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From Ideas to Books to Read for Kids (for free)

Helena Harper's story “Pep, Polish and Paint” is a book for kids that you can read for free. But how did the initial idea materialise into an actual book for kids? And what was the initial idea anyway? This is what Helena says.

“The inspiration for “Pep, Polish & Paint” came one starry night as I was walking home from work. I looked up at the stars in the night sky and imagined what would happen if one of those stars just went out. Who or what would be around in space to help a star that had lost its shine? Spaceships, of course! And so the story was born. That was over 15 years ago. The story went through several drafts - the characters went from having no names to acquiring names, one of the spaceships became female, and Sammy the sun's reactions changed as well.

Then came the illustrations. I found an illustrator via one of my online author friends. It took over a year for the illustrations to be finalised and then I thought: why not have some colouring sheets and worksheets which would provide a lot of interesting information about space for kids ? After all, it was a space story, so what could be better than devising some fun activities which would give a lot of information about space for children?

Sammy has inspired me more than once during the whole process to enable me to take action in order to transform the story from a collection of handwritten lines into a fully illustrated, published book and make my goal a reality. I don't think I would have made it without him!”

Whilst “Pep, Polish and Paint” is a printed book, it is also an online book to read for kids (for free), so if you haven't already heard Sammy the sun's story, why not do it now? Enjoy!