According to E-how, there’s a certain technique to writing a dedication in your book. I never knew that. I thought you just wrote from the heart, offering up your firstborn child to your agent for selling the book. But E-how offers six steps to writing that dedication, along with tips and warnings! Following that format, I came up with this:
1. Make a list of who helped you or inspired you in writing the book. Include close family and friends, editors and fellow writers. Also include historical figures, if applicable.
Oh boy. That’s going to be a long list. So many people inspired me, from my first picture book author (Three Little Kittens) to the book I’m currently reading (The Zombie Survival Guide). I’d like to thank them all but that would take up all the pages in the book.
I’d also like to thank my family—my husband and kids for letting me neglect them so I could fiddle around on the computer. And my mom for giving birth to me and my creativity. And my dad for paying for my orthodonture and college. And all my aunts and uncles and once-removed relatives for buying my book if I mentioned them in the dedication.
And to historical figures like Amelia Earhart and Bonnie Parker and Carolyn Keene (oh, she wasn’t real?) and all the women who took part in the women’s suffrage movement, and Margaret Sanger, and a bunch more, but I’ve forgotten their names.
- Read some dedications by your favorite authors. Take notes on how they begin their works.
These are kind of inspiring:
Larry McMurtry wrote in The Desert Rose: “To Leslie, for the use of her goat.”
Helen M Winslow dedicated "Concerning Cats" to” “The Pretty Lady who never betrayed a secret, broke a promise, or proved an unfaithful friend; who had all the virtues and none of the failings of her sex”—her cat.
Cornell Woolrich dedicated The Bride Wore Black to “Remington Portable No. NC69411.”
And from anonymous: “To my Mum, you might not want to read this, it gets gory and sexual in the middle parts of the book.”
Determine the style of dedication you want to write. A dedication can be a short chapter explaining how the idea for the book came about or it can be as short and simple as "To my ma."
I like the poetry and simplicity of “To my ma.” I’m going with that.
I'll bet Cornell Woolrich's Remington Portable No. NC69411 was really touched by that dedication.
Posted by: Michael A. Black | June 07, 2012 at 12:56 PM
I thought about dedicating my book to my morning latte....
Posted by: penny warner | June 07, 2012 at 05:08 PM
Very funny as usual. Delicious to read.
Rita
Posted by: rita lakin | June 07, 2012 at 10:52 PM