Rhythm and Rhyme in Picture Book Texts: Build your House!

If you write picture books, you've probably already noticed that rhyming picture books...are tough to sell. Many agents and editors state outright that they simply won't even consider a rhyming text!

The reason isn't because rhyme doesn't work in picture books; it's that it's very difficult to do well.

If you want to write a rhyming text, here's what you need to know:

Consistency.

There needs to be a consistent pattern of meter (stressed and unstressed word pattern), syllable count, rhyme and stanza length for the read-aloud to feel flawless (not "forced").

I call this building a house!

(I need to do what now?!)

No really! The four walls of meter, syllable, rhyme and stanza work together to support the narrative.

Wall 1: Meter

The stressed and unstressed pattern to your words. Examples (bold is stressed):

IAMBIC (x /) : That time of year thou mayst in me behold 

• every other word is stressed, starting with second

TROCHAIC (/ x): Tell me not in mournful numbers

• every other word stressed, starting with first word

ANAPESTIC (x x /): And the sound of a voice that is still

• every third word is stressed

There should be a consistent meter pattern with each line 

Wall 2: Syllable

Working together with a consistent syllable count in each line. Examples (number is syllable, line denotes meter pattern):

IAMBIC PENTAMETER (5 iambs, 10 syllables) 

That time | of year | thou mayst | in me | behold 

 1       2       3   4         5      6         7   8       9   10 

TROCHAIC TETRAMETER (4 trochees, 8 syllables) 

Tell me | not in | mournful | numbers
  1     2      3   4     5        6      7     8 

ANAPESTIC TRIMETER (3 anapests, 9 syllables) 

And the sound | of a voice | that is still
  1     2      3        4  5   6         7    8  9

Tip: syllable count is the first place I turn to look when a rhyming text feels "off"

Wall 3: Rhyme

The above two pieces create the rhythm of your text. You don't have to add rhyme but, if you do, each stanza should have paired words that sound alike. Examples:

Trains are humming, coming near (A)Coupled cars from front to rear. (A)Rumbling, grumbling, screech and squeal (B)Rolling, trolling wheels on steel (B)Trains Don't Sleep by Andria Warmflash Rosenbaum

___________________________________ 

Full fathom five thy father lies; (A)Of his bones are coral made; (B)
Those are pearls that were his eyes; (A)
Nothing of him that does fade, (B)
But doth suffer a sea-change (C)
Into something rich and strange. (C)
The Tempest, Shakespeare 1.2.456

The trick here is to pick a word that feels natural and organic to the unfolding narrative, rather than forced in just to rhyme. This often will require changing up your entire sentence rather than just picking a word that rhymes! Don't just try and make a word fit your existing sentence. This is often what results in a "forced" rhyme.

Tip: work backwards. If you know what word/words might fit your rhyme, start writing different sentences that also fit within your syllable count. Meter will often fall into place with syllable count.

Wall 4: Stanza

Finally, keep the number of lines per stanza consistent. The examples in #3 above are stanzas. Trains is a stanza made up of four lines. Tempest would be a stanza made up of six lines (it's not actually written in stanzas, just, you know, for the stake of example). You may have a text with stanzas of four lines each. You may have a text of stanzas of 3 lines, 2 lines, 3 lines, 2 lines. 

Note: final text placement may break your stanzas up for page-turn & visuals, but it should be presented consistently!

Roof: the idea and narrative connecting it all together

You don't need to use one of the established patterns given as examples above; your text simply needs to be consistent in whatever pattern you do use.

Exercise for you

1. Can you pick out the elements of the house in the examples for #3 above?
2. Take a few of your favorite rhyming picture book texts. Can you pick out the elements?

Here are some online resources to help:

RhymeZone: find words that rhyme listed out by syllable count

SyllableCounter: allows you to paste in your text to count your syllables 

Revision: Thinking of WHY not WHAT

For those of you in the process of sending your baby manuscript off and into the world, I wanted to expand on a previous post regarding conflicting advice.

When reading for critique, the instinct is to try and be helpful. Often, I think the result of that is a critique that offers advice rather than a breakdown of the issues at heart.

This is one of my favorite clips. I really hope no one has received or left a critique session with me feeling like this...

But it transitions us nicely (after a few calming laughs) into the reason you should always focus on the WHY instead of the WHAT: the critique you got very likely could be the reader trying their best to help you with a solution, rather than pointing out something that is actually wrong.

Your job when revising is to figure out if that solution is the right one for your work, or if there is something else causing your reader to make the comment that they did that helps to point to what you really need to revise. How? Ask why.

Let's start with the video. WHY did this gatekeeper start spitballing outrageous ideas instead of directly critiquing the work? Well, honestly: from an outside perspective, and someone who has thrown some pretty outrageous ideas out there, I think probably the gatekeeper just wasn't intrigued by the story.

WHY?

Well, there could be two reasons: first, the story itself IS boring and/or non-fresh enough to really spark interest and stand out, OR this gatekeeper wasn't the right fit.

