Birth Stories for Books: Just Like Flowers, by Jenny Jiang

Hello readers! It's time for our first Birth Stories for Books interview of the new year. Today's guest, Jenny Jiang, shares her experience self-publishing her debut picture book, JUST LIKE FLOWERS, which came out in September of 2021.

Image Credit: Jenny Jiang

Dawn Prochovnic: I’m so glad to have you on the blog, Jenny, and I’m really looking forward to learning more about your debut picture book, JUST LIKE FLOWERS. 

Jenny Jiang: Thank you so much for having me! I’m really excited to share the Birth Story for "Just Like Flowers."

DP: I’d love to hear how the idea for this story came to be. Reading your bio on Amazon, I understand that you noticed the lack of representation in children’s literature and wanted to embark on a book-making project as a way to do something about it. Can you share more details about what motivated you to move the idea forward to fruition?

JJ: Of course! I embarked on this project my junior year of high school in December 2020, when I organized a winter-themed Zoom event with elementary schoolers in the Portland area. Before the event, I explored a LOT of children’s books for the storytelling station. When I flipped through the pages, my artist’s eye noticed the lack of diversity in the characters. After the event, I went to the School Library Journal, which confirmed the invisibility of children of color in children's literature: only 25% of picture books include children of color. 

Infographic Source: School Library Journal

This realization triggered my favorite picture books as a child: Pinkalicious, Fancy Nancy, Knuffle Bunny. As an Asian American, my younger self didn’t feel a connection to any of the white-illustrated characters in these books. When children of color view literature without characters that look like them, they internalize this omission as a devaluation of their importance. The underlying cause of the underrepresentation is the lack of authors of color.

When I saw the smiles of the children of color I read to, my heart urged me to step in and make my own children’s book with children of color. This is how “Just Like Flowers” started. This picture book features an Asian American girl as the main character with different races as side characters. The book is perfect for children of color to read to see themselves in a picture book and also helps white children embrace multiculturalism.

Image Credit: Jenny Jiang

DP: What an inspiring back story! How impressive that you took such deliberate and prompt action to address a problem in the world! (As I mentioned in one of our email conversations, for folks who are likewise interested in working to address the lack of representation in children's literature, We Need Diverse Books is a great place to get started: Web, IG, and Twitter.)

I’m curious how you came to the idea of exploring "the value of human differences through the unique metaphor of flowers.” I’ve written in previous blog posts about how this metaphor likewise played a role in the inspiration for my picture book, LUCY’S BLOOMS. Was there a distinct interaction or experience that inspired you in the direction of this particular metaphor for human diversity?

JJ: Lucy’s Blooms is such an adorable picture book! 

DP: Thank you!

JJ: For "Just Like Flowers," I heard a really beautiful quote in a movie: “the next time that you see a flower, just remember that part of what makes it beautiful is how long it took to grow.”

I wanted to center my picture book around appreciating human differences, ranging from race, height, and body shape. My goal for the book was to combat beauty standards and spread the message that every feature is beautiful.

I knew that books teaching this already existed out there, so I wanted my book to teach this message in a unique way. As I looked at picture books online, I figured the best way to uniquely teach this lesson is to develop a metaphor that I create. I remembered the quote in the movie, and my mind started making root connections.

I connected the beauty in flowers, a concept kids intuitively understand, to the beauty in humans. I looked at all the types of flowers as if they were people. Flowers have different colored petals and take on different shapes and heights, just like humans. As I started the brainstorming process, the metaphor kept blossoming.

Image Credit: Jenny Jiang

The metaphor took a long time to grow, but I think it blossomed perfectly as it approaches appreciating human diversity in a new way.

DP: Wow, Jenny! That's a fantastic example of how the seed of an idea can germinate and take root! Thank you so much for sharing that. 

When you compare one of your earliest drafts of this story to the version in the published book, what stands out for you in terms of what is most different? Likewise, is there anything in particular that stands out that was included in your earliest drafts and survived the revision process?

JJ: In “Just Like Flowers,” Julia paints herself in her art class, and when she discovers no one has purple paint, she becomes upset about her unusual purple hair. When I first conducted character study on Julia, she actually had brown hair, like most Asian American girls!

Image Credit: Jenny Jiang

After peer feedback, I implemented an amazing idea to give her an unusual yet memorable feature: purple hair. This unnatural color for her hair helps draw attention to kids.

After Julia becomes frustrated with the lack of purple paint, her teacher explains the flower metaphor. Originally, I planned for the narrative to end after the metaphor, but then I wanted to tie the story back to the original painting scene. I developed the idea of mixing her friends’ paint bottles together to make purple paint.

