I read my books aloud before they were published.
People are usually surprised to hear this, but I don't really read children's books.
I feel sometimes that in children's books there are more and more grim problems, but I don't know that I want to burden third- and fourth-graders with them.
I had a very wise mother. She always kept books that were my grade level in our house.
I was a very observant child. The boys in my books are based on boys in my neighborhood growing up.
With twins, reading aloud to them was the only chance I could get to sit down. I read them picture books until they were reading on their own.
My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening. She read mainly travel books.
Otis was inspired by a boy who sat across the aisle from me in sixth grade. He was a lively person. My best friend appears in assorted books in various disguises.
As a child, I disliked books in which children learned to be 'better' children.
In seventh grade...I found a place on the [library]shelf where my book would be if I ever wrote a book, which I doubted.
Ramona was originally an accidental character I added to the Henry Huggins books because I noticed that none of the characters had siblings. I added Ramona as Beazus' pestering little sister.
My mother always kept library books in the house, and one rainy Sunday afternoon - this was before television, and we didn't even have a radio - I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered I was reading and enjoying what I read.
My books take place in a very specific neighborhood in Portland, Oregon. It must be the most stable neighborhood in the United States.
I'm very surprised at the high number of boys who have written to say that reading my books was hard work but worth it. I have many loyal boy readers.
'Dear Mr. Henshaw' came about because two different boys from different parts of the country asked me to write a book about a boy whose parents were divorced, and so I wrote 'Dear Mr. Henshaw,' and it won the Newbery, and I was - it's been very popular.
I wrote books to entertain. I'm not trying to teach anything! If I suspected the author was trying to show me how to be a better behaved girl, I shut the book.
If we finished our work, the teacher would say, 'Now don't read ahead.' But sometimes I hid the book I was reading behind my geography book and did read ahead. You can hide a lot behind a geography book.
I don't necessarily start with the beginning of the book. I just start with the part of the story that's most vivid in my imagination and work forward and backward from there.
If you don't see the book you want on the shelves, write it.
Quite often somebody will say, What year do your books take place? and the only answer I can give is, In childhood.
One rainy Sunday when I was in the third grade, I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered that even though I did not want to, I was reading. I have been a reader ever since.
My favorite books are a constantly changing list, but one favorite has remained constant: the dictionary. Is the word I want to use spelled practice or practise? The dictionary knows. The dictionary also slows down my writing because it is such interesting reading that I am distracted.
I hope children will be happy with the books I've written, and go on to be readers all of their lives.