Creating a Great Kids Book with Adrienne Quintana

Introduction (various voices) 00:05
Welcome to the Empowered Author podcast. 
Discussion, tips, insights and advice from those who’ve been there, done that, helping you write, publish and market your nonfiction book.
Being an author is something that you’ve got to take seriously.
I’m proud I’ve written a book.
What does the reader need, first? What does the reader need, second?
What happens if you start writing your book before you identify your “why”? What’s the problem with that?
You’re an indie author, you take the risk; you reap the rewards; you are in charge of the decisions. You’re the head of that business. 
Every emotion you’re feeling when you’re writing is felt by every other writer.
The Empowered Author podcast. Your podcast hosts are Boni and John Wagner-Stafford of Ingenium Books.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 00:57
Every author was a reader first. And this love of reading is commonly cultivated as children: children who read become adults who write. But more than that, they become adults who think, lead, innovate and contribute. Writing books for children has many things in common with writing books for any other age group. But there are differences too. And that’s what we’re talking about today. And we’re joined by children’s book publisher, Adrienne Quintana of Pink Umbrella Books. Adrienne, welcome. 

Adrienne Quintana 01:32
Thank you. Thank you for having me, Boni. It’s nice to be here. 

Boni Wagner-Stafford 01:35
Nice to have you. I’m excited about today’s conversation because as I was thinking about, you know, how do we think about kids books – and in many ways, it’s easy for me – full disclosure here to think about them, “Oh, that’s, you know, you only need this many words. And so maybe it’s easier.” And then it’s like, “Well hang on a minute.” This is actually really, really important. And because it’s not that many words, we have to think even more carefully about what those words are. But first, before we get into that, I really want to talk about your journey as a children’s book publisher and an author. So you – Pink Umbrella Books focuses mainly on children’s books but you’re also an author of techno thrillers. Tell me about how those two things coexist.

Adrienne Quintana 02:24
How do they coexist? You know, and I think I love that you began with your introduction talking about how we start out as readers. And I actually did not start out as a great reader. I struggled pretty hardcore as a child but my mom did a great thing: she read out loud to us; she started with those picture books and she worked her way right on up. She read us, you know, a lot of CS Lewis and a lot of these, you know, fantasy books. And so even though I struggled to read myself, she instilled that love of reading in my mind and that eventually became, you know, reading and quickly turned into writing. So my journey as an author: I started out – I took some creative writing classes in college. I did some not serious writing as a youth. That was really fun. And I think I had this dream and aspiration of being an author. But, you know, it wasn’t fully developed and I had other ideas and interests. But it was probably – I was a young mother and just in my late 20s and I had a really good friend who was a great gift giver and I am not a great shopper and not a great gift giver. And I wanted to give her something unique for her birthday. And our children played together at the park every Tuesday. And she had six kids and she called them her little rats. And I thought it was so cute. And I had this idea that I could write a children’s story for her and have it illustrated about our little rats and the Tuesday playgroup and so it was called “Rat Tuesday”. And then I had my sister Shalece illustrate it for me and got it all put together and found print-on-demand publishing and got it published and sent it to her. And so I feel like it was a really unique – the one unique, amazing gift I’ve ever given anybody. Don’t expect it again. It was a lot more involved. But I just found this amazing creative outlet at that time when I had these four little children and not a lot of time. And it just, it kind of ignited a fire in me. So I did that and self-published that book and it was available and it sold reasonably well. And then a couple of years later, I went on a girls’ trip with the same friend to New York City and I came back with this suitcase full of souvenirs and one of the souvenirs – well, it wasn’t even a souvenir but it was just a pink umbrella that was in my … It was raining in New York so I bought a pink umbrella. And my four-year-old at the time thought it was the best thing ever. She didn’t want the crown from the Statue of Liberty. She didn’t want the necklace I bought her. She wanted this umbrella. And she would just pretend she was going to all these places and jump off of things and fly and that’s where I got the idea for my second book, which was “Isabella’s Pink Umbrella”. And so that one I published and that was the time when I established my company. Pink Umbrella Books. And I had these ideas of publishing for other people and all of that. And this was back in 2012. Well, life, you know, happened and not too much else as far as publishing for other people. But I had established my company and I had built a website and I did a few things. And I think at that point, I did a little contest for kids where they could send in, you know, a story and we judged it and it was really fun. And then a couple of years later – you asked about the techno thriller. So I had always wanted to try to write a novel. And I have a little sister who is 20 years younger than me. And so we were reading a lot of the same young adult novels. I was really into reading YA at the time. And so we were sharing back and forth and talking about what it would take to write a book. And she called me up in 2013, and said, “Have you heard of National Novel Writing Month?” And I had not. But I was intrigued. And I thought, you know, with everything I have going on in my life, this is something that I need to try because it’s a goal that I’ve had and it sets a – you know, you start at the beginning of November with your “It was a dark and stormy night” and you’re supposed to write the end at the last day of November. And so that felt really amazing to me. But I actually started my first novel, “Eruption”, I started it on the first day of September, thinking, “I should give myself a little extra time.”

