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.gif) Neela Sakaria: Thank you for joining us. Is CAN A ROOSTER DRIVE A TRACTOR? your first children's book? Tell us about your background in writing.
Bonnie Richardson Murphy: Yes, CAN A ROOSTER DRIVE A TRACTOR? is my first book. As a mother, grandmother, and former teacher, I've always been fascinated with children's books. I've watched children's responses and reactions to books that I've read to them. I wondered why they were so taken with some, yet others didn't appeal to them at all. Then I realized that the books I loved to read were the books they also loved to hear and read. Simple, isn't it? If I loved it, they usually did too.
Neela: Why a book about farm animals?
BRM: There were several reasons. I was playing "farm" with a grandchild who was two at the time. We were placing animals in the little tractor, and I kept asking him if the animal could really drive the tractor. I thought, "What a great idea for a book!" I wrote CAN A ROOSTER DRIVE A TRACTOR? that
same day.
Having grown up a country girl, I've always been interested in animals, and am amazed at how little knowledge many children have about them. So many of them haven't a clue where their milk, meat, eggs, etc., come from - except from the grocery.
I also wanted to give our hard working farmers a plug. My husband, Steve, has been in the agricultural business for years, and we know how difficult it is these days for farmers, especially the small, family farmer.
Neela: What makes CAN A ROOSTER DRIVE A TRACTOR? unique in comparison to other books for children?
BRM: Parents and grandparents love to read it. It isn't a tiresome, boring book to read to children. It is also an easy book for beginning readers.
Though the book may appear simplistic, some teachers have used it to teach rhyming. Others have even incorporated it into math lessons.
Example:"If a cow can't drive a tractor, she can produce milk on the farm. If the cow gives 2 gallons of milk today and 2 gallons of milk tomorrow, how many gallons of milk will the cow give in all?" I also think it is one of the very few (if any) books, written and illustrated by a brother-sister team.
Neela: I love the illustrations - talk to us a little bit about the illustrator. Who inspires the drawings? Are you as the author involved in that process?
BRM: I can talk all day about the illustrator. He is my wonderful brother, Shelley Richardson, who is also a former educator. After I wrote the book, I literally had to talk him into illustrating it. He had never done anything like that, but then, neither had I. He has always been a talented artist, and anything he does, he does well. Sometimes we disagree about his artistic interpretation of my ideas, but usually (and I stress usually), he's right.
Neela: Do you think there is something about rhyming that works as an educational tool for children? Was writing the book as a series of rhymes, a conscious choice for you?
BRM: Absolutely! Rhyming has been used for many, many years as a teaching tool. Example: How were you taught the year Columbus discovered America? (Fourteen hundred, sixty-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.) Children seem to remember facts best when rhyming is associated with those facts. Using rhyme was a conscious choice. Children delight in rhymes, and it's the first thing they notice when the book is read to them.
Neela: Do you have children or know children who have read your book? How have they responded to it?
BRM: We have two sons and one daughter, all grown and married with children. There are four grandchildren with another due in July. Naturally, it's their favorite book. (What did you think I'd say?) But really, I've been surprised and very pleased with the letters and comments I've received from people I've yet to meet saying this was their child's favorite book.
I also go to schools and read and talk about my book. Though this book was written for smaller children, occasionally I will read to third and fourth graders and even their response has been wonderful!
Neela: Looking back, is there anything you would do differently or change, in terms of the process of writing/publishing this book?
BRM: Not really. I think God's timing is everything, and if I'd done this earlier, it probably wouldn't have worked.
Neela: Are you working on any future projects?
BRM: You bet! Lots of them. The stories keep coming to me, and I keep writing. Shelley and I have completed another book and we're trying to find a publisher for it. He's now in the process of illustrating another. He really has the harder job.
Neela: Can a rooster drive a tractor?
BRM: Although our publisher, The Alabama Farmers Federation, has received pictures showing a rooster at the wheel of a tractor, I'm still unconvinced that one can. But then, stranger things have happened.
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