Why You Should Read Your Children’s Book Manuscript Out Loud

Reading a story aloud is a powerful way to connect. For children, hearing a story builds language, fosters imagination, and creates memories. For adults, it sparks meaningful dialogue. As an author, hearing your story aloud offers a firsthand experience of what will resonate with our readers. 

Listening to a story aloud also invites you to consider how rhythm, repetition, pacing, and emotional tone can help form connections with your reader. The way your words sound is just as powerful as how they appear on the page. When rhythm and visuals work together in harmony, your story becomes unforgettable—captivating young readers’ eyes, ears, and hearts all at once.

In this blog, I will walk you through these read-aloud elements and how to shape them while seamlessly weaving them into your writing.

The Role of Rhythm 

While the plot of your children’s book is undeniably important, the rhythm of your words is most likely what will keep a child engaged. Children are naturally attuned to rhythm, hearing lullabies and nursery rhymes long before they can speak or read. 

Here are some tips for writing with rhythm: 

Read every draft out loud: If you find yourself stumbling over your words or feeling awkward saying them, your reader probably will too. Reading out loud allows you to adjust the flow of your writing in real time. 

 Vary sentence lengths: Short sentences create energy, while longer ones can slow the pace. 

Find the beats: Just like a song, good writing has a unique cadence that carries a reader (or listener) along. See if you can decipher the patterns in the way your words sound when spoken, and if this matches the tone of the characters or plot. 

To strengthen your rhythm skills, I highly recommend reading other children’s books aloud, whether to an audience or yourself. Here are a couple of my favourite books to read aloud that have lively rhythm: 

Repetition! Repetition!

Children love repetition—just ask any parent who has been begged to “read it again!” Repetition creates familiarity, and familiarity builds connection. When you use repeated words or phrases in your book, children quickly learn to anticipate what’s coming, even giving them the confidence to join in during read-alouds. 

Here are some books that showcase repetition in action:

Tips for effective repetition in your writing:

• Use for emphasis, not filler: Each repeated line should serve a purpose—building rhythm, reinforcing a theme, or inviting interaction. 
• Keep them short and sweet: Make your repeated phrases fun and easy for a child to anticipate. 
• Be intentional with placement: A refrain at the end of every page turn can be powerful, but too much repetition can feel forced

Perfecting the Pacing

Good pacing is what keeps a child from wandering off halfway through your story. It’s the rise and fall of energy, the build of suspense, and the pause before the page turn that makes them gasp or giggle. 

Think of the pace of your story like its heartbeat—when should it speed up or slow down? What does it sound like? What does it feel like? Here are some of my most-used tips for establishing your story’s pace:

• Utilize short and long sentences: Shorter sentences create a sense of urgency or speed, while longer ones allow for more reflection or description. 
• Include character dialogue (if applicable): Rapid-fire dialogue can excite, while longer speeches can slow things down. 
• Find where the speed varies: When reading your story out loud, be mindful of where you speed up or slow down. This can indicate whether not enough is happening, or if too much happens too quickly. 

Emotional Tone: Your Story’s Heart

At the end of the day, what children remember most aren’t the exact words—it’s how the story made them feel. 

As authors, we get to ask ourselves: What do I want children to feel when they hear this story read out loud? Do you want to spark laughter, offer comfort, ignite excitement, or build empowerment? The tone you choose shapes everything, from your word choice to the rhythm of your sentences to the way your illustrations complement the text.

Here are some tips for setting the right emotional tone:

• Choose words carefully: “Hug” feels tender; “squeeze” feels energetic.
• Match tone to purpose: A bedtime book needs softness; a classroom book might need energy.
• Use sensory language to deepen feeling. Words that tap into sound, touch, or movement pull children into the emotional world of your story more vividly. 

Reading Your Story Out Loud Matters 

One of the most powerful tools you have as a children’s book author is your voice. Reading your manuscript out loud isn’t just about catching typos or awkward phrasing—it’s about experiencing your story the way your audience will. 

If, after reading this blog post, you feel like you need to take a few steps back and make sure you’re truly writing your manuscript for children, that is all part of the process. In fact, it’s such an important aspect of writing a children’s book that I could write an entire post just about understanding and writing for children…

Oh, wait, I did! Check out Writing for Children: How to Understand Your Reader for an in-depth explanation of three ways to connect with the audience you’re writing for. 

Want Help Bringing Your Story to Life?

If you want your manuscript to truly come alive when read aloud, I invite you to join my free training How to Write a Picture Book Children Will Love (and Parents Will Buy!. You’ll learn everything about crafting rhythm, repetition, pacing, and emotional tone so your book not only entertains, but also creates lasting connections between you and your readers.

FAQs

Do I need to rhyme to create rhythm?  

Nope! While you certainly can use rhyming as a method of delivering rhythm, it can also be built through repetition, varied sentence length, and sound patterns. 

How can I test if my pacing works?

Read your story aloud to a child, a friend, or even yourself. Notice where energy dips or where you stumble over words—that’s where you can adjust.

Should I test my story on real readers before publishing?

Absolutely. You can share your story by reading it aloud or by sending it to your audience. Reading it aloud lets you see their genuine reactions in the moment, while sending it allows them to reflect and provide thoughtful feedback. Either way, you’ll gain valuable insights into how your story connects with readers.