Image Credit: Jenny Jiang

This end scene helped tie the entire book together. When I asked one kid her favorite part of the book, she said it was when Julia got purple paint to paint her hair. When I do storytimes, I ask the kids to guess how Julia finishes her painting, and I get super excited when they guess it correctly!

DP: What a great example of how peer feedback and incremental revision can really bring out the heart of a story.

Were there any specific resources you utilized (for example, software, reference books, online classes or tools, etc.) that were most helpful to you along the way?

JJ: I looked at many examples of published children’s books to understand their plot structure, sentence phrasing, and illustrations. This process helped immensely. I learned that there’s no right way to make a picture book after I saw a lot of the books varied in text and story complexity. This experience was transformative because I approached all these children’s books with a more mature, nuanced, and artistic perspective than when I was younger, and I found that whenever I go to bookstores now, I look at picture books differently than before I became a children’s book author.

As for the actual creation process, I used Procreate on my iPad with my Apple Pencil to illustrate. Procreate is really intuitive to use, and it helped me produce amazing artwork! I used Adobe inDesign to add the book’s typography.

Image Provided by Jenny Jiang (taken April, 2021)

DP: Thanks for sharing these helping details.  

Your bio indicates that one of the things you enjoy is working with kids. Based on what you've said above, it sounds like you've had the opportunity to share your book directly with young readers. Can you share more about what that experience has been like for you?

JJ: Of course! I have done author visits to pre-school and elementary school classrooms, and I discovered that doing read-alouds is my favorite part of this entire process. I can feel the contagiousness of the kids’ excitement as their eyes glue to the pages and raise their hands. When I visited my own first grade teacher’s classroom (after 10+ years!), I felt so happy to educate the future generation of society this important message while illuminating children of color. I am eager to continue reading my book to young kids and directly see my book’s impact to foster enthusiasm.

Images Provided by Jenny Jiang

DP: That's great, Jenny. I'll bet your first grade teacher was delighted to welcome you back to their classroom! And I couldn't agree more--reading your own book directly to kids is one of the most fantastic aspects of being an author. 

It’s my understanding that you are currently a senior in high school. Do your future plans include writing/illustrating more children’s books and/or further pursuing your general interests in digital art, creative writing, storytelling, and/or working with kids?

JJ: Yes, I’m a senior in high school! In the future, I would love to continue creating children’s books! I’m more invested in the illustration process, so I’d love to illustrate future children’s books, possibly with traditional publishers.

When I’m in college, I plan to continue volunteering with kids because I love their energy and vitality. After each read aloud session, I always step out of the room happier than how I came in. One child who read my book was super star-struck to learn that the picture book was published by a high schooler. It’s fulfilling how I’m able to serve as a role model to young kids.

Image provided by Jenny Jiang

DP: You are an excellent role model, indeed! 

If you're not already a member of SCBWI, and/or Willamette Writers/Young Willamette Writers, I encourage you to give these organizations a look as you seek to further your goals related to traditional publication (both have networks targeted directly to students.) 

JJ: That's so cool! I'll definitely check those organizations out."

DP: In your Amazon listing you indicate that those who purchase JUST LIKE FLOWERS are "taking one small step to promote diversity in children’s books!” Have you engaged in any book promotion and/or marketing activities that have been especially effective in terms of growing book sales?

JJ: As a self-published children’s book author and illustrator, I’ve handled a lot of the marketing. So far, I’ve sold 150+ copies of the book. I find that marketing on community sites helps a lot, as many members of the community love to support local authors, especially high schoolers. I’ve also reached out to elementary schools, where I read aloud my book to educate multiple kids at once. My book is also in local community libraries for kids to check out. My goal is to make my book well-familiarized with the Portland community, and then I will continue sharing my book to those outside my local area.

DP: Sounds like an excellent strategy!  

If you could go back in time, what would you tell your pre-published self? Or, said another way, what do you know now, that you wished you would have known a bit earlier and/or are there any lessons you've learned along the way that could help others who would likewise like to write, illustrate and self-publish a children’s book?

JJ: This is a really great question! I would tell my past self to continue working, despite the amount of work that the book may seem like it requires at times. Frequently, I had late night sessions where I spent hours illustrating but felt like I didn’t get any work done. My brain also filled with doubt that if some adults weren’t able to self-publish a children’s book, what can a high schooler do? There were many times when I was close to giving up, but I remembered my original mission and the smiles of the children of color, so I kept on illustrating. The work at the end is really worth it, as I get to see all the children enjoying your book! Another lesson I would tell myself and to all potential children’s book authors is to not let anyone get in the way. When I first expressed interest in this project, a few family members weren’t supportive, hesitant that the book would fail to get sales. While their discouragement did make me hesitate for a couple of days, I still decided to embark on the project to help children of color see themselves in books. Now that I’m in the marketing phase of my book, I feel proud that my book proved my original discouragement wrong and has surpassed over 150 sales.

