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Fair SSHS senior debuts her children’s book
What started as a challenge with her best friend has led one South Side High School senior to becoming a published author.
In 10th grade, Dylan Rose Rheingold’s friend, Connor, challenged her to write a book when he decided he was going to do the same. After a few months, her friend had thrown in the towel, but Rheingold kept working.
By 11th grade, she had a rough draft of her book, “Is This My Home?” More of an artist than an author, Rheingold had illustrated the entire thing as well.
“The main character is a little bluebird called Baby Bo,” Rheingold said. “He travels to all these national monuments through Europe.”
Bo is looking for his home, Rheingold explained. But along the way, he learns about different monuments in different countries in Europe.
Rheingold put a lot of work into the book. She spent many nights and weekends — and sacrificed her participation in Red and Blue last year — to finish what she started.
“Publishing was the tricky part,” she said. “After researching various publishers, nine out of 10 wouldn’t take solicited books, because it’s all run through agents. Getting an agent for a book is just as expensive as publishing it yourself. And it’s just as hard to find a good agent as to get a book published.”
After her search, Rheingold decided to publish the book herself.
“In the beginning, I’m not sure [my parents] thought I was going to follow through with it,” she said. “Because this was very time consuming, and now I know why most 17-year-olds don’t have published books.”
Rheingold’s book isn’t publicly available yet. But she will be doing readings at the Rockville Centre Library, Jacob’s Ladder Preschool (at Central Synagogue) and for the class of Ms. Ebel at the Hewitt School, one of Rheingold’s former teachers.
As a senior, Rheingold has been applying to many colleges, with a focus on art. Having written, illustrated and published a book has given her quite a leg-up, she said.
Rheingold said she wants to major in both art and business, and is looking at Northeastern University and Syracuse University. Many of the people she’s spoken to at colleges, after seeing her book, have asked if she wanted to become an professional illustrator.
“A lot of the [college] representatives I met with were surprised,” she said. “When someone asks you what you did over the summer and you pull out a book, they look at you funny.”
