What is your favorite part of writing books?
I love how new ideas come to me when I least expect them, and how stories take me to a totally different time and place. I also get to learn a lot of new vocabulary words along the way. I love to read books and my mom tells me that reading more books will help my writing skills grow even more. So now we get to make all kinds of trips to libraries and bookstores to get more books and I love it! I especially love going to book events and meeting famous authors and illustrators like two of my favorites, Lynn Plourde and Russ Cox. Not only are their stories so much fun to read but they are so nice and even take the time to talk to me about my writing and encourage me to keep writing. I want to be like them when I grow up!
Do you think you will continue to write?
Yes, I will. I like to visit schools to share my books because I want to help encourage and inspire other children that might be struggling with reading and writing like I did when I started school. I also have to keep writing because if I get too many ideas in my mind and don't write them down I don't think I would be able to go to sleep at night.
Are you working on another book right now?
My second story, BUCKAROO BOBBIE SUE, will be publishing later this fall and I am working on finishing my third story right now, titled TINY TINA. Tina is picked on for being the shortest kid in her village but ends up being just the right size to become the hero for the whole Kingdom. *Spoiler alert, there is a dragon involved.
Is writing a book harder than you thought before you did it?
I find that the stories ideas come to me a lot easier than some of the actual words do. I love rhyming stories because Dr. Seuss stories helped me get beyond my struggling reader problems. The hardest part is trying to tell the story I think of and also make the lines rhyme. That can be really tough and sometimes I get totally frustrated and feel like giving up. Then my mom tells me to take a break for awhile and go back to it later. So many times that does the trick and when I look at it again I can think of all kinds of new ideas.
Come meet JoJo Thoreau and dozens of additional authors and artists at Books in Boothbay on July 11!
