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Christine and her two children were eating at a restaurant in fall 1998
when Greg decided his mom’s writing career should take on a new dimension.
“He asked me to write a children’s story,” says Christine, a wife and
mother from North Augusta, South Carolina. “He even had a title ready. He
said, ‘Let’s call it I Can Read Books Upside Down.’ I loved the
title and his sudden enthusiasm for writing, so I said, ‘Sure. Let’s write
it right now.’”
She grabbed a paper napkin and began writing rhythmic, rhyming verses
about a boy who wakes up to a ‘downside-up and outside-in’ day in which he
eats a burger and fries for breakfast, wears his socks over his shoes,
gives a test to his teacher, runs the bases backward during baseball and,
of course, reads books upside down. Greg and his little sister, Julianne,
eagerly offered ideas as Christine wrote, keeping the story percolating.
An hour later, they left the restaurant with a twenty-verse story that
Greg decided deserved an audience. He asked his mom to read it to his
fourth-grade class.
“Nothing could have prepared me for his class’s reaction when I read them
our story,” Christine says. “They laughed at all the right places, and
when I finished, they started clapping and cheering. They said, ‘Write
another one! Write another one!’ I got started that day on my next
children’s story.”
Story number two was about a child who fantasizes about the meal of his
dreams when his mom asks what he wants for dinner. Again, Greg’s class
cheered when they heard it. “What’s your next story going to be about?”
they asked excitedly.
“I thought to myself, ‘My next story? What have I gotten myself
into?’ But by then, I was hooked,” Christine says. “The teacher asked if I
could read to the class once a week, and Greg insisted that I have a new,
original story each time. Suddenly, my story-writing factory was in full
production.”
Christine’s children provided plenty of inspiration for story ideas. The
stuff of daily family life – messy rooms, baseball games, math homework –
all found its way into her stories. Greg’s class suggested ideas, too, and
Christine began incorporating the students themselves into the plots. She
wrote about what they want to be when they grow up, for instance, and
about their pets showing up for school when they stay home with the flu.
“These were their favorites,” Christine says. “Their eyes just sparkled
when they heard me reading about them – their
pets, their favorite gifts, a leprechaun’s visit to their classroom.....”
“Christine’s stories were the highlight of our week,” says Susan
Tharpe, the students’ fourth-grade teacher at
North Augusta Elementary School. “They couldn’t wait to see her walk in
that door. They knew they were in for an incredible treat. Her writing is
amazing. I kept asking her, ‘When are you going to get these stories
published?’”
It
hadn’t really occurred to Christine before Susan asked. As publications
editor at the Medical College of Georgia and a free-lance magazine writer,
Christine has always made a living writing. But her real passion --
fiction-writing -- never turned lucrative. Her unpublished novels
languished in her desk as rejection letters poured in. “I was never
discouraged,” Christine says. “I got some wonderful feedback from
publishers. But the bottom line was always the cold, hard fact that
publishing a book is really tough in today’s publishing industry.”
But since her children’s stories were already written – dozens of them by
this point – she figured she had nothing to lose but postage by submitting
them to publishers. “Getting published would be icing on the cake,” she
says, “but nothing could compare to the joy of reading to those kids every
week.”
At the end of the school year, Christine wrote her final story for the
class: a tribute to the experience they’d shared. “I didn’t anticipate how
emotional I’d feel reading to that group for the last time,” Christine
says. “Our bond was incredible. My voice broke as I read them their last
story.
“When I finished, we hugged and they presented me with a huge basket of
goodies and thank-you letters. Several wrote that because of me, they want
to be writers when they grow up. I’ve never been so touched. Without them,
I might never have discovered the joy of writing children’s stories. Their
inspiration was priceless. I told them that if I ever published one of my
stories, I was dedicating it to them.”
She has made good on that promise. One of her stories, Dreams to Grow
On, was published Sept. 1 by Illumination Arts, a publishing company
based in Bellevue, Washington that specializes in inspirational children’s
books.
“It’s such a thrill to have a book published, particularly by Illumination
Arts,” Christine says. “Their standards are incredibly high. They’re
committed to nothing short of excellence, and I’m so gratified that my
story is in such good hands.”
And Christine seems to have found a permanent niche in the classroom. She
visits schools to read the book, then offers a
20-minute talk about how children can set their own dreams in motion. Each
class is precious to her, but Mrs. Tharpe’s
1998-99 fourth-graders will always have a special place in her heart. “I
think that we helped each other discover our potential,” Christine says,
“and that’s what Dreams to Grow On is all about: children
envisioning and working toward their dreams. Having this book published is
a dream come true, and it’s a dream I wouldn’t have fulfilled without the
inspiration of Mrs. Tharpe’s class.”
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