If the clever title of this new picture book release from children’s author Denette Fretz doesn’t grab your attention, then the cute cover certainly will.

I Want Your Smile, Crocodile is the latest release from the author who brought us Pirates on the Farm and Conrad and the Cowgirl Next Door. When you read titles like that you know you’re in for a treat, and Denette’s latest book does not disappoint. Meet Jack, the meerkat, who shares a distinctly human trait: he’s not happy with the way he looks. Now who can’t identify with this…

Surely if Jack could have crocodile’s smile, or porcupine’s spines, or elephant’s snout, he would be happier? Written in playful rhyme, I Want Your Smile, Crocodile follows Jack’s humorous journey to discovering a wonderful truth… he is perfect just the way God made him.

Here’s my author interview with Denette…

Denette, thank you so much for joining me! Let’s get the formal introduction out of the way. What does the bio on the back of the book say about you?

“Denette Fretz is the critically acclaimed author of two books in ‘The Next Door Series’ – Pirates on the Farm and Conrad and the Cowgirl Next Door. A perpetual doodler and songster, Fretz teaches elementary art and music in Medford, Oregon.”

Okay… now for two interesting and quirky facts about you that we won’t find on the back of your books…

I talk to a volleyball. I rescued Cheesy Bob from a school closet about 11 years ago, and he has been a classroom mascot and rule-teaching scapegoat ever since. (“If Cheesy Bob paints his neighbor instead of his paper, then…”) The kids love him. Cheesy Bob’s beach ball cousin, Cheddar Jack, is currently visiting from Monterey.

Skip the birthday cake and bake me birthday pie. And make it blackberry. Please.

Haha Denette, I love Cheesy Bob! Okay, what inspired you to write ‘I Want Your Smile, Crocodile’?

When you see God’s handiwork in someone you love, but he or she wishes to be someone else, it kind of breaks your heart. And I wonder how The Potter−who molded the clay for a purpose−feels. (See Isaiah 64:8 and Ephesians 2:10.) Jack’s struggle is everyone’s struggle: embracing whom God created each of us to be and praising him for it. (See Psalm 139:14.) This struggle is fiercer in our social-media-comparison era. In I Want Your Smile, Crocodile, I was inspired to write fun characters and pointed humor to convey to children that “God’s great heart designed each part” of them.

I love that Denette! Your two previous books, Pirates on the Farm and Conrad and the Cowgirl Next Door were written in prose. What made you switch to rhythm and rhyme for this title?

Once I had the rhyming title, “I Want Your Smile, Crocodile,” I researched more three-syllable zoo animals and correlated rhyming attributes such as, “Give me your swish, Jellyfish,” or “With spikes so fine, Porcupine.” When these characters were established, it was natural to hear protagonist Jack’s voice in rhyme−with a few short “prose breaks.” Also, I’m a singer, which helps with rhythm and rhyme. I’ll often lie in bed with “BAH dah-dah DAH dah” rhythms bothering my brain. (Hmm…that seems like a candidate for the “quirky facts” question.) Some of my first writing successes, way back in fifth and sixth grade, were in rhyme.

As someone who also loves to write in rhyme, I can identify with those ‘rhythms that bother the brain’! The illustrations by Jackie Urbanovic complement the text perfectly. Did you have any say in those?

Because I Want Your Smile, Crocodile has humor that is created when pictures and text are opposed, illustration suggestions were submitted with the original manuscript. Otherwise, some of the content would have been lost. For example, Jack’s words say:

“I want your smile, Crocodile.

Kids love your pointy chin.

If it were mine,

they’d stand in line…

and wait for me to grin.”

However, I didn’t want the corresponding illustration to show happy kids standing in line, so I proposed it show zoo goers scrambling away from Jack the Meerkat who is sporting a crocodile smile.

I could not be happier with Jackie’s humorous additions, text interpretations, colors, creative scene transitions, and her character creations. I especially love her portrayal of spunky Jack.

I couldn’t agree more, Denette… her illustrations are wonderful. Finally, what’s next from the pen of Denette Fretz?

Much of what I have written lately has been work related. I recently wrote the script for a Bible-themed musical and then directed it for 112 kids, ages three to six. I am back to penning prose in a simple, humorous manuscript…involving a cat. Also, I am optimistically writing more adventures for Jack, in hopes that readers love him as much as I do.

Well I’m sure they will Denette. Thank you so much for joining me today!

Connect with Denette Fretz.