Meet Denyse Waissbluth

Author Cookie Boyle met up with Denyse Waissbluth, author of Teatime Around the World appropriately, at a tea shop. 

Her first children’s book has received wide praise and has been reprinted several times. Denyse and I share a love of travel and writing about other countries, so I was especially interested in hearing how she captures the nuances of other cultures. I was also curious about her writing process for a children’s book, which needs to weave words with illustrations. Denyse’s perspectives were insightful and inspiring and, I believe, helpful for any aspiring author.

Her second children’s book, Soup’s On Around The World, is available in October, 2025. 

Denyse, can you tell us about your first book?

Teatime Around the World is an illustrated children's picture book for those in kindergarten to Grade Two. It explores how tea is celebrated and recognized around the world through various traditions, cultures and ingredients.

What inspired you to write a book about tea?

It was inspired by my personal love of tea, which started on a farm in rural Manitoba. My grandparents had an old wooden table and I had 16 aunts and uncles and 25 cousins and we were always there eating my grandma's great food and sharing a pot of regular black tea. But it showed me that tea was a gateway to welcoming and an invitation to hospitality. As I got older, I started to travel and I noticed that different countries and cultures had their own teas. So I started doing research on the ways that countries enjoyed and celebrated tea and had enough material that I decided I wanted to turn it into a book for kids. 


Why a book for kids? 

When I started writing the book, I was a new mom. So I think that was a personal way for me to write something that I could share with my son as he got older. Children welcome everything and they celebrate everything and everything is meaningful, so I thought children were a really nice audience for talking about that story of inclusion and diversity and welcoming and fun.

And when you were writing it, what was your process?  

I have traveled a lot, so I had experienced a lot of tea, but I had done my master's degree just a few years prior in international communications. There was a three-week period when I was in China and I did my thesis on, basically, understanding Chinese culture through tea. So I had a lot of history or academic knowledge on tea and tea traditions and cultures. At the time, I was also going through a tea sommelier certification, so I was learning about tea history and tea types. So the manuscript came after years of research that I was doing, not knowing I would eventually turn into a book. 

For children's books, working with an illustrator is so important. So how did you find your illustrator and what was that experience like? 

My publishers found the illustrator — based on the topic and that they had worked with her before. And also it was a really nice coincidence that the illustrator, Chelsea O’Bryne used to work at the Granville Island Tea shop, when she was a student at Emily Carr University of Art and Design. So, for her, it was also quite a personal project.

What did you learn through the process of manuscript and illustration development?

One of the biggest learnings through both the text as well as the illustrations was how nuanced it is, when you’re talking about someone else's culture or story. The publishers hired a cultural expert who looked at every word and every element of the illustrations. We probably spent about five months reviewing it all — everything from the colours that we use to how people were seated, if they had their legs crossed, the colour of their scarves, how tea was positioned, or how men and women were sitting across each other. It was really enlightening too and reminded me that I’m telling someone’s story, so there's a heightened responsibility, especially when you're sharing it with children. 

Was there any one tradition around tea that was more surprising to you than another? 

There were some beautiful ones that I discovered. In Pakistan they use baking soda in their tea to make it almost pink. 
Another one that struck me was Morocco where children are invited and encouraged to take part in tea. There, you do three servings, and each of them has a very special meaning. But I think what struck me was that all the elements, no matter where they were, how different, are all really meaningful. Nothing was just haphazard. It was all quite purposeful. 

And how was writing for that age? Did you read a lot of children's books to understand the language level? 

Yes, so because I was reading to my new son, I would choose books in that age range. I understood the type of language to use, but also the balance between making the story interesting and relevant for the child. However, usually at that age, it's a grown up reading to them, so the adult has to be okay reading the same story 10 times. 

How did you balance the two audiences for your book?

Really, the book is for the children, but ideally, it's a book that a grown up would enjoy reading to them. The story is tied together basically through a poem. It's a rhyming poem that is just a few words each on each page that collectively tells a story about tea around the world. And then on some pages there are side bars, they are very short — about 30 to 50 words — that give a little bit more background, and I've heard it’s the reason it works well from grown ups. The children will happily sit through the poetry and then each time they read it, the grown ups will choose maybe one or two sidebars to dive into. So the reader can make the story as long or as short as they want. The child or the grown up can choose which page they want to read more about, and then it can be kind of built upon over time. 

What have you heard from readers of your book that surprised you? 


I’ve done some readings for school-aged children online, or in person. And what I notice is that children can see themselves and their families in the stories. And although some of them may know tea, what I found is they relate it to food, which makes it meaningful and fun. I recently did a reading to a Grade One class and I kept the information quite light, but what surprised me was that they really wanted to dive in. They wanted to talk about cultures and differences, and it reinforced how intelligent and how sophisticated even little children are. They're great conversationalists and they can make great meaning out of things. 

When you see your book on a bookstore shelf, what are you most proud of?

I think it tells the story of something that's quite beautiful. I think there's so much of what's different about people, and even though teas are celebrated differently, it's really uniting, and it's comforting.

Has the response to the book surprised you? 

Yes. It’s in English only, so it’s selling well in Canada, the US, Australia and the UK. But I’ve also received a few emails from people in Japan. And I’m starting to get tagged on social media from people in Tehran. 

And your second book is about to be published. Tell us about that. 

My second children's book is called Soup’s On Around the World. I was able to work with the same illustrator. It has the same kind of thematic poetry with some sidebars. It’s a good way to introduce children to different foods in different contexts. 

Are there any recipes included?

Yes, there are only two recipes because we didn't want to choose favourites among the cultures. One is a personal one that I shared, which is my grandmother's recipe and then the illustrator shared a recipe of her family as well. 

Denyse, thank you for taking the time to meet with us. Any final thoughts you’d like to share?

Reading the book to children, I’ve seen how important it is for them to see themselves in the stories — even if it isn’t about their culture. The ability to see yourself in the story, at any age, is just so powerful. 

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Teatime Around the World, and Soup’s On Around the World are available at your local bookstores, or online.