In the United States, National Grandparent’s Day officially falls on September 12th this year—that’s this Sunday!

It’s right around the corner—and at Readeo, we’re excited for it because we LOVE grandparents! Our own grandparents paved the way for us and have played a large role in making us who we are. And at Readeo, grandparents make up a large portion of our user base. They deserve our gratitude—and certainly more than just one day a year!

To celebrate Grandparents Day, we’re taking each day this week to post about grandparenting. We’ll have guest posts by grandparents and grandchildren with stories, tips, experiences, and a few jokes along the way. So join us in celebrating those special people in our of our lives—Grandparents!

How did the character of Mercy Watson come to you?

Mercy Watson popped into my head when I was on an airplane. I have a little notebook, and I took it out and drew a pig face and wrote her name underneath. I knew right away that she was a pig that lived with Mr. and Mrs. Watson, who were not pigs. I worked on it for two years.

What about the “hot toast with a great deal of butter on it” that Mercy loves so much?

I was driving Alison McGhee to the airport. She got into my car with a piece of toast, and it was very buttered. I said, “Must you eat that in my car?” She said, “You don’t understand toast,” and she talked the whole car ride about how good it was and how it should be buttered all the way to the edges. On the way home, it clicked in my head as the thing that made it all work with Mercy Watson. So a pig pops into my head with a name attached, and then I had to wait 2 years for toast to show up. After that, it was the easiest writing experience ever, because you think of the experience and put the pig
in it.

Speaking of Alison McGhee, I hear you have a new book coming with her.

We sure do, it’s a book about a tall girl and a short girl. I’m short.

It’s a book about friendship called Bink and Golly. And Bink’s the short one: is your hair curly and do you wear striped socks?

You’re onto me, Jennifer Brown. I am Bink. Bink c’est moi.

Now back to Mercy. Do Mr. & Mrs. Watson think that Mercy is their child?

If we had to psychologically analyze what was going on with those two, we’d say in some dim recess of their brains they know she is a pig, but mostly she is their child and that’s how they treat her. It happens all the time with dogs, and I’ve heard rumors of it happening with a cat. That’s what’s happening with the Watsons. It’s a family.

Is it more challenging to write longer books like Because of Winn-Dixie and The Tale of Despereaux than it is to write about Mercy Watson?

Mercy Watson is, I have to say, easier. It’s not because of length, it’s because there’s a rhythm to it and the words fall into that rhythm. It’s also easier because I know the characters, and when I’m writing the novels I’m learning the characters as I go.

Did the artist Chris Van Dusen draw Mercy the way you had pictured her?

The first sketch that Chris did of Mercy was of her looking petite with a bow on her head. And I said, “No no, you must tell him she is a Pig.” Then in the second sketches, there she was: big, self-centered, domineering and kind of loving in her own way.

When we talked with Chris Van Dusen, he said: “The Mercy Watson books were really fun because Kate DiCamillo gave me full range to create these characters…. It was almost like casting a movie.”

He did a great job. The great thing about doing all six of these with Chris, is that what was in my mind was replaced with his world of Deckawoo Drive–his Mercy and his Eugenia and Baby, who are a delight. That made the stories even easier to write. Then I thought, who can I come up with next that Chris is just going to knock out of the park? I couldn’t’ wait to see who he’d come up with. And in that last one [book six], he had to bring everyone back, and he did it!

Visit the Mercy Watson Web site for games, trivia quizzes and more!

Readeo is a proud partner of the Read Today program—a literacy initiative that promotes literacy and an interest in books all year long throughout the state of Utah. As a piece of that partnership, we were invited by KSL TV in Salt Lake City to join in the first annual KSL Book Festival at the University of Utah last Saturday.

Part of the Read Today Summer Challenge, the festival was all about celebrating imagination and the written word and featured New York Times best-selling authors Richard Paul Evans and Brandon Mull, performances by David Osmond, Paul Cardall, the Creativity in Action Dance Co. and others. While we were there, we also saw Ronald McDonald, Curious George, princesses, and even a few Star Wars characters.

The festival was a fun, free family event and a great opportunity to talk with some of our users and to share the Readeo experience with new people. It was great to see the excitement of children and adults alike as they watched Readeo CEO Coby Neuenschwader share storytime as he BookChatted with his niece over the Internet.

