Create, Self Publish, and Sell Children’s Picture Books

Because I work for Barnes & Noble.com, I constantly have an eye on the world of books, especially as it pertains to the online experience. Recently I ran across an interesting site called Big Universe that allows you to create your own children’s picture books. You can design your own layout, write free-form text, and choose from a surprisingly large (and beautiful) selection of imagery to put it all together. Then you can self publish your finished product on the site. It also allows you to connect with other aspiring children’s authors and other people in the publishing world.

The pool of artwork you can use seems to be quite extensive. Here are some sample pages from a few books that I found on the site:

It’s also an interesting place to look for new kids’ books. You can read books online that other users have created, or you can buy them in hard copy. You can browse by age or even by category, such as:

• Animals, birds & insects
• Humor
• Poetry
• Science & Technology
• Social Issues

You can even browse by language. I did a quick search for Hungarian books and got 11! Not bad.

As an information architect, I’m always happy to spot interesting navigation approaches. I like the site’s tabs in the top nav, which animate to show the type of action for that section when you hover over it. For example, here is what you see when you mouse over the Read tab:

As with all self-publishing sites, you should always read all the terms and conditions to understand who owns the rights to the content. From the quick look around their site, it looks like you can link to your book from your own website, but you don’t own the actual source. People who come to the site can buy your book, but it’s not clear to me how the profit model works.

I haven’t penned my first digital kids’ book, but I’m feeling inspired to try it out.

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