daisy May Explores The Heavens

and In The Ocean 

for the local authors shelf, so now local folks can request and check them out. 

They now have 7 of my titles in there, the others being The Storybook Witch,

In The Forest, 

Take Time To Be Kind, and Daisy May and the Life Cycle of Plants.

The last one is checked out at the moment, which I find very fulfilling. It definitely makes this very real for me.

Full Circle

It's been a year since my journey with Blueberry Publishing and what a year it has been! Working with Blueberry helped me to materialize a dream of getting my poem "The Storybook Witch" published as a children's book. It had been 25 years in the making!

It began when I was back in England at the end of the nineties, while my husband was working overseas in Saudi Arabia. I'd gone home for a vacation, and was babysitting for my sister. My youngest niece, Sophie, came home from school one day and said,

"Auntie Rosie, can you find me a witch poem for school?"

It was October, and Halloween was fast approaching. I looked online, and couldn't find anything. There were plenty of fairy tales with witches as characters, but I couldn't find a single witch poem. So I wrote "The Storybook Witch" for her.

She loved it, her teacher loved it and her classmates loved it. I was happy that it had been a success.

As the years went by, I shared it around Halloween, on Facebook, and with friends, and the comments were always so positive. People loved it. 

"Oh, that'd make a lovely kid's book!"

"You should turn that into a book, Rose."

I'd had a similar idea myself, that - with illustrations - it would be a nice picture book for younger children.

I started looking for an illustrator. I spoke with various people over the years and met with locals who had talent, but whose vision and mine didn't quite come together for what I was looking for. I even tried AI and just wasn't getting what I saw in my mind. The idea was there, but it got pushed to the side. 

Twenty five years passed. A quarter of a century. I published a book of poetry titled "Twilight", and had various poems published in "Poetry Now" magazine, and others, but "The Storybook Witch" remained simply a poem. Its evolving into a book just wasn't happening.

That changed in 2024. I was about to turn 69, and I realised that if I didn't do it soon, it might never happen. Thus began the search, again, for an illustrator.

Facebook must have read my mind, as ads for illustrators and book publishing began. Among the ads I saw, was one for Blueberry Illustrations, and out of all those that I looked into, Blueberry appealed to me the most.

Even before I made the decision, Sean was emailing me and answering any questions that I had. Since I was totally new to this, I decided to opt for a complete package of their services, and so I began my Blueberry family journey in March 2024.

I like the relationship with their team. The initial sketch of each illustration, and then the revisions to hone it to my preferences. On some, I was a bit of a pain (I think) but they worked with me and we got it right in the end. After the revisions came the addition of colour, and that made them pop. My dream was becoming a reality.

July 21st 2024, "The Storybook Witch"

was published and is now available on Amazon. It was neat to see I had sales not only in the USA, but Australia and the UK as well. My friends joked that I was now an international author. 

Now, I was in the same predicament for another book, a story this time. "Mister McAfferty's Cat", a project requiring 19 illustrations, and having no luck with AI, nor with a local lass who was very talented but who felt she coudln't commit to 19 drawings ... so I came back to Blueberry and we are, once again, collaborating on it. 

So, I've come full circle, and starting in the same month of this year. I'm excited to see what we come up with. Who knows? Maybe "Mister McAfferty's Cat" will earn as much love as "The Storybook Witch".

Favourites

I think every writer has their favourite creations.

I think my favourite book so far is "In The Forest".

I just love everything about it. I created the illustrations using AI, and it came out absolutely beautiful. I am so pleased with it. 

I want to help make childhood a magical and innocent time.

One of my favourite poems - more of a ditty really - is a poem I wrote about my brother back in 1998 after an incident when he was biking home from Kings Lynn to Hunstanton.

Ode to Jed

Astride the bike, and pedalling fast,
our Jed, en route to Huns'ton wast
whence overtook by wasps, was he,
who stung with marked ferocity.

He dropped the bike and tried to run -
the wasps did follow. Oh what fun!
Five welts - their trophies on his skin -
Jed swears he'll ne'er do that ag'in!

So much going on

I'm still working on "Phoenix - Out Of The Ashes" and "Rose's Rhymes For Children" but am also now working with a young lass who is beginning to illustrate "Mister McAfferty's Cat" for me. She is very talented and I hope we can enjoy many years of collaborations, ahead.

I created a new character, Maisie, for a poem that I'm hoping to turn into a book. She's a quirky little miss, so I'm hoping I can get the illustrations to match her demeanour.

It feels good to be doing this. To finally be doing something consistently with my writing. It's amazing!