There's nothing you can do about an agent not being the right fit. But you should explore whether or not your story stands out in the market AND, if it does, if you've started in the right place - if your characters and voice are engaging enough right from the start to capture interest. And there's where you begin. Research - does your book stand out? And evaluate - are your characters and voice engaging?

Much better than trying to re-work it to be JAWS, right?

Here are a few things you can consider if you're getting responses all over the board, lots of "just not for me"'s, or just want to think about other solutions:

• What's at stake in your novel? For your characters? Is it strong enough?
• Does the reader feel like everything will be ok, even if they don't finish the book? (stakes)
• What's the conflict in your novel? Is it easily solved? (a perceived lose-lose situation is ideal)
• Does your character have autonomy in the conflict and stakes?
• When do you introduce the conflict and stakes? Too soon? Too late?
• Could your readers run into your character on the street and know how he/she would react to a variety of bizarre situations? (voice)
• Does your character's voice resonate in your readers' heads even after the pages stop?
• What's your ratio of dialog-to-narrative?
• Do your chapters end with conflict, or resolution?
• Is your idea unique? Can you condense it into a one-line hook that doesn't sound like ANY other book? (PW has weekly deal reports you can browse for free FYI)
• Does your book contain elements not found or not often seen in your genre? Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
• What kinds of books does your reader/critique-r generally gravitate to? How would that influence what they would say? (don't focus on what you *think* an agent wants; what have they sold? Who do they represent? What have they read recently?)

Finally: what did YOU intend?

Find your book's focus. What are your comps? (in THAT genre, published in the last THREE to FIVE years). What do those books do well? What do you want YOUR readers to take away? What impression do YOU want to make?

Have you asked your critiquers if you've hit those marks?

If you need help figuring out the WHY: ask a friend! I'm sure the poor guy in the video above left scratching his head and maybe just thinking, WHAT?! And not sure where to even begin with the advice he was given.

Stepping back can be difficult; so try collecting the feedback you've been getting, and asking for some fresh eyes to help brainstorm: what should I read between these lines?

Keep an open mind...and don't be afraid to step back from a project, either, and write something new. You might not have found your perfect execution yet. You may need time, and more experience as a writer, to grow into it.

Dig Deeper: Connecting to Characters and Voice

Making your characters believable and relatable and your voice engaging takes more than surface-level details.

Let's take an example of a surface-level voice/detail and Dig Deeper:

I love flip flops. I wear them all the time.

Why?
They’re comfortable.

Why? Why does that matter?
Comfort is way more important to me than looking posh.

Why?
I don’t care what others think about my looks.

Why?
It’s not important.

What is important?
Family. Getting things done. I don’t need to spend a million years on my looks; I have too much to do.

Using these answers, re-write the sentence:

I throw my flops on; no need to spend a million years on my looks. Who cares what others think – I’ve got too much to do.


See the difference? Having dug into my character's statement, I scratched the surface to find out motivation, perspective, attitude...voice! I've taken a fairly common and bland statement and transformed it into an engaging voice.

Let your character talk to you. Had I gone even farther with my questioning, I might have hit on some internal flaws, internal motivations, fears...the deeper you go, the deeper the connection.

If you're struggling to make an emotional scene really punch hard, or trying to find that authentic voice, take some time to Dig Deeper.


An exercise in digging deeper:

1. Find three places in your first chapter where you tell us something your character likes or is feeling.
2. Ask "why" (and/or why-questions) a minimum of six times.
3. Use the answers to re-write the original sentence.

Feel free to share before and after versions in the comments. I'd love to see them!

Thinking Visually

In novels, you're constantly told to show not tell. In picture books, this works a little differently, because the show is done as a partnership with the one who tells.

Illustration shows us: emotion, physical characteristics, detail
It is your MAP: what do you see?

Text tells us: context, direction
It is your GUIDE: where are you going?

Let's look at a few examples:

We Don't Eat Our Classmates by Ryan T. Higgins

What can be shown in illustrations that you don’t need to say?

The text has given us the context: Penelope is nervous. She's starting school. It's important to know if they'll be like her (how many teeth will they have)? The illustrations show us: the emotion/what nervous looks like, that she REALLY cares about and loves school and friends, because she's been practicing - she has her own table of dinosaur friends pulled up next to her writing board, implying she's used to being alone/with her pretend friends - it deepens the emotional layers and context that the text provided.

Think back to your MAP and your GUIDE: what do you SEE vs. what are you TOLD

Here's another example:

                                                            Not Quite Narwhal by Jessie Sima

The text tells the illustrator what direction to go in for these pages without telling her HOW to illustrate the pages; we aren't TOLD what his "tusk" being different means - we can see that. We aren't TOLD what it means they have different taste in food - we can see that. We aren't TOLD how he's a bad swimmer - we (very adorably) can see that with the ingenious use of floaties. And what's more, we aren't TOLD that his family loves and protects and accepts him anyway - but we can SEE that in the way they are surrounding him in a circle, soft smiles on encouraging faces.

Art notes should be used sparingly; think short and simple sentences. If you have multiple complex sentences, descriptive elements, have crafted the text so that you can see the image in your mind's eye...pare it back! The role of the author is to inspire the artist, to provide the artist with possibility, while giving direction.

