If you know and/or love Kitty Corn, then you’ll want to see the board books!

LeUyen Pham and Shannon Hale are the team behind the bestselling picture books Itty-Bitty Kitty-Corn, Pretty Perfect Kitty-Corn, Party Hearty Kitty-Corn, and Bubbly Beautiful Kitty-Corn; the bestselling graphic novels Real Friends, Best Friends, and Friends Forever; and, with Dean Hale, the early chapter-book series the Princess in Black. They’ve made a bunch of other books, too. They are both moms of cat-loving kids, wives to book-creating husbands, honor award winners (Caldecott and Newbery), and believers in unicorns. Pham lives in Los Angeles, Hale lives in Utah, and together they know they can be—and make—anything. You can learn more about Shannon at her website or follow her on Instagram or BlueSky. You can learn more about LeUyen Pham at her website or follow her on Facebook or Instagram.

KITTY-CORN CLUB: PARTS OF US is a board book about body parts. No, it’s a board book about body positivity. No, it’s a board book about acceptance. Actually, it’s all those things and more, told in typical cute, short, and funny Kitty-Corn fashion. It’s brilliantly done in both text AND illustrations, and well worth the read. And today we get to talk about it with BOTH creators together!

Welcome Shannon and LeYuen!

Me: I didn’t anticipate a board book series for Kitty-Corn, yet they are wonderful (and so far, this one is my favorite). Where did the idea for a board book series come from?  Did you two decide to make something shorter for younger readers together? Or was it an agent/editor/publisher request? 

Shannon: This was Uyen’s idea! I’d never done a board book before, but I love them with all my heart. I have four kids, and I raised them on a steady, high-fiber diet of board books. I was thrilled to get a chance to make some board books from the ground up—not picture books put into board book form, but really explore what a Kitty-Corn board book could be.

LeUyen: I’ve always LOVED board books.  When both my kids were babies, I’d stack their board books in piles around them like a castle wall and watch them roll around, knocking them down, flipping the pages, chewing the edges.  I like to think my kids were born into books that way.  When we talked about doing more things in the Kitty Corn universe, this was the one that I went for first. The simplicity of board books – pared down words, simpler images, chunky pages – is actually very deceiving.  It’s hard to come up with something fun and creative and engaging to keep the attention of the youngest ones, and to do it in a way that’s engaging for the adults reading them too!  But we were definitely up for the challenge. 

Me: The Kitty-Corn stories have so much humor in them and yet you always bring everything back to a heartfelt moment. This book does the same. Who came up with the topic of body positivity for the second book? What about the octopus? Who decided there needed to be an octopus in the crew?

Shannon: When Uyen and I were working on the first picture book and thinking of doing more, we asked ourselves, what is the key to these stories? And we decided it is friendship. Always they come back to friends having fun together, learning to understand each other, playing and making mistakes and having each other’s (fuzzy) backs. This board book was an opportunity to introduce a new friend, and Uyen and I have always been so in love with octopi, one of the coolest, most interesting and unique creatures.

LeUyen: That, and quite honestly octopi are so SO fun to draw.

Me: Both of you ladies are queens of your craft in your own right, yet you continue to make amazing projects together. Have you met in real life? How long have you been friends?  What was the first project you worked on together? How has your friendship evolved over the years and projects together? 

Shannon: Uyen and I have been friends for over 20 years. We met through a publicist we’d both worked with in 2004, though we didn’t work together till the Princess in Black series, starting in 2012. We got really close while we worked on my graphic novel memoir Real Friends. It was while on tour for Best Friends that we came up with Itty Bitty Kitty-Corn. It feels so special to have a chapter book series, graphic novel series, picture book series, and now board books with one of my dearest friends.

LeUyen: I’ve said this many times before – my sole desire in all of these books is to make Shannon laugh.  Before anything else – our agents, our editor, even sometimes our audience – I’m happiest when Shannon sends me a list of all the things that make her happy from my drawings.  There’s the joy in knowing in an abstract way how much kids love these books, but to me the real moment is Shannon’s reaction. In that way, we really do mirror Kitty and Unicorn in the books.