We want to thank KSL—particularly Nadine Wimmer, Angela Folsom, and Steve Poulson—for their dedication and proactive approach to literacy, and for allowing us to be a part of the festival. We hope it becomes a regular event to celebrate books, reading, and imagination.

All of us at Readeo are delighted to welcome Charlesbridge Publishing as our newest partner. Charlesbridge appreciates both the learning and leisure aspects of reading, with their strong reputation in educational books, such as The Day-Glo Brothers by Chris Barton, illustrated by Tony Persani, about the sibling duo that invented neon-bright paints and dyes (it recently won a Sibert Honor for Nonfiction from the American Library Association), and their commitment to high-quality books for family reading.

One of our favorites is Aggie the Brave by Lori Ries, illustrated by Frank W. Dormer, the poignant and reassuring story of a boy who misses his dog when she must sleep over at the vet (to be spayed), until they are reunited. And if you like that one, you’ll love Aggie and Ben: Three Stories, with further adventures about the boy hero and his beloved dog.

If your young ones are mystery fans, be sure to check out Ace Lacewing: Bug Detective, by David Biedrzycki—other than his green complexion and a pair of antennae, Ace has a great deal in common with Sherlock Holmes as he strives to keep Motham City safe (he even has his own Watson:  Sergeant Zito the Mosquito). Deep in the Swamp by Donna M. Bateman, illustrated by Brian Lies, will appeal to nature fans as well as those who enjoy a good story in an exotic setting (plus it doubles as a counting book). There’s something here for everyone!

Laurie Rosenwald is a painter, a type designer, a graphic artist and, of course, a writer and illustrator. Because she does so many different things, she works with many different media, or artist’s tools. She says that her love for the artist’s tools led to the book And to Name But Just a Few: Red, Yellow, Green, Blue. If you look on the page with the “Mary Had a Little Lamb” rhyme, you can see some of them: crayons, colored pencils, pastels (which are like chalk) and perhaps her favorite, collage.

Where did you get the idea for And to Name But Just a Few…?

I was in the Blue Apple offices with a manuscript I had done called Bubbling Mud about Iceland, where I lived in the early 1990s. Someone suggested, “Why don’t you do a list book, like numbers or letters or colors?” I love colors. So I wrote what became the text of the book in an hour that day. Then it took more than a year to put it all together, design it and illustrate it. I make 100 collages and throw out 99.

So the artwork took much longer than the rhymes?

The rhymes came pretty quickly to me. There wasn’t a lot of revision the way there was with the artwork. The design is what makes it. If you do a beautiful drawing and it has to fit in a square, it kills the illustration. I like being able to do everything, the art and the design. That’s when things look great, when they work together.

We liked the wordplay, like homonyms (“Lettuce explain” for GREEN) and synonyms (a girl’s name that means the same as PURPLE).

I have to admit that it all came to me in a flurry. I love love love to write. I love it so much that I feel guilty about it. I should be cleaning my room, or going to the gym. But no, I want to write.

And what a great art lesson in the YELLOW pages!

Yellow is very important for that reason. It’s the one you mix with blue to get green, or red to get orange. Caran d’Ache crayons are my favorite crayons. They’re very opaque. I wanted to have some illustrations that were painted, and things that have glue and paper and collage. This is the first book I made using a digital camera. I would take pictures, cut them out, and refine them in Photoshop. I was making collages without gluing them down. I wanted the book to feel the way I do about art supplies. It’s almost romantic.

There’s such a freedom to your artwork. Is that why you like collage?

Almost everything I do involves something organic, something out of control and human. And also something strict, graphic and controlled. It’s like the two sides of the brain – the arty side and the logic side. I start with making very sloppy, very quick drawings. Sometimes I use a squirt bottle, like a ketchup bottle. I always start with black on white paper. Then I take digital pictures of those drawings and bring them into the computer and add color, backgrounds, fonts [or type]. I teach a course called “How to Make Mistakes on Purpose.” I’ve taught it at the School of Visual Arts, and for corporations that want to be more creative. In my own work, I feel like a fraud unless I’m making a discovery.