DP: This is such excellent advice, Jenny, for creative folks in all ages and stages of their careers. I'm sure your experience is going to inspire many other prospective authors and illustrators to keep working on their creative projects to bring their goals to fruition. 

Is there something you wish someone would ask you about your path to publication for JUST LIKE FLOWERS that you haven’t had the opportunity to share yet?

JJ: A fun thing to learn about my book is that some of the illustrations were implicitly illustrated based on REAL elements of my life.

Here is an example of one page where Julia and her friend hug, which is eerily similar to one of my favorite photos of me and my friend hugging. This was unintentional, and I immediately showed my friend after I made this connection.

Images provided by Jenny Jiang

The flower box, which appears in many of the pages’ backgrounds, is inspired by a planter box in my neighborhood!

Images Provided by Jenny Jiang

I love how I was able to integrate little snippets of my life into my children’s book.

DP: I love all the little behind-the-scenes details you've shared! 

And thank you so much for sharing your Birth Story for JUST LIKE FLOWERS with us, Jenny. I wish you much success with this project!

JJ: Thank you so much for giving me this platform to share my story! I hope I was able to inspire future children’s book authors and illustrators!

DP: I have no doubt that you have, indeed! 

Dear readers, if you have been inspired by Jenny's story, please consider adding her book, JUST LIKE FLOWERS to your personal collection. You can find it here. Can't add another book to your own collection? Ask your local library to include it in their collection and/or share this post with a friend. 

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Jenny Jiang is a senior at Sunset High School in Portland, Oregon and she loves creative writing, illustrating, storytelling, and spending time with kids! Jenny is passionate about Asian American representation in literature, and her debut children’s book JUST LIKE FLOWERS takes one step to promote diversity in children’s literature. Jenny is looking to study Business Administration during undergrad, specifically concentrating in marketing. Outside of school, Jenny loves to perform in Speech and Debate, where she continues to spread stories advocating for Asian American social issues. 

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Birth Stories for Books is an occasional feature of Dawn Babb Prochovnic's blog. Dawn is the author of multiple picture books including, Lucy's Blooms, Where Does a Cowgirl Go Potty?, Where Does a Pirate Go Potty?, and 16 books in the Story Time With Signs & Rhymes series. Dawn is a contributing author to the award-winning book, Oregon Reads Aloud, and a frequent presenter at schools, libraries, and educational conferences. Contact Dawn using the form at the left, or learn more at www.dawnprochovnic.com.  

Birth Stories for Books: LET'S DANCE!, by Valerie Bolling

by Valerie Bolling and Maine Diaz

One of the things I love most about being an author is discovering new books and meeting fellow creatives. I get to sit with a pile of new (or new to me) children's books and call the time spent "working." It's the best kind of work!

Valerie Bolling's debut picture book, LET'S DANCE!, (illustrated by Maine Diaz, Boyds Mills & Kane, 2020) is so much fun. The language is playful and rhythmic, the characters are diverse, and the invitation to join in and dance is irresistible!

I was introduced to Valerie by a mutual friend, Susan Uhlig, after I put out a call for contributors for my Birth Stories for Books and Have Swag Will Travel blog features. Valerie was kind enough to share her path to publication for LET'S DANCE! with me, and I'm so delighted to be able to share it with you here, today.

Take it away, Valerie!

Let's Dance!
by Valerie Bolling

At the start of each year, my husband and I set goals for ourselves. Having been inspired by a visit from our nieces in December of 2016, I decided that one of my goals for 2017 would be to explore the possibility of getting a picture book published. With this in mind, that January I had written two stories in which each of my nieces was the protagonist (The Greatest Gift for Zorah and I Do for Anyah). I also found and revised two stories I wrote many years ago (Play Date and Come In! Come In!).

Thus, began my pursuit to become a published writer. I spoke to people who I believed could be helpful – and they were – and I wrote and wrote and wrote ... and revised even more. I enrolled in a course at Westport Writers Workshop and revised I Do and The Greatest Gift. I continued writing after the course ended.

