An Apple executive who now writes children’s stories

Once upon a time there was a communications director who worked in a very important apple-shaped company. And after a long career of more than 33 years, he retired and started writing stories for children. and that’s how paco lara (Valls, Tarragona, 1956) abandoned Manzana back to Apple, its content creation tools and the Books app iPhone, iPad and Swordwhere you can find Emma’s stories, “a little Californian girl with Bueu genes”. He has just published his latest adventure, Emma and the lioness Anyawhere the protagonist and her friends will “learn to use the power of the magic word more to find an answer every time they have a problem and don’t know what to do».

In addition, there are already about fifteen titles dedicated to Emma, ​​who is nothing less than Lara’s granddaughter. “Since she was little, she constantly asked me to tell her stories. And in order to be able to invent a different story every day, I thought the best option was to create some characters, small animals, and put them every day in a new situation that they have to face and solve with Emma’s help,” he explains.

Emma, ​​who has already turned six years old, has an exuberant fantasy and creativity. “In our almost daily conversations, telling each other stories and playing at a distance, ideas constantly appear that end up in new stories. So she is almost a co-author, not just a source of inspiration,” says Lara. «His favorite line when faced with any incident or predicament of any of the characters we imagine in our conversations is: Don’t worry… We can fix it! And that determined and positive attitude, to never give up and try again as many times as necessary, permeates all of Emma’s stories.

Emma and the magic seed, Emma and water cherries, Emma and the cave of letters, Emma against garbage, Emma and the unicorn that couldn’t fly or Emma and the spell of the mocking witch are some of the stories available for free download. In many of them, the plot is a way to raise the awareness of care for nature among the little ones, as well as the elders who read them. “When Emma was born, my concern for nature and the environment increased. For the planet to have a future, you must love it and take care of it, because today there is no other planet on which Emma, ​​her generation and those who follow can live and enjoy it,” recalls the author. All titles also try to convey values, knowledge and useful resources to learn, grow and be happier.

Emma always looks forward to summer and Christmas to jump from the Pacific coast to the mouth of the Vigo River, where her roots are. His mother is an engineer Miriam Pena, a Galician from Bueu, named by the American organization Women 2.0 as one of the twelve best engineers in Silicon Valley to follow. In order to save the nine-hour difference between Spain and California, Paco Lara thought of recording the stories on a podcast, so he could listen to them when he went to sleep. They are now available on Apple Podcast, Spotify and other platforms.

But it didn’t stop there. «As a next step, I thought it would be good to make a drawing app for girls and boys who follow Emma’s stories They could draw pictures of the characters and learn to write their names. I started studying how to make iOS apps (for iPhone and iPad) and from there the My Drawings app was born,” he says. Then he published the series Learning to read with Emma and her friends, a simple resource for children who know Emma’s stories to practice their first steps in reading accompanied by their elders: «These are very short and free booklets, available in Spanish and English. With very simple words and expressions supported by illustrations. The goal is to keep toddlers focused so they can put their progress into practice by devoting a short amount of time to each reading session. Even if they struggle to read any of the eight pages, the brevity makes it easy for them to stay engaged in the reading activity until the booklet is finished.”

Lara’s tools for creating books, recording her reading, and creating apps—be it writing, editing, illustrating, layout, podcasting, programming, and even publishing—are a Mac computer and an iPad with Apple Pencil. “The only thing I add to that is the Procreate app for the iPad, which is fantastic for drawing, painting and creating illustrations, and it only costs 16 euros,” he explains. Books are written and compiled using the Pages word-editing app, included with every Mac, iPad, and iPhone. Artwork is created on the iPad with Procreate and Apple Pencil, then pasted directly onto the pages, which he mocks up with Pages. From the same application, you can submit books for publication in Apple Books / Apple Books stores. As for podcasts, he uses Apple’s GarageBand application, also free, to record and edit the reading of stories.

Children’s literature is not the only field that Lara has trodden, and she also published What is that tree?, an interactive guide to meeting and identifying dozens of species. “While walking around my city, I can predict the names of many streets, squares, monuments, and even unique buildings. But one day I realized that I was almost completely ignorant of the names of the trees I encountered on the way,” explains the author. With descriptive sheets, photo galleries, quizzes for readers to test their knowledge, and an extensive glossary, as well as an interactive table that lets you select trees by leaf shape, the book has its own relationship in the app of the same title. available for iPhone, which allows you to play to identify trees.

MundiRetos, an application that helps to get to know and learn thousands of facts about different geographical areas through entertainment (there are versions for Spain, the European Union and America, and the one for Africa is being completed); Sanitometer, to control the expiry date of medicines and health products and manage the list of their replacements; and Expiration Meter, for viewing food expiration dates, are other free apps developed by Paco Lara.

He uses a Mac and the Xcode program to create applications. “It’s a very complete application programming environment and it’s free too. Not only does it allow apps to be designed and programmed, but they can also be submitted to Apple once they’re complete for publication on the App Store,” says Lara, who encourages anyone drawn to book and app creation to give it a try: “Knowledge to learn and practice with this tools can be found in the free manuals available in the Apple Books store itself, and in resources and annotated step-by-step examples for developing applications offered on the web for Apple developers (Apple Developer) ».