Boni Wagner-Stafford 06:20
Right, exactly. 

Adrienne Quintana 02:22
And I wrote 2,000 words a day for two months. And I had just over 100,000 words when I finished the first one and shopped it around and found a small … Well, I had some interest from – I was very green in the whole publishing process and I was nervous and I was shopping it out to a lot of agents. And I had some good response back, even in the first month, from some agents, that I had an offer from a small press publisher that felt safe and comfortable to me. And so I took that offer. So I published that first book and then a couple of years later – or I guess it was the next year – I published the sequel to it through Pink Umbrella Books. And then at that time, I decided to start really putting out a call for submissions and I received some amazing calls and I heard some response back and we just published probably two or three titles per year since then. And then that has transformed also into author services, which is kind of the way that we’ve transitioned in that we’re going now, specifically with the picture books because we’ve become pretty skilled in that, so …

Boni Wagner-Stafford 07:30
Right. So just before we – I’m really looking forward to getting into the children’s discussion – but it for those that are interested, the techno thrillers are called “Eruption” and “Reclamation” and they are still available wherever you might buy books. Okay. And we’ll – when we publish the notes, we’ll include links to those as well. Let’s pause for a moment for a message from our sponsor.

Commercial 07:58

Boni Wagner-Stafford 08:33
Okay, so let’s talk about kids’ books. There are lots of similarities between the – you know, in the mindset of an author, whether you’re writing for an adult audience or a children’s audience. Let’s start there, though. Tell me what the similarities are from your experience.

Adrienne Quintana 08:54
I would say that the similarities are that, you know, reading a book, we’re looking to create tension when we’re … Not – I mean, yeah, honestly, that’s what keeps somebody moving forward: they’re looking to have tension resolved. Like, we want to know what’s going to happen next because we’re worried about something. And I think that that’s the same. Although it’s not as pressing in some children’s books, the ones that you think of that you really like, there’s a lot of problems that are happening for your main character that they need to resolve. And usually they’re more simplistic problems for picture books but that is the core of it: that there’s a problem that needs to be solved.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 09:33
And then you think about, even for – and maybe especially for a children’s audience or an audience of children, that we as parents are trying to teach our kids how to solve their own problems. So from that simplistic viewpoint – and, you know, adults, we’re still solving problems that’s part of being alive but really, that’s really a very important function when we’re trying to turn our little people into bigs. 

Adrienne Quintana 10:06
Exactly, yeah, I think we’re trying to solve – and that is something else, I think, that’s more unique. I think that picture books compared to a novel like – you know, there’s, there’s often a moral involved in every story. There’s a moral or something that you’re trying to teach in every story. How hidden it might be: I think it’s less hidden when it comes to children’s books. I think those are often a little more heavy handed trying to teach a specific value or principle or a moral.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 10:35
So solving problems or having the main character face a problem and somehow resolve it is a similarity. Is there – what else is similar between writing for children and adults?

Adrienne Quintana 10:50
I think just that trying to make a character connection. Like where you’re giving your character flaws that someone can relate to, I think that’s very similar: I think we all want to have somebody that’s not perfect, that has flaws that we can connect with.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 11:08
Alright. Differences? Where can we start? 