In June of 2017 I wrote my first draft of Let’s Dance! Since most children enjoy dancing, like Zorah and Anyah (and adults do, too, including me!), I decided to write a fun, rhyming story celebrating the universality of dance. My goal was to showcase dance as a language we all speak, even though we have different “accents.”

Let’s Dance! was originally titled I Love to Dance, as this line was repeated throughout the book. Marianne McShane, a friend who is an author, storyteller, and librarian, suggested I read Watersong by Tim McCanna as a mentor text and that I start my story with a line that appeared later in my manuscript: “Tappity-tap/Fingers snap.” She said that would immediately encourage readers to dance along from the beginning of the book. Her recommendations helped significantly in revising the book and inspired me to change its title. Since the “I love to dance” lines were deleted from the manuscript, I decided upon Let’s Dance!

Revision is an ongoing part of the writing process and perhaps the most necessary. That’s why I share the story about Marianne. No writer achieves success on her/his own. We each have friends, writing partners, critique group members, and a large supportive writing community that encourages us to forge ahead amidst all of the rejection. I am fortunate to have an amazing critique circle: critique partner, critique group, debut group that offers critique, WNDB mentor, and, most recently, an agent! At the time I wrote Let’s Dance!, however, Marianne was the only person who offered feedback because I hadn’t formed my circle.

I continued to revise Let’s Dance! until the end of 2017 and felt ready to start querying on January 1, 2018. What a way to start the year, huh?! I sent more queries on February 25, 2018, and an agent was interested in the story! She requested I send her two more manuscripts, but when I did, she wasn’t as interested in those stories, saying, “I foresee a harder sell for the other projects.” Thus, she decided to pass.

All in all, I submitted Let’s Dance! to 26 agents, editors, or small presses. Of the 26, I received eight “not interested” responses, and 16 people didn’t bother to respond, which is not uncommon. If there’s no interest in a manuscript, there may not be a response. I received two yeses: the first from the agent I recently referred to, and the second from the editor who wanted to publish the book. (That story is coming soon!)

In addition to direct queries, I participated in two Twitter pitches in June. I received a “like” in #PitMad that was turned down when I sent the manuscript, and I received another “like” later in the month during #PBPitch. That was the “like” from Jes Negrón, an editor at Boyds Mills & Kane, that led to Let’s Dance! being published!

When I sent the manuscript to Jes on June 18, 2018, she emailed me two weeks later on July 2, requesting to have a conversation. During that phone call, I learned that she was interested in acquiring the story! I shared with her my desire for the book’s illustrations to display an inclusive representation of children: gender, race, ability. I specifically said, “I want a lot of brown kids in this book!” Jes assured me there would be. I also said I wanted children of differing abilities and from diverse backgrounds. I said I wanted the ballet spread to include a boy in a tutu, and Jes agreed. (In the end, I got something even better: a child in a blue tutu whose gender is indiscernible.)

Jes asked me to write illustrator notes next to each stanza in the manuscript to signify the type of dance my words described. I hadn’t connected all of my words to particular dances, so this was an interesting exercise. When I completed that task in July, Jes said what I had written was fine but suggested deleting two stanzas; one dance was too similar to another, and she didn’t necessarily connect a specific dance with the other stanza. Besides those deletions, Jes changed not ONE word of my manuscript.

In October 2018, Jes expanded upon my desired vision for diversity by sharing that she thought we were missing out on an opportunity to make the story more global. She recognized that some of my words could describe cultural dances. For instance, where I saw “Tappity-tap/Fingers snap” as tap dance, Jes imagined flamenco from Spain. I envisioned the electric slide for “Glide and slide/Side to side,” but Jes suggested long sleeve dancing from China. I am thrilled to have this added layer of cultural representation in my book! It was at that time that Jes requested that I write backmatter: two-sentence descriptions for each dance featured in the book.

It’s ironic that my first published book is written in rhyme because I started out writing “poetry.” In first grade, I had a black and white marble composition book that I used to capture my poetic musings. I loved creating simple rhymes, using the most recent phonics lesson I had learned in school. I created “masterpieces” like: “There is a cat. It sat on a mat. It caught a rat.” How interesting that my writing has come full circle, that my first published book features rhyme. I continue to be grateful that this book, illustrator, editor, and publisher are what propelled me on my path to becoming a published author.

I want anyone who reads Let’s Dance! to know that not only are people connected through dance, but we’re also connected simply because we’re human. Regardless of how we dance or how we look, we are worthy, valuable members of society. I will continue to write books that make all children feel seen and heard and valued and validated. I want to do my part to promote a world of equity and inclusion, of peace and joy.

