One night in 1993 as she sat telling her daughter, Jennifer, a bedtime story, Diane Z. Shore discovered how easily characters and plots came to her.
She wasn’t sure why the story of a little girl getting a sticker stuck to her tongue popped into her head.
As she concocted the tale in the voice of Sylvester the Cat, her little girl rolled with laughter.
Shore stopped. She knew that if her daughter thought it was funny, the whole world would, too.
“The next morning, I started writing it -- in rhyme,” Shore said.
Sitting in a crowded Starbucks the other day, the Marietta author remembered that moment and Theodor Seuss Geisel, the master of children’s literature and the inspiration behind much of the success she now enjoys as an award-winning children’s author.
Geisel, known around the world simply as Dr. Seuss, would’ve been 107 on Wednesday.
Growing up, Shore fell in love with the late author’s whimsical art and touching philosophy.
“Once a month, we’d get a book and it was usually Dr. Seuss,” Shore remembered. “I loved reading stories in rhyme. That’s probably what gave me a love for rhythm, fun words and humor.”
Shore, 52, didn’t set out to become a writer, though. She wanted to be a teacher. But when she entered Eastern Illinois University in 1976, right in the midst of the women’s movement, she decided it was time to switch from a female-dominated career to a male-dominated one.
After earning degrees in business administration in 1980, she went on to the University of Illinois and in 1984 got an accounting degree. For the next seven years, she worked as a CPA and auditor.
Shore married in 1990 and, in 1994, shortly after her son Sam was born, toyed with the idea of returning to work as a CPA but decided it wouldn’t allow for a flexible schedule.
One night while telling her daughter a bedtime story, Shore created the story about the little girl getting the sticker stuck on her tongue. "I had taken Jennifer to the doctor that day, and the doctor gave her a sticker."
Soon after writing it down the next day, Shore sent "Sticker Tongue-Tied" to Dutton publishing. Three months later, she got her first rejection letter, then another and another and another.
“It wasn’t as easy as I thought,” Shore said.
She soon joined the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.
“I started going to those conferences and learned I was doing everything wrong,” she said.
The mother of two eventually enrolled in writing classes, where she learned the fine points of developing characters, the use of vivid verbs and alliterations.
Shore was told to give up trying to publish in rhyme because publishers were uninterested in prose that wasn’t easily translated.
She discovered it was easier to write for a magazine. She started studying and writing poetry and then selling it to various magazines, including Highlights for Children, Cricket, Spider and Jack & Jill.
Now when she wrote a cover letter for her books, she threw in a line about having been published in magazines.
By 1996, the tenor of the rejection letters had started to change. A compliment was thrown in here and there. Some asked for something else or for revisions.
Shore’s confidence was building, and her writing was improving. She tucked "Sticker Tongue-Tied" into her drawer, but she continued to write in rhyme. Six years and 385 rejection letters later, Shore signed her first book contract, and in 2003 “BUS-A-SAURUS BOP,” a rollicking rhyming read-aloud, was published by Bloomsbury. In 2004, it won the 2004 Children’s Choice Award.
The story of the dinosaur bus was followed by "Look Both Ways," which won the 2007 Kansas State Reading Award; “This Is the Dream,” which catalogs events before, during and after the civil rights movement; and “This Is the Feast,” the story of the first Thanksgiving.
Her favorite title, which was inspired by her son and daughter, is a HarperCollins I-Can Read: "How to Drive Your Sister Crazy," which last month was awarded the 2011 New Jersey Garden State Book Award.
Just a week ago, “This Is the Game,” about America ’s favorite pastime, baseball, and how it has changed, hit bookstore shelves.
But you won’t find Shore at any bookstore signings.
As she has done for the past six years, she will be crisscrossing the country instead, inspiring children to read through her hilarious and widely popular “A-Rockin' and A-Readin!” school presentations.
On Monday, Shore was at Mountain Park Elementary in Roswell, where she conducted three writing workshops to help prepare fifth-graders for the upcoming writing assessment exam.
“I love being with the kids because I get to return to my love of teaching,” she said. “Visiting schools is my favorite part about being an author. The kids give me such great ideas!”
You can find out which school Shore will visit next at her website: www.dianezshore.com.
About the Author
