Today I share the reasons I’ve been told:

Don’t Write in Rhyme

“Why not?” you ask.

“But publishers are constantly printing new rhyming picture books.”

“I’ve heard librarians like reading rhyming books at story time.”

“Children love rhyme, don’t they?”

“But Dr. Seuss was amazing and he only wrote in rhyme.”

and so on …

Here are the two simple reasons you should not write rhyming picture books:

1. The Business Reason: Rhyming picture books cannot be easily translated into other languages. Therefore, rhyming picture books are immediately less valuable to agents and publishers.
2. The Artistic Reason: It’s very easy to write bad rhymes. Lots of people do it. Therefore, there is a stigma associated with rhyming picture books – a cringe-worthy stain on the entire genre (I’m not kidding – I got a very painful looking cringe from a highly respected and successful agent when I told her…