Below is an excerpt from Ms. Linda Sue Park's website. Ms. Park is a second generation Korean-American married to an Irish man. I am currently reading one of her children books entitled Project Mulberry. My son Moses read it first and liked it a lot. Someday I want to write my own books, but until then I will read and keep reading and write here and there. In a sense I'm building my writing muscles. Right now, they don't look much, but someday they will amount to something.
The Importance of Reading. Read. That's the single best thing an aspiring writer can do for his or her work. I once heard an editor say, "Read a thousand books of the genre you're interested in. THEN write yours."I was astonished and pleased to hear her say this--because that's exactly what I did. During the years when I had no thought of writing for children. I read and read and read. Middle-grade novels. Hundreds of them--easily more than a thousand. Then I wrote mine--and it sold on its first submission. Luck? Coincidence? Maybe...but I doubt it.My personal reading list draws from a wide variety of genres. I love middle-grade novels best, but I also read Young Adult novels and picture books. I read adult literary fiction, mysteries and nonfiction. I read poetry. I love books on food and travel. Whether a wondrous story or a hilarious passage of dialogue or a beautiful sentence or a memorable image, every bit of reading I do helps my own writing. The rhythm of language and the way words combine to communicate more than their dictionary meanings infuse the serious reader's mind and emerge transformed when that reader sits down to write.
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