Here are some questions Carmen is frequently asked about writing.

Do you write by hand or do you use a computer?
Because I have a connection between my three H’s, I write my first draft by hand. My three H’s are: My Head with my thoughts, my Heart with my feelings, my Hand puts it all down.
When I am writing the first draft, I don’t worry about spelling. I take off the hat of my Dr. Speller Lego doll, and put her to sleep. I also blindfold my monkey. My monkey is my editor! I blindfold him when I hear him saying, “I’m don’t like what you’re writing. I won’t buy this.” It isn’t true that my editor is saying that, but I think he will say it. But this is my first draft. My editor won’t see my first draft.
When I am done writing my first draft in a yellow pad, I go to the computer and type my story. As I do so, I make more changes. Then I wake up Dr. Speller, fix the misspelled words, and then I rewrite and rewrite and rewrite.
I could fill up a truck with rewrites of any of my books.
An extremely important step in this process is my writing group. They are my lifesavers. Without them I wouldn’t be able to be published today. They tell me when a scene is not working, when a character is not speaking the way a person her age would, when they can’t picture the place where the story is taking place. They are hard on me, but I prefer for them to tell me than hearing it from my editor.
When I feel that the story is as perfect as I can make it, I submit it to my editor.

Did you like the illustrations?
I do! But I still think it is important for the author to see the illustrations before they are published. That was particularly useful for me with Cesar. David Diaz drew Cesar’s teacher as a man. When I saw the error, I told my editor that it was supposed to be a woman. I laughed when I saw the illustration again – David had left the character in place but this time, it was wearing a dress!
For In The Shade Of The Nispero Tree Teresa’s only dress without a bow was white. Raúl Colón illustrated her with a pink dress. But because I saw the illustration early enough, instead of asking him to change the color of her dress which I liked, I changed the text--just one word, from “white” to “pink.”
I wasn’t as lucky with Juan Bobo. A literal Spanish version can be found in the back of the book. I wanted to translate sugarcane syrup as “melao,” the word we use in Puerto Rico. The correct word is melado, but we say melao. Fearing that other spanish-speaking wouldn’t understand what I was saying, I called it guarapo, which is not quite the same thing because the guarapo is more liquid than melao. But when the book came, I saw that Ernesto Ramos had used the word “MELAO” in one of his illustrations. If only I had known, I would have used Melao.
I love, love, love the illustrations in Juan Bobo. But I had another problem with them.
Traditionally, the Puerto Rican Juan Bobo hasn’t been as dark as Ernesto Ramos painted him. I had problems with this for two reasons: Because I didn’t know how Puerto Rican were going to react when they saw a different Juan Bobo, and because I was afraid that the African American community would think that we were poking fun of their culture.
But then my editor asked Ernesto why he had made Juan Bobo so dark. Ernesto said that, as a little boy, that was the way his mind pictured Juan Bobo. Now I don’t know if Ernesto was black or not. (Ernesto died before the book was out). But who are we to tell a young mind how to see a folk character? I applaud Ernesto for illustrating our glorious Juan Bobo the way he saw it. It gives a good story to tell.
By the way, some experts claim that the Juan Bobo stories originated among the Arabs who lived in Spain. So, Juan Bobo shouldn’t be all that pale.