Elaina Rae Eskins, a communications sciences and disorders senior, never dreamed a simple poem she came up with while gazing at the moon would start a year’s journey of excitement.
“When I was younger, I used to write all of these short stories, and I always dreamed of becoming an author, but I never thought it would happen this early in my career,” Eskins said.
As of December 2018, she is an author of the children’s book, “Stay Awake, Moon!”
Eskins’ journey started when she read the poem to her roommate, who said that her poem is a great start of a children’s book and connected her with Abigail Cloud, an English professor and the editor-in-chief of Mid-American Review.
From there, Eskins and Cloud met several times over the course of the spring 2018 semester. Cloud showed Eskins the techniques to reword things into the appropriate format according to the creative writing process.
“I was surprised that (Cloud) was willing to take the time and help me write this book; I wasn’t even a part of the creative writing program,” Eskins said. “As the editor-in-chief of Mid-American Review, along with being a professor, she already had a lot on her plate, and still she was very patient with me.”
Once the writing process finished Eskins turned to her close friend and graduate, Greta Brubaker, for the illustrating process. Brubaker illustrated the book just as a favor for her friend.
“We were in her (Brubaker’s) apartment at the time, and the place was covered in rough drafts of potential illustrations for the book; we went through a few until, finally, we decided on one design,” Eskins said with a grin.
After the illustrating process Cloud introduced Eskins to the tool that would help with the final touches: Blurb.
Blurb is a publishing website that helps writers get their pieces publicized. It is through this website Eskins and Cloud picked the font, designs and final edits of the book. In December 2018 “Stay Awake, Moon!” was officially available to the public.
Eskins said her goal for her career is to help make speech therapy more affordable for all. “Stay Awake, Moon!” can be used as a tool to assist kids in speech therapy. Eskins and Brubaker have gone to several events promoting the book, including readings at local schools. As of Feb. 15, the book has nearly sold 100 copies.
To support Eskins or buy a copy of the book, students can like the “Stay Awake, Moon!” Facebook page.
