Nuts and Bolts for Mentor Text Monday by Kathy Halsey

We know to read mentor text picture books that match our manuscripts, but writers also need to keep up with craft books, their own professional development. I was lucky enough to stumble into a great book and Facebook group, Word by Word Book Club, run by children's writer Meg Miller.  We are studying/discussing Linda Ashman's THE NUTS AND BOLTS GUIDE TO WRITING PICTURE BOOKS.  You can purchase this book as a PDF, Kindle edition from Amazon or an ePub. It's inexpensive and I find the ePub is a perfect platform for this type of reading. I can highlight, take notes, click live links, it's fabbity-fab! (Gotta confess this is the first e-book I downloaded on my new MacBook Air and I'm loving it.)

I joined the FB group late but it  was simple to jump right in on Chapter 6, "Writing the Rollicking Read-Aloud." As a busy writer, it's easy just to dip your toe into any chapter you need. Each chapter has examples, advice from editors and published writers, up-to-date reading list of picture books (mentor texts galore!) and a section entitled "Sharpening Your Tools."
Linda's style of writing is fun, breezy and not pedantic. Here's a short example from chapter 6: ""And, yet, if things go well, one day you will face down that squirmy group of preschoolers. Talk about intimidating. That’s when you find yourself wishing you’d cut out those long, descriptive passages—as lovely and poetic as they may be—and written something a bit shorter and zippier." 

Open up that laptop now and get started on a fun, professional mentor text for all picture book writers, regardless of genre! Linda's got it all: humor, subbing, character-driven books, rhyme, voice and point of view! Also, join the Word by Word Book Club on Facebook for great discussions!