Adrienne Quintana 11:13
I think the biggest one, you hit on at the very beginning, which is the very - and this is something I did not know when I started out: that every single picture book is 32 pages, precisely, which is including the title page, which is including the author bio. There are 32 pieces of paper inside a picture book. That’s what it is. So that’s very specific. And I thought, “That can’t be right. This is crazy. How can we …”

Boni Wagner-Stafford 11:38
I know. How weird.

Adrienne Quintana 11:39
… jam it into such a specific box? But as time has gone on, I recognize that – you know, and I think that the reason that that started out was because publishers had a certain way that paper folded and how it fit and whatever cost-wise was taken into account. And now with print-on-demand, that’s not a thing. I mean, you can print as many pages as – or as few pages – as you want and it’s fine. But looking at it and the number of manuscripts that have come across my desk and the number of times I’ve been at a book festival and had people walk up and pick up the book and look at it with their child, I will tell you that 32 pages is the right number of pages. And I will tell you that there are a specific number of words on a page that a parent wants to read to their children. So, you know, specifically, I remember my – having these Disney Princess books that my children would want me – that my girls wanted me to read to them at night. And every parent out there knows this: where you see it and there’s so many words, there’s a block of text on the page and you’re reading it to your kid at night. And it’s too long. You want three, you know, three or four sentences maximum on a page for a picture book, so I can turn the page and my toddler’s not wanting to turn the page or that I’m just not falling asleep and I’m not bored out of my mind.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 12:55
And they can engage with the images as well as the word since they’re there. That’s really a visual connection for them.

Adrienne Quintana 13:01
That is a big difference too. And I think that’s something that when we work with our authors, helping them to visualize. You know, they’ve written out the story. And a lot of times we’re cutting words because we say, “You know what? Those can be told by the illustration. That doesn’t need to be repeated in the text. You know, let’s put that as a note for the author, the illustrator.” And also, one of the biggest characters in a picture book is the page turn. You know, that’s a very – that’s something you don’t think about when you’re laying out a novel, like where the page turn is going to be. But it’s huge, you know: there’s something with a dot-dot-dot. We want a page turn there so that it says and then the illustration tells us the story just as much as the words.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 13:44
So it’s multi-faceted in a way that we don’t think about with a full length, adult manuscript. You know, adult manuscript is multifaceted in a different way with the concepts and ideas and layers within the text. But now you’re almost talking about multimedia with a kids’ – illustrated kids’ book.

Adrienne Quintana 14:08
Absolutely. And really, when you think about what – the importance of a picture book in developing the storytelling that goes on in your head, you know, it is showing kids how to develop their imagination, how to put those pictures in their mind, so that when they’re reading the book later on, you know, those things flow. It’s very – I think it’s essential in building that imagination.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 14:33
So this, the 32-page thing and these other concepts that you’re talking about: what’s the upper age limit? You know, like we segment our reader audiences into age groups and so for kids – what is the age group of kids that these parameters apply for? Yeah.

Adrienne Quintana 14:50
It’s really like kindergarten through second grade that are reading picture books and by second grade, they’re moving on to beginning readers, which may have a few spot illustrations but they’re going to look a little bit and feel a little bit more like a chapter book where you’re reading more words and you just have one or two illustrations. They might have one or two spreads. But the focus, by the time they get to a beginning reader, is going to be on the words rather than on the pictures.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 15:15
Right, which, of course, is another one of those things that’s the same regardless of the audience, whether it’s a children’s audience or an adult audience. Which is, at the beginning, you need to know who you’re writing for and identify that audience. So not all children can be written for and to, in the same way, and have it be effective at connecting with the reader. So kind of age five-ish, age – you know, maybe we’ll say four to seven or eight for it for the 32-page picture book. Okay. So now from your experience providing, publishing to children’s authors and author services to children’s authors, what are some of the common – I don’t want to say mistakes – but the common areas of learning that the authors that you find yourself working with go through?

