BLOG TOUR: Dotti Enderle!

Today it is my pleasure to be the last stop on the blog tour of author Dotti Enderle! Recently, I have had the pleasure of getting to know a little bit about Dotti, thanks to a few listservs we are both members of, and I have to admit to being totally wowed by her energy and productivity! One of her recent picture books is Granny Gert and the Bunion Brothers, illustrated by Joe Kulka, my last blog tour guest and good buddy of long standing. The world of children's books really is a small one, you know?

Many of you already know Dotti as the author of the successful series, "The Fortune Tellers Club." But, as though that were not enough, she also has written several picture books, with more coming down the pike.

Other stops on Dotti's tour this week:

Karen Lee
Elizabeth O. Dulemba
Ruth Mcnally Barshaw
Kim Norman

EDITED TO ADD: Joe Kulka just posted one more interview with Dotti! Check it out at his blog.

So I guess I am not the last stop after all!

Personally, what I would really love is to sit down with Dotti and a bottle of wine and actually get to know her in person, close up. I want to hear all the details about all her journeys and see the needle on my extra-energy-meter start quivering. How does she do it all? Where does all the get-up-an-go come from? Maybe I'll get the chance to find out at a conference or the next Library Association event. In the meantime, we get at least a little inside info from her tour...

Can you give us some background into what it is like to become a professional story teller?

I discovered my talent for storytelling back in 1993 while working part-time for a local preschool. I soon became the school’s enrichment coordinator, and four mornings a week, I went from room to room for thirty-minute sessions, entertaining the kids with stories, songs, and puppets. I enjoyed it so much I joined the Houston Storytellers Guild, entered storytelling competitions, and began getting hired to tell stories at libraries, schools, and festivals. It’s been one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done, and even as an author, I still incorporate storytelling into my school presentations.

I would love to hear about that "Aha!" moment when you sat down to write your first book.

The first book or the first published book? My first published book was The Lost Girl, Book One of my Fortune Tellers Club series. My “Aha!” moment came when my oldest daughter and her friends pulled out the Ouija board at a sleepover, reminding me of my own childhood, my best friends and me asking the Ouija board questions about our future. I suddenly snapped to the idea of three tween girls solving mysteries with different forms of divination. And I knew from the first sentence that it would result in a series.

Is there something specific from your childhood that is especially relevant to what you do now?

I can’t pinpoint any specific event that led me to become an author, but every children’s author brings much of their own childhood to their books. In my upcoming book, Man In The Moon, I draw on the year my family lived on a small farm. Through the entire writing process I visualized that farm as the setting of the book, including an old flatbed truck full of junk that had been abandoned on the property next to ours. The main character, Janine, shares many the hopes and dreams I had at her age.

Please give us a peek into the life of an author with a successful series in print.

I wish I could tell you how glamorous, enriching, and life-changing it has been, but the truth is, I spend half the day in my jammies, tend to laundry first, and still have to plunge the toilet occasionally. I do get lots of fun fan mail, more invitations to speak at schools and conferences, and am now spending as much time dealing with the business of writing as with the writing itself.

Play Fortune Teller and tell me where Dotti Enderle will be in five years.....

Truthfully, I’ve never been able to predict my own future, but I hope to be doing the same thing I’m doing now…turning out fun books for kids, like my newest picture book, Grandpa for Sale. I have so many more books left to write, and hopefully in five years a few of them will have made their way into print.

Comments

[johncena]

I think Dotti Enderle is a good author. i love her books. i heard that smallest world of children's book was written by her.i want to know more about her books.
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johncena

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