Me:  Aww! I love that! Would you recommend working as a team?

Shannon: I think extroverted artists and writers are rare breeds, but LeUyen and I both are, and that makes it more fun to work on collaborative projects. Everybody is different. Finding the right teammates for your particular personality and style is tricky. I can’t believe my luck that Uyen and I found each other and work together like magic. It’s fun to work with Uyen and we make each other better. A perfect combo.

LeUyen: It’s funny, because Shannon and I started this project with that exact idea in mind.  Usually, an editor chooses an artist for a project, and then gets the author’s take on it. It’s a very professional approach, and definitely has reasons for being an effective model. But this particular project is more akin to Shannon and I as little kids, sitting in the back of the classroom, giggling and sending notes back and forth to each other. There’s an intimacy to these books between us that can sometimes be hard (“I want MY way!”) and then can also be pure joy (“How did you KNOW that’s what I wanted too?!”).  We’re trying very hard to please each other. Is that working as a team? Or playing together as friends? I’m voting for the latter.

Me: Ha! YES! I love how you approach the topic of body parts. Each of these characters have similar body parts (except the octopus, of course). This is definitely a toddler topic (i.e., one seen in other board books), but this story has subtle messages of acceptance and positivity. I love that! What drew each of you to this project (besides the fact that you’re both book creators and friends)? What made you want to include all those things? 

Shannon: One thing that’s never a problem is ideas. I don’t feel precious about ideas because there are so many possibilities. We could make a thousand different Kitty-Corn board books. And when we’re together, Uyen and I will bat ideas back and forth like kittens with a yarn ball. Parts of Us just felt right. It felt fun and funny and kind and true, which is our measuring stick for all our Kitty-Corn books.

LeUyen: Often, too, these messages that end up coming out were not the original intention.  In that, the original intention was simply to have fun – an idea gets placed on the table and Shannon and I just kind of go for it, like she said, as kittens with a ball of yarn.  If it comes out with a message attached, it’s an added plus.  I think Shannon and I are both incredibly empathetic people – in our stories and art, that’s what we’re always striving towards.  We’re always looking for that positivity, so much so that we hardly notice we’re doing it.  Any book either of us work on, point towards those messages. INCLUDING board books!

Me: The text is succinct (I think I counted 43 words).  The illustrations are bright with color (and humor).  Each component is beautiful and strong on its own.  What is one thing that surprised each of you in writing and/or illustrating this story together? Are there any surprises left for you at this stage?

Shannon: I’m always so eager to see Uyen’s art. When I’m making books with Uyen, I experience Christmas morning over and over again, every time I see an email from her in my inbox. She always manages to make choices that surprise and delight me, and I know they must surprise and delight kids too.

LeUyen: We’re like Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. We kind of match each other easily.  But there are always still surprises. I laugh out loud at some of Shannon’s words, and try to do the same for her with my pictures. Board books are, I think, more of a challenge for the writer.  You simply can’t rely on words the same way as you can in longer narrative form. The best scripts are the ones that are the most spare and generous for allowing the art to tell story too. Board books are very hard to write for that reason, and Shannon really nails it.

Me: What advice for other aspiring picture book writers and/or illustrators would you each give? 

Shannon: Write for fun. Write a lot. Give yourself permission to write badly. Low stakes, high frequency writing is the best way to develop your craft. It’s not about coming up with one perfect idea; it’s about honing your skill, like practicing a piano for decades before soloing at Carnegie Hall.

LeUyen: I used to say DRAW EVERYDAY. But the truth is, if the desire is in you, you don’t need to be told to do that. You simply will. So just listen to that inner voice. Let your pencil cross the page without judgement. Draw for the joy it brings. I think that’s what Shannon and I are doing with these books. All else that comes after the joy is just the icing on the cake.

I love that ladies. Basically, create with joy! Thank you so much for stopping by my blog today Shannon and LeUyen. It was a joy to chat with you both!

Dear readers, this board book released in March and is the 2nd in the series. If you haven’t had a chance yet to track it down, I highly recommend it. It’s bright and colorful; full of humor, joy, and kindness; and will definitely grab young reader’s attention. You won’t want to miss it!