Children's Book Editor - Taylor Norman

“A good picture book should be able to be read by anybody,” says Taylor Norman, editor at Chronicle Books in San Francisco and our guest on the podcast this week. As an editor it is Taylor’s job to find the right manuscript and shepherd it through the process from acquisition to print. No small feat as creating picture books is a multimillion-dollar industry creating memories that last a lifetime.

Getting you book in front of a publisher like Taylor requires you as the author/illustrator to become immersed in the field. This is not a quick output, or one-off idea to try. The work you create can fill libraries and enter the world of “literature”. Talking to parents is the first step if you think you have a good idea. “I think as a parent, you want the right book for the right moment at all of your moments. And there's tons of melodrama in one day in a kid's life. And ideally, the picture books that get published address those types of moments in a kid's life,” Taylor says. As far as the books she is looking, “I'm interested in books that have a purpose because they're authentic and they tell a true story that a kid will respond to.”