MY CHANCE TO BE PUBLISHED

When I began to write in 1980, publishers in the United States rejected my stories in Spanish. But I wasn't about to give up. I wrote a story in English and sent it to the Willamette Writers Kay Snow Contest. To my surprise I won! The judge of the contest was famous author of children books Eric Kimmel. I asked him what were my chances to get published. He answered, "Why don't you write stories that you heard when you were growing up?" Eric meant folktales, his speciality. He also knew something I didn't. This was the beginning of the multicultural movement in children's books. Educators were begging publishers for books that represented their students. I don't believe in the word "multicultural" as it is sometimes used, because everybody has a culture. Multicultural includes everybody. Multicultural books are about everbody and for everybody. But in the early 1980s educators had a need, and I was in the right place at the right time thanks to Eric Kimmel.