Jilanne Hoffmann - Award-Winning Children's Book Author and Lego Enthusiast
- litkidsmagazine
- Jul 10
- 4 min read
Jilanne Hoffmann is an award-winning children’s book author who loves building with Lego and going on hikes with her family and dog, Wrigley. Her books include her middle grade novel, HeartLand; a chapter book, The Gold Rush: Shifting Sands and Dreams of Gold; and two nonfiction picture books, The Ocean’s Heart: The Tiny Creatures Essential to Life and A River of Dust: The Life-Giving Link Between North Africa and the Amazon. She’s also the author of two board books, Happy Camper and The Honey Bear Hive. Jilanne lives in San Francisco.
1. If you could travel anywhere in the world to do your work, where would you go?
I have ADHD, so if I were to travel to write, I would be distracted by all of the new things I’d be seeing while traveling. So I need to surround myself with the familiar so I can travel to the world inside my stories. That’s how I focus best.
2. If you could pick a single fruit to create a story around, what would it be?
It’s interesting that you ask this question, because I did that with HeartLand, my middle grade novel. I chose the pineapple. If you read the book and then the acknowledgements at the end of the story, you’ll find out why.
3. Why did you begin writing?
As a kid, I always liked to tell stories, embellishing the truth. I didn’t think of it as lying at the time. I always just wanted to tell a better story. But writing stories is far better than lying in real life. So I channeled my wanting to create my own version of the truth in my stories. But when I write nonfiction, I focus on true details to show how nature doesn’t need any embellishing. Our planet is filled with beautiful and surprising things.
4. What is something in your field that you don't yet know how to do, but you would like to learn?
I have never written a mystery, so I’m setting my sights on that for my next novel. Fingers crossed that it turns out well!
5. Do you prefer to work alone or with others?
When I’m writing, I need to work alone. But I always need my community of writers and illustrators to talk to when I need to have my work critiqued, so I can make my stories better. I love my writing groups and critique partners. They not only give me honest and careful feedback, but they also support me when I’m getting rejections from editors or when I feel like I just can’t figure out what to do with a story.
6. What is the hardest part of your job?
Finishing a story and letting it go. I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist, so I’m trying to learn how to let things go. If you want perfection, you’ll never finish anything. So at some point, you have to say “good enough.” That’s one reason why I like deadlines. I’m forced to send something to my agent or editor.
7. What part of your job do you have the most fun doing?
I love disappearing into my characters’ world. It’s great fun to spin a story out of thin air. It feels magical. And sometimes I look at a sentence and love it and wonder where it came from. Part of the magic is not knowing how things are going to turn out until the light bulb turns on, and I suddenly know how the story needs to end.
8. What did you like to write and read as a kid?
My parents worked paying jobs and also worked a small farm, so they didn’t have money or time to spend on books. I received secondhand books from one of my mom’s friends. They were Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys and a series about talking animals that was very nature-focused. One of my favorite picture books was a book of poems about the seasons. It also had magical, fascinating elements like fairies and odd humans who disappeared into the sea. I wrote little snippets of poetry and fantastical stories just to entertain myself. I never showed them to anyone.
9. What was your favorite subject in school?
I was never a fast reader, but was always good at math. So I ended up becoming an engineer before I turned to writing. I should have paid attention to the fact that I really loved reading, even though I didn’t think I was very “good” at it, because of my slowness.
10. Would you and your main character get along?
As I mention in the author’s note to HeartLand, the main character has an overactive mind, like mine. She also loves building things with Lego, loves dogs, and ends up loving the woods, too. So I think we’d get along just fine.
11. Have pets ever gotten in the way of your writing?
I have a dog named Wrigley who sleeps under my desk when I’m writing. But when she decides it’s time to take a walk, she stares at me without blinking. If I ignore her, she lets out a high-pitched whine that I can’t ignore. It doesn’t matter if I’m in the middle of writing a scene. That whine destroys my concentration, LOL.
12. What are common traps for new authors?
New authors tend to compare their work to others and think they’ll never be good enough. An author, actually every artist, just needs to focus on improving their art and not on what everyone else is doing. That said, it’s important to study the work of masters to improve your own work. But most of all, it’s important to enjoy the process of creating something out of nothing. To me, that’s the key to being happy as an artist.
13. If you had to describe yourself in just three words, what would those be?
Tigger-esque, optimistic, curious.
Jilanne, congratulations on the release of your lovable new novel, HeartLand! Thank you for taking the time to discuss writing craft and your inspiration with us. Please follow Jilanne on social media and check out her novel, HeartLand, available in our Bookshop. Keep shining!
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