Why I Don't Write Children's Literature by Gary Soto

neighbors’ stray snubbed me. I said hello to an elderly gent who got around with ski poles; his eyes were leaky as faucets and he didn’t strain to lift his head in my direction. The normally friendly postal carrier, Carolina, drove right past me. Birds jumped into bushes and hid. Cats hissed and showed me their fangs. Had they all heard of my novel?
    Later, driving around Berkeley, I noticed that I never got a green light. When I gazed in the rearview mirror, I noticed parking enforcement following me. And were those unmarked squad cars stopped at the corners?
    Had the reviewer read the right book? If he had, the critical egghead would have been forced to report positive findings, for there was much mirth in what I wrote. He might have used the words “daring,” “quick-witted,” and “tender,” or even “Get outta here!” “Get outta here!” would have meant that I had caught the right feel in the novel, my fictional couple coming together after many years apart. There was symbolism at work here: he, skinny and dedicated to poetry; she, slightly chubby and caught up in the consumer world.
    I faulted myself, though. The back of the book sported no glowing recommendations. I fumed like a factory, brooding on how James Patterson, Cormac McCarthy, and John Grisham always get really good blurbs. Bestsellers rack up notices such as “slyly comic” (that’s me too), “exceptional moral enchantment” (look on page 45, for Pete’s sake!), “astute” (my characters pay attention to their follies), “lavish” (two lovers in a public hot tub on page 87), and “expertly controlled” (the miracle of Wite-Out when you’re composing on an old-school typewriter).
    The heavy hitters in the literary world harvest raves, while I, a lowly poet like Silver Mendez, gleaned this review: a single paragraph of five sentences. Plus, the reviewer was anonymous — probably hiding in a state college where good brains go to committee meetings and die.
    â€œSee!” my wife scolded after two days of pouting.
    â€œSee what?” I asked, a brewski in my paw.
    â€œNever, ever begin a novel with a bra — I told you that. But did you listen?” Red-faced from kitchen work, she reprimanded me while stirring a hearty, three-bean soup with a large spoon, an action that had her bottom wiggling like a hula girl’s.
    I followed the wiggling, liked what I saw, and looked down her blouse. Then I licked my lips for another beer. Thus inspired, I began to make notes for a sequel: Amnesia in a Republican County. This time around I would write my own blurb on the back (unsigned), which would rave, in part, “Gary Soto has blended comedy and pathos; this book is a sharp-eyed romp, an academic comedy about politics and political correctness.”
    Like Poetry Lover, this novel would involve love and its many deceptions. On page three, the female protagonist, the hot-tempered wife of a Baptist college president, would scold skinny Silver Mendez, “And ‘motherfucker’ ain’t a cuss word?”
    And, darn it, I couldn’t help but write, “In seconds, her lacy bra hit the floor: two large gifts were presented to him . . .”
    Not surprisingly, this book received not a single review.

WELLS, ENGLAND
    My wife and I were in London for a week before we left by train for Bath, a pretty and touristy town known for its curative waters. According to tradition, you sip from a ladle of spring water and are healed. I drank from the ladle, made a sour face, and immediately thought of ale: a pint of ale could make it all better.
    We stayed at a B&B on the famous Royal Crescent, slept in a frilly bed, ate our daily English breakfast, which included tomatoes and kippers, and strolled in the mist, for it was early April, still cold, still short on the supply of sunlight. There were reports of snow, but we saw neither flurries nor a