How to Explain the Unexplainable

Editorial by Amy Koppelman wtriting for Publishing Perpectives

Four years ago, when my father-in-law was diagnosed with cancer, my children asked my husband and me so many questions, most of which we couldn't answer: "What is cancer? "Why does it happen?" "How is it diagnosed?" "How is it treated?" "Is it contagious?" I began Googling cancer books for children. There were several on the market, but they were either very childish (a story about a dinosaur's mother) and/or scary (pictures of tumors and children with bald heads). I was looking for a book that explained cancer, one that said: this is what cancer is, this is how cancer develops in a person's body, this is how it spreads, these are the ways to treat it and so on.
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Bonus Material: Is a Kids Book About Cancer Too Tough to Sell?
By Edward Nawotka

What would happen if someone I knew was suddenly stricken with cancer and I had to explain it to a child, what would I do? Apparently, calling a bookstore would be a bad idea. As Amy Koppelman explains in our lead editorial, few books exist to explain such traumatic topics to children in a forthright manner. War, terrorism, and disease are all difficult subjects that we want to shelter our children from as much as possible, so it's no surprise that even if the books do exist, there are few of them available on store shelves.
(read on ...)