Revealing your characters (real ones, of course) that are integral to your creative nonfiction piece is another technique that is often used to breath life into your characters. Use information from research to reveal their personalities, mannerisms, appearances or pet peeves. This will keep the reader engaged and also bring your character to life for the reader. Here is where anecdotes can be helpful to illustrate character traits. How did your character react in a certain situation, what did they say, etc.?
Dialogue in creative nonfiction is used to convey accurate in- formation as well as to connect the reader to the person in the story. Any quotes that reveal a sense of humor in the subject are especially important when writing creative nonfiction for children.
The ending of your story or book should be used to sum up the book's content. This can be done in a serious manner or humorously depending always on the tone you want to convey and the topic of your piece. Any nonficton topic is bound to have changes and new developments in the future. This is especially an important element that should be made clear to the young reader.
The creative nonfiction author for children has the challenge of using their research to tell a story while presenting factual information to the reader in a way that will engage and inform the reader and be as exciting to read as any novel.
Happy Writing!!
Publishing Research Quarterly, Fall 91, Vol.7 Issue 3, p47, Giblin, James Cross
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