Thank you for sharing your beautiful and inspiring birth story for LET'S DANCE!, Valerie. Your book is sure to bring so much joy into the lives of children and families that read it together, and dance together.  

Friends, the best way you can say thank you to Valerie for spending some time with us today, is to support her work. LET'S DANCE! is available everywhere books are sold. 

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Let’s Dance! (Boyds Mills & Kane) is Valerie Bolling’s debut picture book. In addition to being an author, Valerie has been an educator for over 25 years. When she taught elementary students, it was difficult to find diverse literature for them. Thus, she is passionate about creating stories in which all children can see themselves and feel valued and heard.

A graduate of Tufts University and Columbia University, Teachers College, Valerie currently works as an Instructional Coach with middle and high school teachers.

Besides writing picture books, Valerie writes a Monthly Memo for teachers that she publishes on Twitter, and she has been published in The National Writing Project’s Quarterly (“The Family Writing Project Builds a Learning Community in Connecticut”) and NESCBWI News (“Microaggressions Don’t Feel ‘Micro’”). Recently, she had a poem accepted for publication by Cricket Media.

Valerie is represented by James McGowan of BookEnds Literary Agency, and she is a member of NCTE, SCBWI, the NESCBWI Equity and Inclusion Committee, the Authors Guild, the WNDB Mentorship Program, #12X12PB, 2020 Diverse Debuts, 20/20 Vision Picture Books, and a picture book critique group.

Valerie and her husband live in Connecticut and enjoy traveling, hiking, reading, going to the theater, and dancing. You can visit her website at http://valeriebolling.com/index.html.

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Birth Stories for Books is an occasional feature of Dawn Babb Prochovnic's blog. Dawn is the author of multiple picture books including Where Does a Cowgirl Go Potty?, Where Does a Pirate Go Potty?, Lucy's Blooms (Spring '21), and 16 books in the Story Time With Signs & Rhymes series. Dawn is a contributing author to the award-winning book, Oregon Reads Aloud, and a frequent presenter at schools, libraries, and educational conferences. Contact Dawn using the form at the left, or learn more at www.dawnprochovnic.com.

Seeking Diverse Contributors for "Birth Stories for Books" and "Have Swag Will Travel" Blog Series

The blog has been quiet for awhile. I've been quiet for awhile. I'm doing my best to listen. To learn. To reflect on how I personally contribute to and benefit from systemic racism. To make changes in my own behaviors. To become a better ally.

I first started my blog as way to provide free, accessible activities and learning extensions related to my books and my training and consulting company, SmallTalk Learning. Many of the teachers, librarians and families that I serve via my infant/toddler sign language workshops and early literacy training and consulting business hungered for more resources than I could effectively and affordably supply in person. Many of my workshop participants are from communities of color, and the educational resource aspect of my blog continues to be something I'm proud of and that I feel confident makes a positive difference in my community and in our world.

As my blog evolved over time, I started creating different collections of posts, for example, Quick Ideas for Getting Started with Signing, Start to Finish Story Time, (as well as the expanded version of that series, Start to Finish Story Time, Expanded), and Birth Stories for Books.

I'm especially proud of my Birth Stories for Books series, and my Have Swag Will Travel series, as these posts help me (and my readers) meet and learn from a variety of different authors, and they allow me the opportunity to amplify the voices and works of other authors. The first posts in these series started with a general outreach to my personal/ professional social network seeking contributors for guest posts and/or interviews. Since then, contributors for each series has evolved through word of mouth.

What I am not proud of is that as of this writing, I have only hosted one guest of color on my blog. This is not due to a lack of interest, but it is due to a lack of intentional outreach. This must change. As I pay closer attention to the Black Lives Matter movement, and as I reflect on and learn about my own contributions to racism and the systemic inequities in our society, I understand that I personally must do better. Going forward I will intentionally seek out a wider range of voices to amplify. I will seek opportunities to discover and reach out to writers and illustrators of color that are outside of my current personal/professional circles. I will work to establish a more diverse network of contributors.

If you are a person of color, or a person from another underrepresented community, and you have an interest in your work being featured on this blog, please reach out via the contact form on the left, or through a DM on my Twitter account. I want to learn about your unique path to publication. I want to hear about the unique obstacles you faced in finding a publishing home for your book(s). I want to learn your professional tips and tricks for book events and other book promotions. I want to shine a light on you and on your work.

Please feel encouraged to share this post widely so that I can begin to expand and widen my outreach to a more diverse cast of book creators.

And ... if I've made a mistake on how I've worded something, or characterized something in this outreach, call me out. I want to be made of aware of my mistakes so that I can learn, and so that I can do better.