Liz Yanoff: Ms. Berkes, thank you for agreeing to be interviewed about your NYSRA Charlotte Award nominated book Over in the Jungle. This fresh take on a traditional rhyme is well loved by our readers. Miss Lee’s class had several questions for you about jungles and your writing process.
WHY DO YOU LIKE RHYMING STORIES?
I have always had fun with rhyme and when I was a teacher in New York, I discovered that kids are naturally “wired” for sound and rhythm. Repetition and rhyme are a great way for students to share in a story, especially if they are just beginning to read.
While my first three picture books are also in rhyme, in Over in the Ocean, in a Coral Reef, I used the familiar song “Over in the Meadow” and put a new twist to it. 
Kids can sing the story in rhyme, count all the animals, and of course enjoy Jeanette Canyon’s vibrant clay illustrations. Two years later, we did the same thing with Over in the Jungle, a Rainforest Rhyme, which is my fifth book. All eight of my picture books are in rhyme. Rhyme gives a book forward motion that you don’t necessarily get in prose. It sets the pace and because I love music, I like to think that I’m making music with my words.
WHAT INSPIRED YOU?
My grandfather was a wonderful storyteller, and my parents read to me often. When I was eight, I started writing plays that my friends and I performed in the summer. Our show included scenery, costumes and music. We spent weeks getting ready for it in our backyard. Reading, writing, music and theater have been a constant in my life. But it wasn’t until I moved to Florida and became a children’s librarian, that I took writing seriously. Reading lots of children’s literature and working with kids really helped me find my niche: “narrative non-fiction.” See www.MarianneBerkes.com
WHERE DO YOU GET YOUR IDEAS?
Ideas are all around you and you can use them to build stories. I have always had an appreciation of our Earth and a respect for nature. I spent a lot of time outdoors as a child, and still do. Discovering nature is a life-long adventure and ideas are everywhere you look. All you have to do to get ideas is to be really awake, that means staying curious about the world around you.
WHY DID YOU WRITE ABOUT JUNGLES?
I came up with the idea for the rainforest book, after the success of my Ocean Reef book.
When I moved to Florida I was amazed at all the beautiful fish I would see when I snorkeled. That’s where I got the idea for that book! The art director at Dawn Publications chose Jeanette Canyon to illustrate it because it needed colorful illustrations.
Well, a rainforest, which can be described as a large and thick jungle, is also filled with vibrant color. I used the same theme, so kids could discover lots of amazing animals and plants that were again beautifully illustrated by Jeanette. In this book I also suggest that kids mimic the animals when singing the song, which has been a lot of fun to see when I visit schools.
WHAT IS A CANOPY?
It’s a lush leafy layer that forms an umbrella over the rain forest. That is why it is called a canopy. Many of the trees entwine and are held together by creepers and vines to make a thick cover which is anywhere from 60 to 130 feet above the ground. Many different animals live in the canopy layer of the rainforest.
WHAT IS A HONEY BEAR?
In the glossary I mention that honey bears are also called kinkajous. I love the word “kinkajous”, but couldn’t fit it into my rhyme. Writing in rhyme isn’t always easy.
Look at the third line: “Lived a mother honey bear” and substitute the word “kinkajous.” That works, but when you say “and her little kinkajous five” the rhythm is off. Luckily there was a “synonym” for kinkajou, which is “honey bear,” and I could say “little honeys five.” Actually it tells you more than the word, “kinkajou” does. Would you have done the same thing?
But I haven’t answered your question. Honey bears live in the canopy and look for sweet things to eat. You can learn a lot by just looking at the illustration. See them enjoying the nectar from yellow balsa flowers, and scrambling toward honey in a bee hive. Can you find anything else to count? And what does the moon tell you?
DO HOWLER MONKEYS REALLY LIVE IN A DEN OR DO YOU ONLY HAVE THAT BECAUSE IT RHYMES?
Great question! I took some license with the word “den” because I had to rhyme it with ten. (As I mentioned earlier, rhyming isn’t always easy.) I also wanted to find an animal that was a “father” to go with the number ten, which is what I did in my “Ocean Reef” book, and also in my latest book about Arctic animals, published in 2008. (The male Arctic wolf is number ten.)
The large howler monkey is what I came up with for number ten, because the males do mark their territory, which is in the canopy, by making loud vocalizations. While they travel from tree to tree in the daytime, they sleep high under the canopy trees at night, and while it’s a stretch, I felt calling it a “rainforest den” could work!
WHAT DOES THE POISON DART FROG DO?
Poison dart frogs (also known as poison arrow frogs) have extremely poisonous skin which protects them from predators. If a predator licks one of these frogs, it can get sick and die. Native hunters use the poisonous skin to coat the tips of their hunting arrows and blow-gun darts, and that is why it’s called a “poison dart” or “poison arrow” frog. Like other amphibians, they need water, and in the rainforest, the mother puts her tadpole babies into bromeliad plants which hold water.
DO YOU LOVE ANIMALS? WHY DID YOU CHOOSE THOSE ANIMALS?
As I mentioned above, discovering nature and learning about animals is a life-long adventure for me. I have written books about frogs, birds, seashells, ocean reef creatures, rainforest animals, Arctic animals, and animals that migrate. The only book I’ve written that is not about animals is “Going Around the Sun” about planets, which of course I found fascinating too. I learn so much when I write my books, and I do lots of research. I’m currently writing a story about a manatee (Roly Poly Manatee) because I saw a mother and baby in a lagoon near my home recently and it inspired me to write about these amazing creatures. And guess what? It’s not in rhyme!
WHAT WILL YOUR NEXT BOOK BE?
Going Home, the Mystery of Animal Migration, published by Dawn Publications, scheduled for release in February 2010.
Regarding the questions you asked illustrator, Jeanette Canyon, I’d like to answer one of those also, please.
WHY DID YOU DECIDE TO PUT AN EYE-SPY AT THE END OF THE BOOK?
I absolutely love what Jeanette Canyon did with that page, but she did it because it was in the text and had to follow that. It was how I wanted the book to end, but the way she did it was incredible. I wanted to show all the animals from top to bottom and she did that by turning the two pages around.
I ended my story as an “eye-spy”, which I also did in the “Ocean Reef” book because, as a former librarian I know how much kids love books like “Where’s Waldo” and the “I Spy” books by Jean Marzollo. And it worked!
Marianne Berkes
June 2009
[Reader's note: Janette Canyon's interview will be posted on June 27, Liz]
1 Comment
June 19, 2009 at 10:43 pm
Also see the printable bookmarks for this book on our primary resources page as well as on Marianne’s website. Liz