Interview with debut picture book author, Omar Abed

KidLit in Color: Hello Omar, thank you for answering our questions! What was your inspiration for The Book That Almost Rhymed?

Omar Abed: When I wrote this book, I was actually pitching a completely different book to publishers. Some of the feedback I heard for that other story was that it "rhymed too much", or that the rhyme didn't enhance the story. My agent recommended I try to write a non-rhyming story, but no matter how hard I tried, my brain kept defaulting to rhyme... or things that sounded like they almost rhymed. This story was born with the opening page repeating in my mind. "The other day, I wrote this book. You won't believe how long it took..." From there, I discovered the plot. It's kind of a backwards writing process, but it worked out here!

KLiC: What are your favorite illustrations in the book?

OA: I have so many! Hatem Aly did such an amazing job with this book. Something that caught my eye early in the sketching process was how Hatem added imaginary costumes on the characters as see-through overlays. It helped demonstrate how the characters were really traveling through their imaginations. The story starts out kind of bland and explodes into color as their imaginations develop the story around them. I think Hatem did an amazing job capturing that. Here are some illustrations to show what I mean:

OA: You can see how the setting slowly builds around them, and their adorable see-through costumes helping them play pretend. I just thought it was all so well done.

KLiC: What’s the one thing you want children to take away from your book?

OA: You said one thing, but I'll give you two. At a surface level, I hope this book helps children discover a love for reading with their parents. I see the way my son latches onto a good book and wants to re-read it, and I hope kids and parents love this book enough that they're both excited to re-read it together.

But at a deeper level, I hope this book subtly teaches kids to embrace their siblings / friends in ways that don't come immediately natural to them. In this story, the siblings are in constant conflict over the story, until they realize that maybe both of them were helping the story along in their own way. When we can learn to communicate on another person's level, we can understand them better and empower them.

KLiC: What’s next for you? 

OA: More books! My next book (which hasn't formally been announced yet... shh...) touches on my background as a software developer. In this story, a software bug infects a young boy's book, and the boy (along with a helpful cast of characters) must learn how to stop the bug from destroying his story. No formal timeline yet, but follow me at @OmarAbedWrites for updates. An announcement about that one should go out soon, including the title and illustrator!

KLiC: Is there anything you want readers to know about you or your book(s)?

I think it's funny that I never planned to write picture books. I enjoyed poetry and music (to a normal degree, like anyone else), but the rhythms and lyrics in each of those somehow led me to children's books. To me, I don't draw hard lines between different writing mediums. It's more of a continuum, a spectrum, than distinct art forms, in my opinion. Who's to say a book can't be sung, or that it needs to have words at all? People are so unique, and their stories should reflect that. Sometimes I have to find the right medium to deliver certain stories, which is why I write across genres (YA, picture book, poetry) and don't consider myself "one type" of author.
​