Adrienne Quintana 16:10
The first thing that pops to mind is we have a lot of authors who are working in verse. And so we have a lot that come not well skilled with the rhythm. And so – you know, and there can be a little bit of give and take with that but I think that’s one of the places that Mary, our editor works the most with authors, is just developing that steady rhythm and understanding where the beats are. That’s probably one of the biggest things. Because you might feel pretty skilled in having your rhyme scheme or whatever that is but that’s not the only – if you’re going to have a rhyming picture book, I think it’s super important to do that right. And it’s something that I love. I grew up on Dr. Seuss and I love the way it trips off the tongue. And I love that when it’s done well. When it’s not done well …

Boni Wagner-Stafford 17:00
Not so much. 

Adrienne Quintana 17:02
Not so much. It can be a little bit painful to try to read those things. And anything that makes you stop as you’re reading it aloud to your children is frustrating. And so those things we try to really help our authors hone. And Mary, I mean, she lovingly calls herself, you know, the Metre Nazi but she will not let it pass and if it’s not, you know – but she’s really patient with our authors and has taught them a lot about how to get that flow and to get that rhythm. So that’s one thing that I think we really help people with. The next, I would say, is – I mean, not all of the people who come to us are writing rhyming picture books but the other thing is, like just getting it to the right word count. Getting it the right length. And the right number of words per page is really important. And then also just developing. A lot of times they’ll come to us without having a lot of tension. We’re working with a client right now who is writing more of an informational book. His son has a medical condition that he feels like there was nothing out there addressing this. But even if it’s something that’s educational, like that, it’s still sort of needs to fit a flow and it needs to have some tension, you know, that we were looking at it and we’re like, “Really, what you’ve written here doesn’t lend itself to the pictures,” – there were a lot of pictures of the same thing happening because it was, you know, just a medical thing that was happening. And so we got to look at how to build the tension in that and how to have a rise and fall of the action and just feel like it’s satisfying because we’ve gone on a journey with your, you know. And so I think, developmentally, I think that we need to have all of those same elements that you would have in any story.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 18:43
So do people tend to come with you – come to you – with words only or do they tend to come with some illustrations or notions of illustrations and maybe, do some come with illustrations first?

Adrienne Quintana 19:01
I’ve never had anyone come with illustrations first. Although one of my favorite titles that we published at the very beginning is called “Duck, Duck, Moose” and Joy Heyer is a member of SCBWI and is primarily an illustrator. She’s very talented illustrator but came to us first with fantastic illustrations that just grabbed me. And we were so fresh and new that I couldn’t …

Boni Wagner-Stafford 19:28
What is the – sorry to – what is the acronym that you called? You talked – SC …

Adrienne Quintana 19:33
SCBWI, which is Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Which is …

Boni Wagner-Stafford 19:39
Right. Got it. Thank you.

Adrienne Quintana 19:40
… highly recommend that everyone who is considering publishing or writing a children’s picture book to join this society. They have so many insider tips and it’s a great place to connect with illustrators if you’re an author. If you’re an illustrator, it’s a great place to get your name out there. They have a lot of critique groups that can meet together. They have a – in almost every major city, they have conferences where you can go and learn the craft and learn about the industry. So I highly recommend SCBWI to anybody who’s considering this.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 20:12
Great. So back to the question, sorry. And I totally – my brain went off trying to figure out what that acronym was. I’m not familiar with the children’s market. But so story and words is most common. Story and words, sometimes with illustrations, happens and almost never illustrations first, without the words.

Adrienne Quintana 20:34
Rarely illustrations first. So when Joy came to us, she had her illustrations because that’s her, her – and then we spent time working with her on developing the rhyme, the metre and all of that. And it came together and it’s just beautiful: “Duck, Duck, Moose”. But yeah, I would say the most common for people to come to us with just the words. And then a lot of times, they’ll want us to help connect them with an illustrator, which, you know, if you’re considering indie publishing, a lot of times we’re looking at finding an illustrator who is just, you know, building a portfolio because they’ll be a little bit more reasonable to hire for the first time around. But to me, that’s really important to find an illustrator who really gets the vision of what you want to do because they’re really your partner. And honestly, with a picture book, what they do is more important than what you did, because no one will open your book if the illustrations don’t bring them across the bookstore or, you know, grab their eyes online. And so the illustrations are very important. A lot of times we do have people come to us where they’ve illustrated something themselves or where they’ve had a family member illustrate it. And that can go well or not so well. I think it’s really important to not be married to those illustrations if – I mean, it depends on your goals, I guess. Some people, you know, it’s just a bucket-list thing where they want to write a story for their grandchildren. And they illustrated it and that’s what they want. And that’s fine. But if you’re looking to really have it be successful commercially, I think you need to really consider hiring a professional illustrator or someone that has professional quality illustrations, who’s building a portfolio.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 22:16
Right. And that illustration component is – so for indie publishers who are – or indie authors, rather, who are kind of spearheading their own publishing efforts, is illustration inexpensive?