So yes: this means, if you're the text author...you should tell not show!

Other considerations when thinking visually:

Is there room for dynamic illustration? 

Think about scene and perspective; would each potential spread in your story be in the same space? Would they look relatively the same? Is there room for an illustrator to give spot art, full spreads, motion, creative energy, different perspectives - a variety of art? The book needs to be visually stimulating to capture attention; if you haven't left room for dynamic illustration, you've limited the visual possibility.

Does it work in a traditional 32-page picture book?

Use a storyboard (red text mine):

In your text, place spaces between lines to denote potential pages. Is your conflict occurring around pg. 7, your climax around pg. 28? 

Do you have "page-turn"?

Does your text invite the reader to turn the next page? Do you wonder, what comes next? Look at the examples above: you know you've just started this story. You've been given the conflict...what happens next?

You can use punctuation to leave room for page turn, too. For example:

Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons by James Dean and Eric Litwin 

Mind your P's!

Provide possibility.

Establishing Motivation in Picture Book Biographies

If you've ever heard: but WHY did he do this? What was DRIVING your subject? What INSPIRED her to...

My friend, you are in need of establishing motivation.

Motivation is the heart of your subject's actions. It's a key element that your reader can connect to and be inspired by. It takes a biography from "telling" to "showing."

This doesn't mean you need to psycho-analyze your subject; the reader just needs to see the connection between how your subject grew up to who s/he became and what s/he did. Because the picture book audience is intended for children, typically that is set up through the childhood lens, because it allows the audience to connect on a relatable level.

How or what in your subject's childhood helped him/her solve the problem s/he faces later in life, that led him/her to do the thing (s) you are writing about?

Here are some examples (I linked to these so you can see the previews):

1. Funny Bones by Duncan Tonatiuh

Here, you can see the progression nicely; the author sets up why Posada become a printer & why he was into art, and leads into, why did he start doing political cartoons (you can't see in the preview, but it explains the political atmosphere in Mexico, and how most people couldn't read and write, thus Posada was doing the cartoons to help spread the word and reach people).


2. I Dissent by Debbie Levy  (Author) and Elizabeth Baddeley (Illustrator)

Here, you can see who inspired Ruth (her mother), the atmosphere she grew up in, and how her personality built into who she became.


3. For the Right to Learn by Rebecca Langston-George  (Author) and Janna Bock (Illustrator)

Here again, you can see how Malala developed her love and passion for learning in childhood, and why it was important to her, and when that was threatened to be taken away from her, she fought back.


4. A Picture Book of Martin Luther King, Jr. by David A. Adler  (Author) and Robert Casilla  (Illustrator)

Here you can see where Martin Luther King Jr. got his peaceful side (father was a pastor, attended church) while establishing the turmoil/problem within the atmosphere he lived in, both of which help the reader to understand why he approached the problem the way he did, what the problem was, and why he was passionate about advocating for equal rights.


It isn't so much a matter of picking THE defining moment in your subject's life so much as WHAT about your subject's life led him/her to who he/she became.

Within the span of a few pages and a few hundred words, of course!

What is Authenticity in Voice?

Are you hearing from agents that they're not connecting to your characters? Perhaps you need to work on authenticity in your voice.

Anyone could write a book about my grandmother. And they could probably find out a heck of a lot more about her life than I know through research.

That doesn't mean they knew her.

That's not authenticity.

It is factual; it is not authentic.

Authenticity is heart. 

I've written before that voice is the aspect of the novel that lets the reader forget about the writer. It's what makes characters real. It has perspective, a unique way of thinking about and looking at things based on where he/she is from and the experiences he/she has had.

If you were to ask me to describe my grandma, I would smile and laugh a little as I reflect and begin to speak. Why? What prompts that emotional reaction? Authentically writing about my grandma is evoking in the reader that same reaction - allowing them to feel my perspective.

A writer's craft is in figuring out what tools to use and how to do this; showcasing memories? Using key words (for example, notice I immediately switched to "grandma" instead of "grandmother" when I started writing about her)?

My point of view is one of the more intimate; it is not the only point of view or the whole story or even perhaps the most accurate. But it is authentic because it is based on experience. It is perfectly possible to portray her in a different way based on a different authentic point of view because mine is not the only experience with her.

Heart comes from an original experience.

So here's the challenge: a writer, who has never met my grandma, needs to figure out first, what an authentic point of view would be, and second, how to accurately evoke the emotional response in the reader to convey that POV

The farther the writer's intimacy with that point of view, the harder it will be to accomplish.

And it's not just research that will do that.

It takes a lot more introspection and dissecting. It takes a full understanding of the limitations the writer may have to understand that point of view.

The problem I often see is that a lot of writers confuse this work (creating authenticity) with research, or presenting facts.

An exercise in authenticity:

1. Tell me about your grandma.
2. What emotional reaction did you have as you began to reflect and think about what to say? (This is your authentic point of view).
3. How (and what) do you write to evoke that same emotional reaction in the reader as they are given the information? (This is writing an authentic point of view).

I hope that you find this exercise challenging; it should be! It is the effort any of your characters' voices should be given. Find the heart!