The Write Conversation: The Birth of a Book

Arrival Date: October 29, 2024

Weight: 11.5 ounces

Length: 10 inches X 8 inches X .5 inches

Hair color: ginger and gray

Don’t you love how authors call releasing a new manuscript “birthing a book baby”? I think it’s quite a fitting analogy. The scenario became even more personal for me when both of my daughters gifted us with newborn grandbabies right smack dab in the midst of the birth of my book baby, A Gingerbread House.

My daughters had dreamed of becoming moms, probably since my sweet girls pretended to mother their stuffed animals. They made quite convincing pet-mamas.

I, too, had a dream. For more than three decades, I dreamed of publishing a children’s picture book. I tried, but it wasn’t meant to be. God led me down a different path. He blessed me with contracts that included magazine articles, newspaper articles, compilation acceptances, and eventually, books for homeschooling families, parents, and moms.

During this time, one daughter suffered a miscarriage and years of infertility. The other daughter wanted so badly to celebrate a Mother’s Day. Her desire was answered without struggles or drama when she became pregnant quickly.

As a children’s picture book writer wannabe, I weathered years of rejections and “not now,” “doesn’t work,” and no answers at all. But when I received a “yes,” it happened quickly without struggles or drama. Well, I take that back—my yes after all those years came with a “now wait two-and-a-half more years before snuggling on the couch with your book baby.”

I knew the wait would be worth it. When the publisher first leaned over and whispered in my ear during an evening session of the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference that she wanted my book, I felt like shouting my excitement from the mountaintops. I was expecting a book baby!

Elation, joy, and giddiness followed. When I signed the double lines of the contract, reality sunk in. I would soon birth a book baby. A children’s picture book, book baby. How would I stand the wait?

Jenifer and Jessica both dealt with fatigue and nausea in the first trimester. I felt writer’s fatigue – the joy of an impending arrival, but exhaustion from the long wait. Then the queasiness set in – would I meet my publisher’s expectations? Could I meet the demands of being a children’s picture book author? Would children like my book?

The middle months rocked along for both girls and my gingerbread world. The publisher and illustrator stayed busy doing their thing to bring my book baby to life.

In the early days of the third trimester, Jenifer started having false labor contractions. Not terribly painful, but uncomfortable, disconcerting, and miserable nonetheless.

I also experienced sometimes uncomfortable but not necessarily painful book contractions with edits, endorsement-seeking moments, and illustration picture-pondering.

Unlike most book launches, I had just as much uncertainty about my book baby’s arrival as my girls did with the arrival of their babies. My book had the misfortune of being stuck on a ship when longshoremen up and down the east coast went on strike, backing up boats offshore for miles.

My publisher couldn’t give me a due date.

When the strike ended, my book was on the move again. Yet it was a false start, because many ships needed unloading, and warehouse arrival remained unsure.

Jessica and Dawson created their own false start, when they trekked to the hospital with her painful – yet unproductive – contractions. Two days later, however, the contractions did their job, and baby Danae launched into the world, six weeks after her cousin Maverick had arrived. I was one proud grandmommy!

Eighteen days later, A Gingerbread House, made her appearance into the world, with a sweet ginger-haired girl on the cover accompanied by her gray-haired grandpa.

I was one proud book baby parent. I’d waited more than three decades for this book baby. A dream come true.

God’s timing is always best.

Though a book baby can never compare to the precious little ones God gave us in the midst of my book launching, the weight—and wait—of carrying a book that has the potential to change a child’s life is heavy and significant. It’s a moment I don’t take lightly.

I’m humbled and grateful for new life, in bassinets and bookstores.

TWEETABLE

The Birth of a Book from @JLavenderWrites on @EdieMelson (Click to Tweet)

A Gingerbread House

by Julie Lavender

A little girl and her grandfather make sweet memories creating and decorating a gingerbread house.

But wait—something’s missing!

Will the pair of bakers figure out what’s missing from their masterpiece?

Written in rhyme, the rollicking story takes the creation from dough to completion in a tale that tantalizes all five senses and brings joy to the two bakers, as well as the readers!

Julie Lavender is thrilled to announce the birth of her newest book baby, A Gingerbread House, a picture book published by End Game Press. She’s also pretty excited about two new grandbabies’ births, making her grand total of grands equal three. Julie is grateful this Thanksgiving season for all the Lord’s blessings in her family life and writing life.