Adrienne Quintana 22:35
Illustration is all over the map. So if you were to hire – they’re kind of industry standard. So if you go to SCBWI, somebody who’s a member of that, I think you’re going to be looking at roughly $10,000 to illustrate it a 32-page picture book. So, you know, I think that’s a chunk of change. It depends on where you’re at in life. And, you know, if you really research what most indie authors make on a first time around, that’s more than you’re going to make the first time around. But, you know, I think if you’re looking at long term and looking at building a – it’s not only the first book that you’re going to publish but you’re going to publish a series of books and I think it’s important to have quality illustrations. But I would say too that you can find illustrators who are building a portfolio, who want a partnership, who will work with you in terms of, you know, having either a smaller amount upfront and then sharing royalties with you on the back end: it’s definitely an option. Or some people who would just take – you know, who are building a portfolio but who have the talent that you’re looking for, that you can look at more like two or $3,000 to illustrate.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 23:51
Yeah, and you hit on something that, again, is another similarity between writing and publishing for an adult audience – any audience – which is figure out what’s motivating you to do it first: make sure you’re clear on what your goals are because that really informs every other decision that you have to make. So we’ve talked about the illustration; we’ve talked about the story creation and some of the tension. So how many words reasonably fits on those 32 pages? You’ve talked about three or four sentences maybe max on a page? I’m a, you know, publisher: I work with words. Don’t ask me to do that math. But what’s the word count that you’re targeting for that age group?

Adrienne Quintana 24:35
If you go look it up, most publishers are looking for under 1,000 words. I’m looking for less than that: I’m looking for right around 500 words maximum. 

Boni Wagner-Stafford 24:46
Wow.

Adrienne Quintana 24:47
So it’s really small. It’s not a lot. But based on my experience – and I’ve had a lot of experience, you know, just watching people pick up those books – and our books that have two or three sentences per page, where the pictures of the primary focus, are the ones that people will pick up while they’re in the store with you or at the book festival. They’ll read the entire thing to their child and they’ll buy the book. If – you know, we have a couple of other titles where we went a little longer before we had experience and we thought it was great and it had vocabulary that can help teach: the people will walk up, pick up that book, look at how many words per page and immediately close it and put it aside. So it’s a number one selling point, right after the cover. The cover is the number one marketing piece, in my opinion. But number two is how many words per page when it comes to a picture book.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 25:39
Yeah, okay, that makes perfect sense. Now, what about buying preferences? So in the adult market, I think – I always forget what statistic is but it’s something ridiculous, like 95% of all books are now sold online: something ridiculous like that. Is it the same for kids’ books? Or is the buying – are the buying preferences a little bit different?

Adrienne Quintana 26:04
You know, I’m – I don’t have statistics on that. But I would venture to guess we’re just a little bit behind that. I think that people still probably are buying more picture books in on-ground bookstores than they were before. But I think it’s coming. It’s moving that direction as well.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 26:22
Yeah. And Covid aside, of course, but so … And that makes sense to me, actually, though. So parents are either with their kids – either in the library or in a bookstore – or without their kids and they want to touch-feel a little bit more than they can do it just online.

Adrienne Quintana 26:37
Yeah. And, you know, I’ve – what I will say that’s a little bit different for this is that I personally think – and I need to look for statistics to back this up – but I think that picture books for children are probably bought more by grandparents than they are bought by parents. 

Boni Wagner-Stafford 26:53
Oh, that makes sense. That’s interesting. 

