M is for Money #AtoZChallenge

4/15/2017

Today I'm blogging about my least favorite subject - money.

Why I don't like to talk about Money

It's so cold, heartless, yet so necessary to pay the bills! I'd much rather dwell on the fun parts of writing and reading picture books - the words, the emotional pull, creating that really great cohesive story...
Yet, picture books are essentially a business of buying and selling goods, so money is an important consideration for both Writers and Readers alike.

For Writers: Making Money

Picture Book writers often hear, "don't quit your day job" when pursuing a career as an author. This is true, to an extent.
Very few writers make money off their books alone. Most have multiple streams of income, through

author visits
speaker events

online webinars
critique services

writer's coaching
and other creative means.

For Readers: Money Sense

I like to volunteer at my kids' school library, especially during Book Fair Week. Maybe it's a California thing, but every book and item sold at the fair is the listed price "+tax". It's that plus tax part that is so hard to get those children to understand! They see $10.99 and think they need $11 for the book, when really they need closer to $12.
I get it, though. How on earth can you figure out what 8.25% of $10.99 is?
I don't.
I take $11 and add 10% (a much easier math problem).
Then I say to the bewildered buyers, "The price is $10.99, so you need about $12.10."
This way the kids are happy to get a little change back instead of upset because they didn't bring in enough money.
I know I'm overestimating, so if it's close, I tell them to see if they have enough. But they need to know $11 is not enough.

I've done this trick so much that when a store manager gave me a ten percent discount, she had to grab a calculator and I already knew the new price.

Links:

I started an idea yesterday and I really like it... so I'm going to keep doing it. Below are 5 blogs I visited as part of the A to Z Blogging Challenge.

And a link I found about how language evolves (ties to my post on Kids)

AP accepts new rules