Welcome to My World: Twins!

Sometimes our journey as a writer takes surprising twists and turns! This past week when not one, but two!, of my brand new books arrived at my house just one day apart from each other, I was amazed at how the path for these two books had come together.

Let me tell you a little bit about the stories behind the stories!

A couple of years ago, I started to write the first draft of the manuscript, Yes! You Can Learn How to write Beginning Readers and Chapter Books. You see, I had written and published a number of leveled readers over the years.

What are leveled readers? They’re stories that are written for someone who can read at a certain age level in school.

I have written leveled readers for teachers to use with elementary kids for Scholastic Teaching Resources. Nineteen books in all with about 20 stories in each book. One of these books is a bestseller for Scholastic with over 250,000 copies sold to date.

I’ve written leveled readers for middle grade students for 2 books for Libraries Unlimited. Again, about 20 stories in each book.

I’ve written first chapter books for Concordia publishing. Two series of books, actually.

In fact, beginning readers and chapter books have been the bread and butter of my writing career.

So I thought it was about time to sit down and write a book on how to write these fun stories and get them published in today’s market. I want YOU to be able to experience the fun and success that I have, too. And I know you can, because leveled readers are still in demand even though the market is tight in other areas for children’s writers.

Some books take awhile to get from written manuscript to published book. That’s how it has been with my new how-to-write book for beginning readers. Finally, this past summer, it was polished and nearing the completion of the publication process.

So imagine my surprise in August this past summer, as I was getting ready to launch my new book on how-to-write beginning readers and chapter books, when I landed a whole new contract to write more chapter books in a series that had already been started. I was brought on board to write Book 10 in the series of leveled readers for kids in second grade.

And then imagine my even greater surprise when that finished chapter book was sent to me just 3 months later in the same week that I got my how-to-write-chapter-books book that had taken years to also get published!

Talk about amazing timing!!!