The Imminent Return of Billy Noodle
I didn't grow up with an itch to write children's books, yet one day (in the 90s) I invented a character that someone thought was worthy of developing, and about two years ago, I finally did it. One of the fellows I work with is a crackerjack illustrator, and he was onboard to develop it with me, which I took as a good sign given that his girlfriend, a teacher and therapist, also encouraged him to pursue it. After a few months of sketching and chatting, he put together a set of illustrations for the first installation of what I hope to be many about a boy named Billy Noodle.
The book is intended as a first step in a long journey with Billy, in which the page count and the reading level increase as Billy ages: he starts out at the age of potty-training, so he's 2 or 3 (maybe even 4. I have girls, and we had that sorted at 25 months.) The second book was intended to be about taking a bath and developing good hygiene (humorously), but we had to put that on hold temporarily for the following business reason.
The second book now is actually a prequel of sorts, as we decided we needed to beef up the page count of the first few books, given that no print-on-demand publishing houses will accommodate a book of such (short) length. Our plan is to bundle the two together, sell in the Amazon Kindle marketplace, market it, and see what happens next. Ideally we are able to launch a "platform" and release 4-6 books over the next two years, and then approach a traditional publisher, like Scholastic, Workman, Houghton-Mifflin, and a bevy of others. Or get an agent. Or, if it's successful enough, continue to self-publish on Amazon.
Billy Noodle Easy Poo-Poo came out in October of 2015. My illustrator informs me that he will have the second book completed by the end of August. My fingers are crossed. My legs are crossed. Working with artists can be trying. I hope we have the second book on Amazon by October 1, and we can start this machine up again.
I'm getting out the pencils, and polishing the rosary.