Adrienne Quintana 26:55
It’s a gift that …

Boni Wagner-Stafford 26:57
Keeps on giving.

Adrienne Quintana 26:58
That keeps on giving. And maybe not only grandparents but that older generation who are trying to support parents who are busy and who – you know, our generation is more willing to give an iPad or a phone to that child. And I think that the older generation recognizes the importance of those physical paper picture books. And so I think that that’s something to think about when you’re appealing – who you’re appealing to too. Because a lot of times – like, I know that my mother in law bought probably the majority of the picture books that we had in our home and I’m so grateful to her for that because at the time, my husband was in law school and we couldn’t afford a whole lot. And she just filled up those bookshelves and I read those books and I was so grateful for them. So I think, you know, when you’re thinking about who the buyer is, that’s something to consider, I think. The children might be asking for certain popular books but when you look at who’s really buying the books, I think you should consider that it’s also the grandparents or the aunts and uncles, you know: that these are the buyers.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 28:02
Yeah, that makes sense. So what about that electronic component? So adult books, you know, we just – at Ingenium Books, we’re just – you just always do an ebook and a paperback. And that’s just what you always do. What about these picture books for kids? Is there an appetite for them in electronic format?

Adrienne Quintana 28:21
I do think that there is. It’s not as much as for adult books but I do recommend having that component just because I think, one, when you’re indie publishing it, it allows for the Look Inside the Book feature on Amazon, which is crucial. I mean, when someone is looking, they’re going to look at the cover but they want to see what’s inside that book and see if it’s quality. So it allows for that. It also allows for building Amazon ads. If you’re – we publish through IngramSpark and KDP. And it is important for us as well to offer the hardbound version of the book. So we’ll do hardbound, which is only through IngramSpark, and then softbound through Ingram and KDP. So if someone chooses only to do the hardbound, then we would say, then you absolutely must have an ebook so that you can do the Amazon ads. Otherwise, you lose out on that opportunity. 

Boni Wagner-Stafford 29:19
Right. Okay. Well, this has been fascinating. We’re just about at my imagined, self-imposed 30-minute mark. Is there anything else that you were really hoping I was going to bring up?

Adrienne Quintana 29:30
This has been a great conversation. You know, I think it’s just kind of whetting the appetite for people and hopefully, you know, giving some thoughts to people that are anywhere along in this process. And really, I would just say, do your research: you know, like, look and see what other people are doing. I think we’ve kind of hit on the main topics. We’re getting started and kind of thinking about things. But I would say one big thing I guess I would leave with you is it’s crucial for anyone who’s written a picture book to read it out loud to children and see the response. And I think that’s – I mean, it could be a good thing for all authors to do but it’s a really practical thing and sometimes people don’t think about doing it. So read it out loud and see how it flows and see what they laugh at and see if it’s getting the response that you’re looking for.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 30:19
And more than just one because personality, you know, developmental level, all that kind of stuff can vary. 

Adrienne Quintana 30:26
Absolutely. 

Boni Wagner-Stafford 30:27
Excellent advice. Very fascinating conversation. And, you know, I again, just back to the way I was talking about this at the beginning, which is, this is an important audience for us to serve. And so almost anything we can think about that we want to teach that youngest generation can be framed within a story with tension and a lesson in a picture book.

Adrienne Quintana 31:00
Absolutely. You know, that’s one of the most rewarding parts of what I’m doing now, is I’m finding probably 80% of my clientele for author services are grandparents who want to share something that they know and love and care about and whatever: they want to share it in picture book form with their grandchildren. And I think that’s so touching. You know, and if it happens to serve other people, great. And if it doesn’t, that’s fine, too. But they’re finding a lot of success in sharing this with not only their children. You know, they’re coming into it and not worrying about what they’re spending to do this for these children that they love and it’s serving and blessing other people as well.

Boni Wagner-Stafford 31:44
Right. Awesome. Okay, Adrienne, thank you so much for joining us and for taking the time to talk about children’s books. 

Adrienne Quintana 31:51
Thank you for having me, Boni. It’s been fun. 

Boni Wagner-Stafford 31:57
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