Books with a Cherry on Top - Page 2

"I was just getting really tired of people's negativity," she said of the catalyst to her publishing burst. "There's so much discord in the world, people forget how beautiful life can be."

That is the unfailingly upbeat rhythm behind Why Am I?, a delightful philosophical jaunt for young existentialists. The book, starring a visually optimistic bunny rabbit, is illustrated by Serbian graphic designer and illustrator Bojana Stojanovic, whom Cherry compares to a renowned mid-century Disney artist in citing "a very Eyvind Earle sense to her illustration." After the author noticed that similarity in her work, for the book she says Stojanovic "incorporated even more of that style."

Capri wrote the poems that comprise The Wheel of the Year years ago and hired Sneha Paradeshi, fresh out of the MIT Institute of Design, to illustrate. Organized by the four seasons, it rhapsodizes in friendly language about such pleasures as flowers, birds, holidays, sunsets, shopping, and one less pleasurable experience from an adult standpoint—earthquakes. The author draws a very direct line to the book from the Little Golden Books series of her youth and A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson.

"I'm not doing this to sell books," Cherry admits, explaining, "I just wanted them all to be written."

In fact, the urge to publish her new books was similar to the urge that led her to move her advice column to CA-Modern from it's previous roosts in Bachelor Pad and Tiki magazines.

"I realized I really wanted to focus on family-friendly lifestyle," she said with an assertive nod of her signature crimson mane. At the end of the day, however, "I just want to live in a quiet, happy place where homes are neat and beautiful and all the cocktails are lined up in a row."

To order any of Cherry Capri's new books, visit www.futurahouse.com.