1 Please introduce yourself so that the readers will get to know you better.
My name is Susan Marie Chapman. I am an award winning Children’s book author who started writing Children’s books in 2017. I grew up on a farm in southern Pennsylvania. I am the eldest of eight children which comes with a lot of responsibility. The experience of being around many different animals, spending my days in nature, and taking care of my siblings, gave me much to write about. My dad was an electrician and my mom stayed at home with us. We had a huge garden which covered over two acres. Here, we grew every vegetable imaginable. We also had fruit trees, grape vines, over one hundred chickens, twin piglets, geese, and litters of collie pups every six months, which were descendants of the very famous dog, Lassie. We did not have cows, but our neighbor, Mr. Thomas, had one cow and her name was Daisy. Mr. Thomas always had extra milk to share with us. He would fill up a big glass jug with fresh milk straight from the cow, it was still warm with the cream slowly rising to the top. We would then very carefully carry the milk back to our house and pour it into our hand crank ice cream maker along with ice, fresh eggs from our chickens, a lot of sugar and either strawberries from our garden or peaches from our peach trees. I don’t think that I have ever tasted Ice cream that good since then.
In sixth grade, I wrote a short story and my English teacher stayed after school to help me with the grammar and spelling. We entered my story in a magazine contest for young readers and I won. I still have the tiny award medal that the magazine sent to me. In high school, I was the Sports Editor of our school newspaper, and then Editor in Chief during my senior year. I did not attend college right away. I worked in a local bank for three years. This experience was very helpful when I finally interviewed for college. My parents could not help me financially, so I had to work my way through school, working three jobs at a time. When I finished, I had a Bachelors degree in Economics, an Associates degree in Business and a Certification in Interior Decorating. After school, I met my husband and we raised two amazing children together. I was a stay at home mom, just like my mother was. Presently I live in Naples, Florida with my two Pomeranian dogs, Sugar and Cookie. You will find me in a park, under a palm tree, working on my next book with Sugar and Cookie right by my side.
- What is your inspiration behind your book, “Grumpy The Iguana”?
This is a great question and one that I am never asked. This is my very first story in the Grumpy the Iguana and Green Parrot Adventure series.
On January 1st, 2017, on a very beautiful and sunny day in Florida, I was hit by a car while walking. The person driving the car was backing up and did not see me. I should have been killed but a good samaritan shouted, “STOP” and saved my life. After months of physical therapy and almost losing my leg, I started to heal. I was still limping but I forced myself to keep moving every day. Sometimes I would meet a friend at Flamingo Park to do some much needed stretching. This is where I met Grumpy the Iguana. He was in the same spot every day when I arrived and alway doing the same thing. He had a routine. My friend, who was also my trainer, noticed that Grumpy was not his usual self. “Our iguana looks grumpy today. Looks like someone cut down his tree. No wonder he is upset.” We both watched as Grumpy stared at the place where his tree home once stood. It turned out that the park was making some changes and started to cut down all of the older trees. Apparently these trees were not indigenous to the area. People from the neighborhood started to gather outside of the park in protest. Some held signs that said “Murderers”. Many animals lost homes that day.
- When did you realize that you wanted to be an author?
I have always loved my English classes in school and reading books. When I was twelve years old I had Scarlett Fever and I was very sick for about a month. I started reading books that I found in our attic at the farm house. They were all classic novels, “Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Bronte, “Gone With The Wind” by Margaret Mitchell, “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Bronte. I also read a few Charles Dickens novels, “A Tale Of Two Cities”, “Oliver Twist”, “David Copperfield” and “A Christmas Carol”. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray was another book that I enjoyed. “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexandre Dumas was also very good. I read every one of Nancy Drew’s Mystery series books and Cherry Ames, Student Nurse series too. I still love detective shows to this day.
Whenever I had to write a book report or a true story in high school, I always got an A for a grade. I enjoyed writing, but never thought of it in as a career. My parents wanted me to take Advanced Placement courses in school. English and Art were not something that my parents encouraged. This was funny since my dad majored in English in college. As soon as I graduated from college myself, I met my husband and became a stay at home mom. I never really used my degrees in Economics and Business and I did not think about writing again until twenty years later. I was divorced and living by myself in Florida. I wanted to write a book about my Pomeranian dogs for children. I published “Love, Sugar & Cookie” in 2018 and I now have sixteen books published to date. You always hear stories about people that do amazing things later in life. I wrote my first book at age sixty.
- Please tell us something about your book, “Grumpy The Iguana”.
I wrote this story on the way home from Flamingo Park on the very day that Grumpy’s tree was chopped down. I think it took me about fifteen minutes to write this story. The words kept pouring out of my head and onto a piece of paper, I think it was a flyer for the specials at the grocery store. I had stopped there to write down everything that I was thinking before I forgot it. After “Grumpy The Iguana” was published, people would cry when they read it. I did not understand why at the time but now I know that everyone can relate to what happened to Grumpy, adults and children alike. It is a very emotional book, especially the part where the Green Parrot helps Grumpy and shows him that a little compassion goes a long way.
- For which age group is your book “Mr. squirrel finds a treasure” suitable for?
“Mr. Squirrel Finds A Treasure” is a book about taking care of our environment and how litter affects animals and humans. It is suitable for ages 3yrs to 7yrs or Preschool up until second grade. It really depends on your child’s reading level. I know that my children still enjoyed Picture books until they were in fourth grade. I think they just enjoyed me reading to them and looking at the illustrations.
- What is your favorite quote?
I am not sure if you mean in life or in my books.
My favorite quote is, Take The Road Less Traveled. This comes from a Poem by Robert Frost titled, “The Road Not Taken”. Don’t take the easy way. Always challenge yourself. You will have more stories to tell that way.
My favorite quote from “Mr. Squirrel Finds A Treasure” would be, “Stop the littering”.
- What do you like most about your country?
Our Freedoms that we have are the most important.
- What suggestion do you want to give to parents of little readers regarding a reading habit?
I think reading to your children is one of the greatest gifts you can give to them. So many things are happening all at once when you are reading books to your kids. The child’s imagination is being stimulated. They are listening to your voice and learning how to pronounce words. The illustrations or pictures help the child to link the words to an image and when you read the book over and over again, night after night, you will see how excited the child is as each page is turned and how they can point to everything thing they remember and even finish the sentence on the page for you. That is a memory skill. So make it a nightly routine to read to your children.
- What does literary success look like to you?
Getting books into the hands of as many children as possible is a success story for me because reading fuels imagination, expands vocabulary, it helps a child’s character development and it also teaches them how to form ideas and organize these ideas. The biggest plus is the bonding moment between child and parent, child and sibling, child and grandparent and child and aunt/uncle. All of these variations add to a young child’s mental growth.
All of these scenarios look like literary success to me.
- What is your inspiration in life and why?
This is such a great question. My inspiration for my first book was my dogs, Sugar & Cookie. Their chemistry is magical and although they are already nine years old, they still attract a lot of attention each and every day when I take them for a walk. People of all age groups stop to say hello and pet them.
My passion for writing and to see how children and parents react to my books inspires me to keep going. I love what I do and I cannot wait to wake up each day and work on my stories.
This is not work to me, it is absolute enjoyment.
Susan Marie Chapman on Amazon
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