The Odditorium
Kibi’s creative corner where readers can peek behind the scenes, discover the books we’re crafting, and join us on our storytelling journey.
Kibi Books
Our books are in production and coming soon to your local book store.
Book 2:
The Oddites to Alaska
Kibi Books brings together teachers, librarians, writers and illustrators from all over the world, with the goal of creating books for under-served readers. The group was formed when international school librarian Emma Burns noticed that her students of all ages and ability gravitated to accessible texts. She realised that the majority of her students were multilingual, and that even the capable English speakers found many popular books challenging.
Her experience isn’t unique. Over two thirds of the world’s English speakers communicate in English as an additional language. And yet despite this, the vast majority of English books for young people are written for a native speaking audience. Emma searched high and low for quality high-low books, especially for middle-grade (aged 8 - 12) readers, but quickly learned that this is not a market served by major publishers.
Emma called her best buddies, international school teachers living all over the world, and pitched them a crazy idea; let’s work with our students to write the books they want to read. And so, Kibi Books was born.
The dream team of Todd Denick (author),
Fiona Hunter (language specialist and editor) and Maija Tirronen (illustrator) work collaboratively despite some challenging time zone differences to bring their students’ character and plot ideas to life. Our first trilogy “The Oddites” is in production, and we have lots more in store.
Creating the Oddites
When Todd had the idea for a book of Odd characters, he asked his middle school library students in Germany to use their imaginations to create characters and they came up with the characters we know as Ursel, Tom and Leane.
For Todd it was natural to begin with the audience for whom it is aimed: the children.
Armed with his character ideas from his students, Todd wrote this exciting adventure story as a draft. Next he asked his students to read through it and highlight the challenging vocabulary. Some of that led Todd to change his words, or add to the text to make something clearer.
Next step in the process was the editing which brought Ms. Fi into the picture: Fiona has been a teacher of English language in different places for many years. From her home in the far north of New Zealand, she checks for coherence and grammatical errors, firstly making comments and recommendations, and then making changes directly to the text.
Pointing out structures, highlighting where an illustration is required to aid comprehension, and regulating vocabulary and idiomatic language that would be difficult and possibly barriers for English learners is her role.
So who’s next in the creation of the Oddites?
The illustrations of course. Vital to any engaging text for middle-school readers but especially for those who may have barriers to reading.
The search began for the best artist with a vision that matched Todd’s ideas when he wrote the book and taking into account the questions: “How did this look?” and “Is the tone of the book captured here?” Finally Maija Tirronen, a Finnish student living and studying in Denmark, set to work looking at the text in detail, and along with the ideas from the children, began her illustrations. She came up with illustrations that fit Todd’s vision, and began the process of drafting and working with the team, to make the text engaging and accessible.
