Today I have another funny picture book to share with you.

Kari Ann Gonzalez is a writer of children’s fiction and informational fiction with a heaping helping of humor and STEAM concepts. When she is not regaling her family with tall tales or creating colorful characters for her stories, you will find her reading voraciously. Two cats and six chickens are kind enough to share their home with Kari and her family in California. You can learn more about Kari at her website or follow her on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook.

HOW TO HATCH A READER is a hilarious pun filled book about teaching your chickens to read.  That’s right, chickens!  I’m all about the chickens these days but the teacher in me had to see what this book was all about.  It has some great advice for early readers, certainly, but it’s the funny approach that made me love it.  I never thought about all of the chicken puns out there in the world until I read this book.  And I love a good pun.  This book hits both my funny bone and my teaching interests.  Win, win!

Welcome Kari!

Me: Can you talk a little bit about yourself and about your writing journey up to this point?  What brought you to this book?

Kari: How To Hatch A Reader is my debut picture book and I submitted it directly to Gnome Road Publishing before I found my amazing agent Stacey Kondla at The Rights Factory. While there were many shutdowns in publishing at this time, I felt strongly that I had something with this story.  I knew it was ready to submit based on my critique partner’s feedback and I was seeing my writing getting stronger with placing in contests, and acceptances for anthologies and magazines. So, I submitted this story born of teaching my own daughters to read to our backyard chickens and received that amazing YES and contract that I had been working towards for years!

Me: I love the idea of combining chickens and learning to read.  What gave you the idea for this story?

Kari: In 2020, when schools were shut down, I was teaching my children to read and the task felt a little daunting! I found myself wishing there was a fun guide. Then, How To Hatch A Reader sparked as we lay in the grass reading out loud to each other as our chickens flocked around us. Now, the chickens might have been after the feed, but I like to think they were captivated by our stories.

Me: LOL!  I Love that!  And I love all of the puns and chicken-y quotes that you’ve included in the book.  I laughed at almost every single one (in both writing and illustrations).  Were they always part of your manuscript or did they come about with revisions?  Did you share some in art notes with the illustrator so she could include them too?

Kari: Great question! Some humor I incorporate into the first drafts, but some of my humor was built in later with revisions when I reviewed pacing and page turns. For this story, I used quite a few art notes to get across the early literacy techniques that I wanted to build into the story. The art notes in this case helped both Gnome Road Publishing and Rachel Suzanne (the amazing illustrator) see the vision of pairing the words with the illustrated literacy techniques, while still making room for Rachel Suzanne to have her own creative freedom. She is an incredible illustrator and brought so much heart and humor to this book with her expressive characters. 

Me: What is one thing that surprised you in writing this story?

Kari: I loved how quickly this story poured out of me and how quickly I revised to get it submission-ready. Some stories I have worked on for years and are still not ready. This story was written and revised in a few months before I submitted it.

Me: As a teacher of young readers, I love this novel approach to teaching kiddos about reading (without seeming like it’s teaching them at all).  Is teaching kids to read a passion of yours?  Why did you want to share this with young readers in such a humorous way?

Kari: Thank you so much! I love using everyday moments as teaching moments with my own children. I have found my kids are the most engaged when they don’t feel like they are being taught. Humor ties into that. My kids love to laugh and have really influenced my writing style. They go for the funny books on the shelf every time, and humor is a great way to incorporate information. In 2020, I craved light moments in a dark time, and I knew this story had to bring light and humor to a challenging topic: learning to read!

Me: The illustrations by Rachel Suzanne are absolutely perfect for this story.  I loved the textures and colors she used.  Were there any illustration surprises for you?  Any favorites? 

Kari: I adore Rachel Suzanne’s style. The warm colors, the expressive characters, and the sneaky fox’s antics. She did such an amazing job bringing this story to life. I love all of the spreads, but there is a disco ball spread that knocked my socks off. I laughed so hard I cried! Runner up was the dancing dinosaur and caped underwear crusader spread. She had an incredible vision for this book and I am so excited to be paired with her for How To Hatch A Writer releasing in 2025.

Me: Oh wow!  There’s already a sequel?  That’s fantastic news!  Congratulations!  Any advice for other new picture book writers?

Kari: Celebrate every milestone! Publishing a book is not for the faint of heart, but it is so worth it, so enjoy the journey and the amazing people you will meet along the way!

Hear, hear!  That is great advice Kari.  Thank you for stopping by my blog today.

Dear readers, this book was released in August and I haven’t had a chance to share it with you until now.  If you haven’t yet had a chance to track this book down, I highly recommend it.  It’s light and funny, the perfect approach for teaching reading!