Nissa Van Riper
ABOUT ME
The Page Only My Mom Will Read
How far back?
Well. I flailed about.
Lexington, Indianapolis, Chicago.
A late bloomer.
A degree, eventually.
Kalamazoo.
Refusing perfectly apropos advice
from perfectly qualified individuals
I did not pursue a career in writing.
Instead, residential construction and design.
And then I built my life
in the "seven hills"and infinite exquisiteness
of San Francisco.
Puzzle piece, fitted in.
Soon enough, the impossible proved possible--
I loved a man more than
I loved San Francisco.
Now I share his itinerant ways.
Kansas City, NoVA, Joshua Tree, Orange County.
St Louis, Pennsylvania, Tampa,
Germany.
Moving has taught me many things
about myself, about people.
Motherhood, too, has shaped me.
And so has this insatiable world.
Currently England, which is simultaneously
everything and nothing as I'd imagined.
Life is surprising and challenging and precious and good and right.
And if it's not, I can remake it.
That is the beautiful thing.
Play is the work of childhood.
Jean Piage
WHY I WRITE, AND FOR WHOM
A line crafted with nuance and precision will stop my heart.
Language is my playground. Considering, selecting, combining.
It is other things, too: challenging, frustrating, confronting.
Carefully tended writing turns out stronger stories.
Wonderfully wonderfuller.
​
The world overestimates children's resiliency and underestimates their understanding.
These are things kids deserve to be: included, considered, unscheduled. Hopeful.
And things they do not: rushed, pushed, tricked. Discounted.
Growing up is hard enough.
And man it feels good when they fall in love with a story.
I write to capture those hearts.
My prefereces for the littlest:
Gentle and goofy, un-message-y, straightforward stories with simple and
powerful devices like repetition, imagery, alliteration and rhyme.
Tell stories that kids will clutch and clamor for. On repeat.
Aim to enchant.
For grade-schoolers, build in hearty doses of wonder, wild and whimsy.
Spark a gasp, a giggle, a groan.
And how great if books can provoke fresh perspective.
But ultimately, write to charm.
Preadolescents in middle grades struggle with growing anxieties
and yet retain their childlike openness and imaginativeness.
Focus in the place between naive and knowing.
Construct characters and story lines on this bridge between two worlds.
The goal remains, without a doubt, to entertain.
For young adults, sure, stories can be a balm.
(For some, necessary medicine.)
But they are ˚˖‧✧*.‧m a g i c .˖‧✧*˖ first, remember.
Illuminate.
"If you're a pretender come sit by my fire
for we have some flax-golden tales to spin..."
-- (all hail) Shel Silverstein
Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators member.
scbwi.org
