WHERE DO IDEAS COME FROM? Inspiration for MY FRIEND FROM OUTER SPACE

Published in 1981 by Franklin Watts. OP.

My Friend From Outer Space (Franklin Watts, 1981) was my first published fiction book. It is illustrated by Carol Nicklaus. I got the idea for the story by listening to my own children and their friends play games in which they pretended that they were aliens. The trick, of course, was providing proof, and in my story I decided that the two girls would take a trip to outer space in a cardboard-box rocket ship.

After My Friend from Outer Space was published I took it to my author visits at schools and read it aloud to the children. Their favorite part was always the page where Sherry looks like an otherworldly monster. When I asked the audience at the end of the story if they thought the girls really went to outer space, a few hands always went up. When I asked who liked to pretend sometimes, all the hands were raised. I then made the point that pretend games can be a good way to get an idea for a story!

Note: The new 2023 edition of My Friend From Outer Space is the same story, but revised for a graphic picture book format. It is re-illustrated by Paige Arnold.

TA DAH! New Book! MY FRIEND FROM OUTER SPACE

                                    HOT OFF THE PRESS!

MY FRIEND FROM OUTER SPACE

By Caroline Arnold

Illustrations by Paige Arnold

Published by Caroline Arnold (Amazon) July 2023

ISBN 9798399935614 Paperback $9.99

ASIN B0CB9BXWLC  Kindle ebook $6.99

“Sherry lives next door. She says she comes from outer space. I don’t believe her.”

In this graphic picture book illustrated with colorful anime style art by Paige Arnold, two girls travel to the planet Tinbambam in their cardboard box space ship. But do they really go to outer space? Or are they just pretending?

This is a new version of MY FRIEND FROM OUTER SPACE originally published by Franklin Watts, 1981, (OP), now rewritten and newly illustrated.

I am so excited to have this book available again after 43 years! Children will always like to pretend. It is a story that will never go out of date.

Get your copy now!

THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE: Where Do Book Ideas Come From?

I never know where the idea for my next book is going to come from. In this case, it was a chance encounter as I browsed a volume of my encyclopedia.

I saw the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco for the first time more than fifty years ago, when I helped my parents move from their home in Minneapolis to Marin County in Northern California. The bridge's enormous orange towers and soaring cables suspended over the deep water of the channel below made a big impression on me–it was both a thing of beauty and a triumph of engineering. My fascination with the bridge grew as I made regular visits to my parents.
In 1985, nearly twenty-five years after my first acquaintance with the bridge I was at home in Los Angeles working on a new book. While I was looking up a fact for that book in the “G” volume of the encyclopedia, I happened upon an article about the Golden Gate Bridge. I started reading and discovered that the construction of the bridge had been completed in 1937. I realized that in two years the bridge would be turning fifty, and most likely there would be a big celebration. It was the perfect time to write a book about the bridge. So I did. That book, THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE, was published by Franklin Watts in 1986, just in time to go into school and public libraries so kids could learn about the famous bridge that connects San Francisco to Marin County and northern California.The book is now long out of print, but may be in some libraries.

The Golden Gate Bridge celebrated another milestone, its 75th birthday, in 2012. You can read about it at my travel blog, The Intrepid Tourist. In just eighteen more years, the bridge will be 100!