So, Word Documents weren’t exactly my first format of writing.

I was a self illustrated, children’s book author before I moved on in my career.

So, today I’ve decided to share the remains of that illustrious time before I turned 12 for your enjoyment.

Hope my small self turns out to be as entertaining to you as to my siblings and me. 🙂

(This might get a little long, so buckle up… sit back… get some cookies… whatever)

Presenting highlights of my masterpieces:

 

ROSey And The bere

ParT 1

So the story on the “Part 1” bit is that Squink wrote a book that was about her, underlined with “Part 2”. I asked where part 1 was and she kindly informed me that I was writing it.

I thought that a pretty good opening hook. Though my prize of that page was the fall leaves. And the bear peeking out inconspicuously from behind the tree.

 

*gasp*

After I was cat by the evil bere, he brought me to his cave. Where I languished until Daniel happened to notice that I was gone.

Cue the Indiana Jones music and my dad heroically questing after me.

 

Aaawww…

Man, that bere really had it coming.

So Dad brought me home to Mom and we got a new bere-skin rug. *nod* True story.

 

And, this next bit is what required most of the abridging. I was into drawing comics for a bit and decided to write my own *he-hem* version of Veggietales. Starring notably smaller fruits and veggies.

My all star cast consisted of PJ the Pea, Terry the Cherry, Benny the Blueberry, Rose the Rosehip and the ambiguous “Bean”.

And later on their appropriately alliterated little siblings.

And the bullies: Squish the Squash, Jack the Pumpkin, Brenda the Blueberry and a girl grape who didn’t seem to have merited a name.

This progressed into a hefty, three (almost four) volume series.

The first:

Involving a lovely moral, cliched bullies and a school with very strange rules.

So the opening premise is that there will be a school play of knights and dragons. The actors will get *gasp* ten whole dollars!

Of course, the giant squashes must bully PJ about this.

Yes, because bullies are always so possessive of school play roles. (??)

So PJ and co. do well, but the bullies add a plot twist to the script and it looks like the teacher is favoring them. This breaks our heroes’ little veggie hearts and PJ goes home to his family.

Yes, I know his big sister looks like an invading giant the way I drew her. It was an accident. But I insisted I did it on purpose under the artistic flag of “perspective”.

So, his big sister Petal (a flower person) relates her similar experience and says that PJ should just be nice to the bullies. PJ comes up with a master plan and over-prepares everyone to help the bullies in any way possible.

Turns out that Brenda, who’s in band with Rose, comes in and rips her hat on a trombone (she’s talented like that). Rose willingly fixes it and, much to her horror, Brenda goes straight to the principal’s office.

But everything is not as it seems… *wink*

That’s… um… quite a large volume for stage audition rules… 😕

 

The dramatic entrance with the infuriated principal.

Followed by the teacher peach (ha! I never noticed that pun…) telling Benny to get everyone because they’re on for acting. A nice little jab at PJ’s math weakness here…

A successful play follows and Petal is proud of PJ.

Lovely moral gotten across. Mission accomplished. Series over, right?

Wrong. Things go a little downhill from here…

Enter “Kidnap! In Veggietown”

Which involves an extremely large grudge over $10, more than its fair share of chloroform and a “korn” obsessed with Ks.

I lost the front page… sorry.

We open on the bullies still stewing about losing the play roles and money, then going and finding a kidnapper in the phone book with the intent of “REVENGE!”

His nonchalant bad-guy stance is great.

I told you he was obsessed with Ks. *nods to his “kastle”* Case in point.

I included a condescending footnote defining chloroform to those uneducated as to its wonders.

Keep in mind that all this debacle is over the matter of $10…

 

After pinning Terry with a plunger gun and tying up Rose, they tell Terry to deliver a message and then knock them both out.

There are a few pages where Petal finds Terry and brings her home. PJ proceeds to freak out and jump on Terry.

Because, sorry, our friend just isn’t worth ten dollars. We’ll have to think of something else.

And of course Petal and PJ can’t go to the Rosehips. They have to send their kid sister, Posy, in a lightning storm.

Note our heroic PJ basking in the glow of the fire inside.

Posy delivers the letter and spends the night at the Rosehips with Rowan, Rose’s brother. In the morning she and he decide to read Posy’s copy (?) of Petal’s letter.

This incites a revolution among the little siblings of all of our heroes and, unbeknownst to any of the people in town, they quest off to rescue Rose.

(Rowan and Posy retrieve their friends: Perry the Cherry, Bonnie the Blueberry and Bobby the Bean)

Because bad guys just kidnap people, then proceed to take a nap. All at once.

Rowan proceeds to rappel, Mission Impossible style, down into the open-roofed base, get his sister in the loop with him and wake up the bullies by accident.

Despite the fact that a small child/cherry just got knocked off the edge of a high building, Rose looks bored with this whole endeavor.

Quite the adventure.

 

Wait, there’s a ladder all of a sudden?

This progresses into a fight scene that… um… is a little far fetched.

Bonnie spins around and her braids smack the two girl bullies away. Rowan headbutts Kent in the stomach. Posy (the pea, mind you) whips Jack (the pumpkin) with her pigtails and he falls off the roof.

And Bobby takes the cake for the most impressive move.

A string bean. Dropkicking a butternut squash. Yeeeaaah….

So the fight is over. Our heroes win. Cue triumphant return. (After a detour to fish out Perry)

I realized after a bit that I’d forgotten Perry. So there was an addendum to show him getting in trouble because his mom didn’t believe him.

 

And the most conceptually shaky of the trilogy…

War in Veggietown

Just… watch.

 

Skip to the next day, where Terry sees a newspaper.

Squash City has declared war on Veggietown. Two towns are declaring war on each other.

But it gets better.

The only ones drafted into the army seem to be the schoolchildren.

Benny attempts to follow PJs orders, but is shot.

Enter a character I later described as “Harrison Ford as a cucumber”.

He rescues Benny and takes the bullet out of him, all the while answering PJs questions with clipped, cool answers. It is revealed that the mysterious cucumber’s name is Luke.

He claims he has medical training, but his cure for a bullet wound was a bandaid. (PJ seemed quite impressed though. He had a “?!” over his head. Band aid? What sorcery is this?)

Wow. Still hurting for those ten bucks, are we?

After some heart-rending images of the little veggies missing their big siblings, they all go for a walk and, of course, are kidnapped.

Our heroes see the newspaper and proceed to have a conversation about when they should rescue their siblings. But Petal, Benny and Luke seem to be the only ones with time in their busy schedules to rescue their family members, so they come up with a master plan.

Which involves… wait for it… kidnapping.

*gasp* Whoa! Such a new element!

So, after said kidnapping, Petal impersonates a henchman named Nightshade.

I love how I always referred to the SUPER SECRET PLAN in all caps.

Petal finds out the SUPER SECRET PLAN and then escapes…

…of course, forcing the enemy to surrender.

Yay! Happy ending!

Aww… 

Wait… Luke has a little brother now?

Anyway, that was the end of the completed Veggietown saga.

There was another one involving a tabasco sauce-breathing dragonfruit. It kidnaps (man, I just can’t leave that element alone, can I?)  PJ and Terry. Because they haven’t been kidnapped yet and were feeling left out.

They were trapped in a tower with Benn Gunn as a Garlic and… I left it there.

Well, I’ll leave that up to you. Probably more kidnapping, more ten dollar grudges and chloroform.

Hope you enjoyed a peek into the writefury’s writing past!

What were your little kid projects? Which Veggietown was your favorite? 😛

Please comment!

~writefury